Texas, Our Texas

 They aren’t hiding it anymore:

Wow. Republicans in the Texas Senate just gave initial passage to a school voucher bill that will take ~half a billion dollars~ out of public schools in just two years. 

Funding would be siphoned to religious schools and private schools with no criteria whatsoever.

At all:

The Senate also gave final passage to Senate Bill 2, also authored by Creighton, which would infuse $5.2 billion into school districts to help them with teacher raises and rising costs. 

The bill would raise the basic allotment — the base amount of money schools get per student — from $6,160 to $6,235. This money is used to pay for the day-to-day operations of a district and can be used to increase teacher salaries. It also includes more money for schools to spend of security upgrades. The bill also includes a one-time pay bonus for teachers. Those in districts with less than 5,000 students would receive a $10,000 payment while those in districts with more than 5,000 students would receive a $3,000 payment. 

Abbott said Thursday at a parental rights event hosted by the conservative think tank Texas Public Policy Foundation that once the education savings account proposal clears both chambers, he would then add teacher pay raises to the special session agenda. He also said he has a team working with House Republicans on a voucher proposal that currently stands at 181 pages. In Texas, the governor dictates what can and can’t be legislated during a special session. 

“I want to make sure we provide a carrot to make sure this legislation gets passed,” Abbott said of vouchers.

To recap: Texas has a $30 billion surplus, $10 billion of which is from school taxes. Districts asked for a minimum increase of $1000 per student. The Texas Comptroller (an elected official) said the state could afford it, because: surplus. And it would allow districts to keep up with inflation.

The Senate bill offers an increase per student of $75.00. That is not a typo. And that’s what Abbott considers a “carrot.”

The local school district is closing campuses and consolidating schools in order to lay off staff and faculty and cut the expense of operating schools. The Board is meeting almost weekly to deal with this. The school board clown whose campaign literature I’ve shared here is making no mention of this, and seems to be running in approval of what’s happening to public schools in Texas.

I expect the House to send this voucher bill back to the Senate and Governor wrapped in newspaper as a message. And tell the Senate in the funding bill to put that carrot where the moon don’t shine.

Texas government is as dysfunctional as the U. S. House; and for the same reasons. Whether voters figure out what the problem is, is still an open question.

But the odds are not good.