Texas Should Have The Right To Manage It's Own Money

In an article on the Austin American Statesman, Terra Smith writes about a major problem Representative Lloyd Dogget had with the way Texas was spending it's budget, and how he thought it should've been spent.  Apparently, Texas had approved an increase in overall education spending by $3.25 trillion.  While most people would just be happy that education spending was increasing at all, Dogget was not satisfied, because rather than seeing Texas spend more money out of an ever increasing deficit, he wanted the new funds for education to come out of the "rainy day" fund that Texas has saved for just what the title suggests.  Dogget has actually prevented Texas from getting $831 million from the federal government after Congress passed a bill in 2010 specifically for the funding of education.  The author goes on to talk about how Dogetts approach was wrong because Texas did nothing out of line and how the matter will be resolved in 1 of 3 ways: "Congress may repeal the restriction; Texas legislators might pass a budget that satisfies Doggett's requirement; or Texas will not receive the $831 million it deserves."  In my opinion, the article is kind of confusing because it seems to switch between Texas congress and United States Congress without clarification between transitions.  It is an important matter though.  I would much rather the federal government go "in the hole'' a little in order for the states to not have to touch into a "rainy day" fund if they have one.  Those funds are needed for days like when Katrina struck or natural disasters like this past winter posed to the North East Coast.  That way the federal government will raise taxes, just like usual, and everyone will have to pay their fair share, not Texans having to replace $3.25 trillion into the "rainy day" fund that we just spent and need to save again.

What's going on with A.I.S.D.

An article titled "Time for Austin school chief to level with us," on the Statesman website, published by their editorial board encompasses the hard times facing the teachers within the Austin, and presumably the surrounding areas.  Looking past the the obvious lay-offs, teachers are now having to face the decision to either take a lump sum of about $10,000 and forfeit their eligibility for unemployment benefits, or to wait until they are out of a job to file for unemployment which will pay approximately the same amount.  I'm a 23 year old kid, and after i got out of the Marine Corps I was on unemployment and know from experience that it is IMPOSSIBLE to sustain a household on that income alone.  If a 23 year old with next to no bills cannot stay afloat financially on unemployment, how can they expect someone raising a family to do so?Also the article talks about the A.I.S.D.'s allowances for things such as car stipends and bonuses for employees.  Now, I was under the assumption that teachers were employees of the city and, if anything, board members should be driving cars supplied by the city, not creating spending where spending can afford to be cut to keep teachers in the classroom.  I agree with the authors of this article because if the A.I.S.D. is in such a financial bind, then the public, who also pay their salaries, deserves to be told where their money is going as well as an explanation of how they plan on getting over this hurdle.

Sen. Watson Proposes Budget Reforms

Today Sen. Watson proposed budget reforms that would stop access collections in various departments once 110% of fees were collected.  This means that if the annual fees needed to fund driver's licenses was $10,000, once the state reached $11,000 then they would stop collecting the fees.  But how would this work?  The article didn't reveal the details of this budget reform just that it was proposed.  But it leaves me wondering how exactly the state would go about putting it into action.  Would the state take the average revenue of a certain department and drop the cost per person to average out to 110%, or would the first people who pay the 110% renewing their driver's licenses, license plates, etc. be the only ones who have to pay those fees while everyone else gets a break the rest of the year?  I would like to know how the state plans to implement this proposed budget reform.