Letters To The Editor

IDAHO SCHOOLS AND EDUCATION

Tightfistedness is hurting kids

Some people still don’t get it. A 10 percent pay increase does not inspire most people to pack up and leave town. Working in an environment that has been shutting down slowly for 15 years is unbearable.

An employee who watches children suffer for lack of community support either becomes immune to their suffering, can’t get a job doing something else or stays with the suffering children and so deserves our community’s highest awards.

We can’t beat up the schools, employees and facilities and then be surprised that people apply for work elsewhere.

Those of you who pride yourselves in being “watchdogs” should spend your time watching the children. You may want programs and people cut, and this has happened and is happening. But don’t for one minute think these cuts aren’t hurting children and reducing their potential for success in life.

Every day that I have been on the school board I have been in violation of state and federal laws pertaining to providing the minimum required level of education. The state does not send enough money to abide by the laws and the community refuses to make up the difference.

The Bonner County Education Association may not think unsafe classrooms, overcrowded classrooms, lack of educational supplies, buildings without adequate fresh air, exits frozen shut, almost no technology, leaking roofs, boilers ready to explode, worn out buses, almost no money for curriculum development and teacher inservice, low waters, students who can’t read or write, etc., constitute a financial emergency, but I do. Bill Osmunson Sandpoint

Show kids, firms you’re committed

On Oct. 8, Post Falls residents will vote on a school bond for a new high school. This is a vote on the future of Post Falls.

With Post Falls in competition with other communities for high-paying technical and industrial companies, these companies look not only at land cost and availability of a work force, but at the total health of the community. They look for areas that, along with growth, demonstrate a commitment to providing services and educational opportunities.

There are people out there who will find reasons from the past to vote no on this school bond. The past, for me, has always been a tool to use to look back on my mistakes and to correct them. Make this school bond your opportunity to show the children of our community their future is far more important than any mistakes of the past.

A yes vote is for the children of Post Falls - and so much more. S.J. “Gus” Johnson Post Falls

Vote yes on Oct. 8

Post Falls residents, whether faced with the uncertainty of the Great Depression, a school fire in the ‘50s or overcrowding in the ‘70s, have met the challenges of providing facilities for each generation to learn.

Most of us have reaped the benefits of public education. With community support from senior citizens, young adults with no children in the schools, parents and teachers, with the passage of this measure, we will continue educational opportunity for future generations.

Once facilities are provided, it will be the responsibility of students, teachers and parents to ensure opportunities are used and appreciated.

Some of our great freedoms include voting and making our voices heard.

Exercise your right to vote.

Exercise your choice of action on local education issues.

Make your choice to improve education in Post Falls. Vote yes Oct. 8. Lew and Kim Brown Post Falls

Reject Post Falls school bond

Again, School District 273 taxpayers are being asked to dig deeper into their pockets to fund a new high school and sports facility. We are told again, as well, that a vote for the bond levy is a vote “for the kids,” with the implication that anyone who would vote against it is against education, children, or both.

By any measure, $18 million is a lot of money. What do we really get for that amount? The Post Falls Chamber of Commerce and many local businessmen contend that we are really investing in our, and our children’s, futures. They reason - and tell us ad nauseam - that good schools bring in more and bigger businesses, which in turn provide jobs. Unfortunately, there is no evidence of corporate migration to locales with high-ranking schools. There is no correlation whatsoever between having “quality” schools and having low unemployment or a high corporate tax base.

The real solution is to reject the extravagant bond levy being presented to us on October 8, and support instead the 1 percent property tax proposal and the Tax Credit bill. The 1 Percent Initiative will give property owners much-needed tax relief. The Tax Credit bill will give parents who relieve the public schools of the burden of educating their children a modest income tax rebate, which will in turn lessen the burden of the public schools a net $2,700 per child per year (not to mention alleviate the overcrowding).

To coin a phrase, “everyone wins” only by rejecting the Post Falls school bond levy and instead supporting the 1 Percent Initiative and Tax Credit bill. Anthony A. Ambrosetti Post Falls

This bond’s different; Pass it

Please vote yes on the Lakeland School bond Oct. 8. The $8.6 million will go to build a new combination junior-senior high school and add three new classrooms to Garwood Elementary. The advantages are:

Your taxes with the new bond in place for 1997 will actually decrease if you have a house with a market value of $125,000 (minus your homeowner’s exemption). Taxes on this home with existing bonds for 1996 are $164.25. In 1997, using the same $125,000 home minus the homeowner’s exemption, the taxes are $150, a reduction of $14.25. Why? The Lakeland district tax base has increased almost $95 million and spread the load over a larger area, reducing homeowners’ costs yet including the new bond.

This is excellent long range planning. It not only relieves crowding at existing facilities, it provides assurance we won’t need a new high school or junior high for eight to 10 years.

I know this because I’m the guy who led the opposition to the last Lakeland bond. This bond is totally different; it solves the problems.

I am chairman of Bond for Kids, a group of taxpayers/ patrons in Lakeland that believes in this bond. We encourage everyone to bond together and vote yes October 8. Please take the time to call me and I’ll tell you why I’m voting yes (208) 687-1597. Larry Clark, chairman, Bond for Kids Rathdrum

Don’t tax yourselves like Californians

I am going to vote no on the school bond issue. With so many new people moving into Post Falls, into new homes that provide new tax revenue for the school district, why do we continually need to raise additional tax revenue?

After the last failed attempt to pass this bond I recall the school administrators whining that the students may have to go to temporary modular classrooms. Heaven forbid. I guess it’s OK to live in a manufactured home but the idea that classes could be held in one apparently shocks the sensibilities of the big spenders of our tax dollars.

I moved to Idaho from California partly because California taxpayers are inundated with high taxes. Now I see the same thing happening here. We can’t afford to go down the same old, worn out and failed system of higher and higher taxes, of living beyond our means and being put on a guilt trip because we don’t build new multimillion-dollar schools Vote for common sense. Vote no on Oct. 8. Phil Bullington Post Falls

Post Falls needs better plan

Will persistence pay for the Post Falls School District when it holds an election for the third time for an $18 million bond for a new high school?

Rather than trying to force taxpayers to vote for something they have twice rejected, the district should follow the Lakeland School District’s example. It’s is offering a completely different plan at a reduced cost after its $9.5 million bond failed.

A 1989 facilities study committee for Post Falls recommended building a new junior high school. That committee also recommended completing site development at the high school, which would include general landscaping, student parking and athletic field development. They further noted that “In general, the high school facility is a source of community pride.”

Building a junior high school for grades 7-9 would be far less costly and would relieve crowding at the existing high school.

To save property owners, as well as renters, from increased taxes, the district should build a new junior high school and begin a year-round schedule in fall 1997 at Prairie View Elementary to relieve crowding in the lower grades.

I believe taxpayers should vote no on Oct. 8. Dee Lawless Post Falls

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Ease homeowners’ tax burden

I support the 1 Percent Initiative. We homeowners are being hit from every direction with increased property taxes. It is time to find a more equitable means of financing our schools. It is a shame that our schools are so poorly financed they can’t afford to fix a leaky roof. It is also a shame that the homeowner is expected to pay the tab.

Concerned Businesses of North Idaho oppose the initiative because it “would hurt business because income or sales or corporate taxes would have to be increased.”

That is exactly what should happen. Let everyone share in the cost of our schools. An article in The SpokesmanReview on Sept. 24 (“U.S. needs big reforms once again”) stated that in the 1950s, the corporate share of the total income tax was 39 percent. In the ‘90s it has dropped to 19 percent. It is time for a change. Vote yes on the 1 Percent Initiative. Joe Wright Hope

Humane Society’s position clear

In response to Theresa Potts’ Sept. 25 letter, “Humane Society should take stand on Proposition 2”: It did. The society supports Idaho Fish and Game management of Idaho wildlife. The Kootenai Humane Society understands (unlike Potts and I-CUB) that all wildlife management must remain in the control of Idaho Fish and Game for the betterment of all wildlife and the necessary control (using all available methods of harvest) of predators, bear, cougar, etc.

Everyone who understands the animal rights extremists’ desire to end all hunting, eliminate household pets and stop all animal-based agriculture will vote no on Proposition 2. Ed Lehman, chairman, Idaho Wildlife Council Laclede