Dallas Labor Fights for Schools

It is fitting that a major forum on Texas school problems took place in a union hall. All progressives are concerned about education, and labor is the center of the progressive movement. The Alliance/AFT school employees’ union and its allies organized “The State of Our Schools” on September 29 at the Communications Workers’ hall at 1408 N Washington in Dallas. Their coalition, “Our Communities, Our Schools,” is a broad group of concerned organizations and individuals. The coalition’s first big project was to overcome a well-financed effort to privatize the Dallas Independent School District. The September 29 meeting was largely concerned with the deplorable state of Texas school finance.

Cuts and more cuts

Ted Raab of the Texas Federation of Teachers pointed out that the $5.3 billion cuts to public education perpetrated by the state legislature in 2011 has only been partially restored. Raab said that per-pupil expenditures adjusted for inflation have been falling since 2003. Funding for children with disabilities is particularly scandalous, Raab said. The Alliance to Reclaim Our Schools says that federal standards for  children with disabilities are not being met.

Taxation is unfair

Ted Raab pointed out that the state’s sales taxes are mostly levied against goods that are sold, but services are largely untaxed. Most of the state’s production is in services, not goods, Raab said. Commercial property owners are given a number of advantages over ordinary home owners. For example, they can go to considerable legal expense to get their taxes reduced, then bill the state for the attorney fees! Also, they do not have to disclose property sale prices. Eleanor Chavez added that the Dallas District lost $295 million because of commercial property tax reductions.

Rabb said that the legislature has been steadily pressuring local school districts to fund education through their local property taxes. Even though the constitution makes education a state responsibility, the legislature has reduced their percentage of funding to 38%, while local districts have to pay 62%!

Texas uses a “Robin Hood” method that is nominally supposed to level out educational expenses between rich and poor districts. Tax money is “recaptured” from wealthier districts. But, according to Dallas School Trustee Joyce Foreman, that recaptured money is not given to other school districts. Instead, it goes into the legislature’s general fund! Politicians can then spend recaptured money on any of their other priorities while continuing to starve the school districts.

Foreman said that she is opposing a property tax increase in Dallas Independent School District because it puts such a burden on local homeowners and renters and because she feels that a considerable part of the money raised will be shipped back to the legislature’s general fund.

Texas tax money goes to privatization schemes

Trustee Joyce Foreman said that there is a vicious cycle undermining our public schools. When Texas tax money is diverted to charter schools, they take a certain number of students out of the public schools. Public schools then get reduced funds because their average daily attendance has fallen. The more money that goes to charter schools, the fewer dollars are left for public education!

Lori Kirkpatrick, who emceed the meeting, said that the “recapture” payment is $2.8 billion, but charter schools are getting $2.7 billion. She said, ““We will continue to send more money to recapture and making our problem worse while funding what’s causing the problem!”

Less affluent people pay more

Property taxes are regressive. In other words, they fall much more heavily on people who are least able to pay. Eleanor Chavez revealed that “People in poverty are spending over 12% of their income on local and state taxes. If you are rich, you are spending 2.9%!”

George Rangel of the Dallas union, Alliance/AFT, talked about mistreatment of school employees. What the wealthy people call “reform” is “deform” for school employees. Merit pay, for example, may encourage a few teachers, but it discourages everyone else. Rangel said that teachers aren’t even allowed to be sure what their pay will be.

A teacher in the audience decried the effect: “Teachers are leaving” from her school, she said. A social worker in the audience said, “Kids are dying in Texas!” She said that children go to psychiatric facilities because of the stresses in the testing (not teaching) system.

Who is responsible?

The people undermining our schools are among the state’s most wealthy. The Alliance to Reclaim our Schools charges John Arnold, a former hedge fund manager; Tim Dunn with the Texas Public Policy Foundation and Empower Texans; Stand for Children Texas; Todd Williams of Dallas Kids First; and Texas Aspires. None of these organizations and individuals state their purpose as undermining public education, but all of them do.

One of their pet projects is to privatize the Teachers Retirement System (TRS). Lori Kirkpatrick said, “They want to see TRS implode. That big ball of money is something they want to get their hands on!”

Why?

Wealthy people worldwide try to privatize all public services so they can generate profits. A good example is private, for-profit prisons. Another good example is charter and private schools. Wealthy people have already greatly reduced their tax burden, but they would like to do away with it altogether. Wealthy people do not rely on public schools for their own children, and they don’t want to pay for anyone else’s.

What can we do?

The fightback is political. During the upcoming legislative session, school employees will be going to Austin to lobby legislators. The more people they can bring, the bigger effect they can have. Alliance/AFT organizes buses every year on the first day of spring break, and they encourage everyone to come along.

Our Communities, Our Schools encourages us to demand these solutions:

• Reduce class size by hiring more teachers
• Hire librarians, school counselors, social workers and nurses and every school to meet our students’ needs
• Ensure racial equity for all students
• Provide supports and resources to students who are struggling academically
• Provide desperately needed services to students with special needs

Delna Bryan, who organizes for the National Education Association affiliate in Dallas, made an eloquent plea for everyone to vote. So did a number of other speakers, because political action is critical. State legislators are running for office now. Three Dallas school board trustees will be elected in May.

The Communications Director for the Texas labor federation, Ed Sills, keeps everyone informed of new developments and opportunities. Write him at ed@texasaflcio.org to get on his free mailing list. Stay in touch with Our Communities, Our Schools, Box 4791 Dallas 75208, www.facebook.com/OCOSDallas. Check out further information at www.reclaimourschools.org.