Vote no to more levies
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Editor,
We are shocked to learn that School District 23 in the Polson area is asking for four, count them, four, additional mill levies. These are to replace some existing ones that are about to expire. Vote no. This sounds negative, so let's be positive. A no vote is yes to lower taxes.
Get a clue. We are in a deep recession and there is no evidence of an economic recovery. Check out gas prices.
Government must learn to live within or even reduce spending. Make no mistake, this is not about the kids or quality education. It is about politics and the greed of the government school lobby to maintain their lofty position.
The state assessors have already made the tax situation unbearable by overly valuing property and the state legislature and governor have done virtually nothing to resolve this. Taxes will continue to increase anyway. We do not need more add-ons such as these levies.
The schools have a budget. Live within it like we all have to. There are ways to save. The extremely high salaries and numbers of administrators need to be examined. There are many other ways to cut spending like using more volunteers, which unions generally oppose. We could have 12-month schools and save on plant costs and we could cut down on bussing-many parents bring in their kids anyway and more could. They could be paid a small mileage amount which could total less than the costly bus fleet. We could have Job Corps and Vo Tech students do maintenance. Where there is a will there are ways. Spending more money is just the easy way out and is the wrong message for our kids.
Check your tax notices and see how much we already pay for education. Sixty-two percent of our real estate taxes go to education and with the new mill levies for the library, it will be even more. This means that all other county services, including law enforcement, survive on thirty eight percent.
It is proven that in the U.S. money does not buy better education. The schools have costly special elections as a sneaky way to force their agenda and if they don't get their way, they have another special election. Let's mobilize the silent majority and defeat these plans to confiscate more of our hard-earned and very limited incomes. These higher taxes do not just impact property owners, we all end up paying.
Frank and Mary Mutch
Polson
