| Camille Townsend for Palo Alto Schools |  |
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| Camille Townsend for Palo Alto Schools | |
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| February 1, 2003 164 HANDWRITTEN NOTES: GOV. DAVIS' PLAN TO DIVERT LOCAL TAX DOLLARS SPURS LETTER-WRITING CAMPAIGN SHARON NOGUCHI, Mercury News E-mail and message
groups helped resurrect an old-fashioned tradition Friday, as dozens of
Palo Alto parents gathered to hand-write personalized letters to protest
the governor's proposed education cuts.
''Please reconsider, don't undermine some of the best schools in the
state,'' said Hiromi Kelty, a parent of second- and third-graders at
Addison School, in summing up her letter. |
| ''Parents are very
upset,'' said Camille Townsend, co-director of legislation
for the Palo Alto PTA Council, who organized Friday morning's
''write-in'' at Cafe La Dolce Vita on California Avenue. She had
mentioned her idea to friends, and word spread quickly via e-mail.
Letter writers dropped in after taking children to school.
The gist of the 164 letters was to object to the diversion of local property taxes to the state, as well as to protest the proposed level of statewide cuts to education to help close a budget deficit Gov. Gray Davis estimates at $34.6 billion over 18 months. The governor's proposal, if adopted by the Legislature, would hit Palo Alto schools particularly hard. The school district would not only absorb the 6 percent across-the-board cuts that may be imposed statewide but also stand to lose $18 million more -- totaling one-fifth of its budget. California funds each school district based on a complicated formula that sets a revenue limit, or per-pupil amount of basic funding. Some tax-wealthy districts, such as Palo Alto, Sequoia and Fremont Union high school districts, reap more in local property taxes than their revenue limit. The state has allowed them to keep that amount. Davis proposes that the state take it away. In Palo Alto, the proposed cuts range from 22 percent to 28 percent of the total district budget, said trustee Mandy Lowell. Parents are upset, she said, because many bought homes in Palo Alto for the schools, and often sacrificed the extra bedroom or larger yard they could have had elsewhere in order to afford the city's expensive real estate. Not all the letter writers on Friday were parents of school-age children. Mary Carlstead's youngest child graduated from Palo Alto High School in 1983. ''I want these children to have what other generations had,'' she said. ''I'm passionate about this school district.'' |