From:
Cam Gordon
Date:
Oct 11 15:43 UTC
Short link
One of the things that happens at the City Council is that you actually have
elected officials looking carefully at geographic disparities in the City, and
most specifically in terms of how many resources are going to the area of the
city that they represent. We do listen to one another, seek out information
about the entire City (as well as region and state) and understand that all
areas of the City must succeed in order for each to succeed, but we also know
that we are there to be a special expert and advocate for our geographic area.
To do this we can gather data and make the case to one another about how to
allocate resources more fairly or evenly (and often do).
Wouldn't it be neat if we (on this list) could turn to the school board members
who represent the SW and the N areas and ask them to get us a breakdown of the
MPS investments made in their areas per person or per school age child?
Wouldn't it be helpful if we had one or more school board member(s) who didn't
depend on doing well in the voter rich SW area to get elected?
Cam Gordon
Seward
> Date: Sat, 11 Oct 2008 08:44:44 -0500> From: <email obscured>>
To: <email obscured>> Subject: Re: [Mpls] Yes on MTC buses for public
school students> CC: <email obscured>; <email obscured>> > > Doug
Mann writes:> >> > >There are serious> > >equity issues when property tax money
collected for the school system is> > used> > >to the benefit of residents in
the SW but not on the North Side.> >> > Steve Kotvis writes,> >> > Fact Check:
The above statement is false. Property tax money collected for> > the school
system is distributed equally across all schools and across all> > areas of the
city.> >> Anissa:> I would argue with how to define 'distributed equally' even
if it could be> said to be technically accurate, but it is absolutely an equity
issue when> there is as vast a disparity in the choices available to families
within the> different segments of the city, and no where is it more prounounced
than> between North and SW. There's kids all over the North side, our>
neighborhoods skew very young demographically, but all the families I know>
that I interact with regularly at community events and the like send their>
kids to private, charter or suburban schools. So many families in fact that>
you could fill (at least) a whole school with them, if one was available> that
began to approach to offerings of the standard fare in SW.> > I deeply believe
in and support public education, but I cannot sacrifice my> daughter over my
convictions, and we had to make our choices as a family> based on what will
enable her to succeed. Give us an MPS choice that can do> that, and she'll be
back. One of the problems at this point is there are> plenty of families who
want to return like us if given viable options, but> it is kind of a circular
thing. How do you bring the kids back without> some different options, but how
do you offer different options without the> kids? Honestly, if I saw the
commitment to change the options for North> Side families, I would be heartened
and fully supportive, but I still at> this point couldn't put the yoke of
blazing a new trail on my 11-year old.> It's got to be there first. We have
three more years before my youngest> starts school, and it is one of my
greatest hopes (seriously) that we can> find an MPS school for her. You can
claim to have equal inputs, but you> have to start at least playing in the same
ball park when it comes to equity> of results and end products.> > Anissa
Hollingshead> Hawthorne> > Anissa Hollingshead> > Info about Anissa
Hollingshead: http://forums.e-democracy.org/p/anissahollingshead> > This
topic's messages may be viewed at:
http://forums.e-democracy.org/r/topic/2bL4FfBOZxELclTjiCj9SK>
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