2012 PA 93rd Issues Short List

Posted on January 26, 2012 by Linda Small

I am entering the race for the Pennsylvania 93rd State House District. Here is the press release:

NEW FREEDOM – Democrat Linda Small of New Freedom announces her candidacy for Pennsylvania’s 93rdState House District.   Despite theconfusion caused by the changing district lines, the issues stay the same.  Here is what Small says we must do to help the 93rd district and Pennsylvania prosper:

“Cut corrupting corporate money from politics. Let small business and renewable energy companies create jobs. Invest in our children. Restore state funding for education and lower property taxes.  Get real about global warming, because we are damning our children to a future of dustbowls, heat waves and flooding rains. “

Small, 51, retired as a Navy Master Chief Petty Officer (E-9) weather forecaster. “With my weather forecasting experience, I see that global warming is following the worst case projections. In 40 years the US southwest will be a dustbowl if we don’t act. It will be harder to grow and harvest food, among many severe consequences. Acting now creates jobs in renewable energy and conservation, helps the economy, and cuts pollution from fossil fuels.”

Small strongly believes that Harrisburg is making harmful budget cuts that will cost taxpayers far more in the future. Studies show that investing in education pays huge dividends down the road. The state funding share for education must go back to 50%, taking the burden for funding education off of local homeowners and property taxes.

Corporate influence over lawmakers stifles the free market by producing rules that favor large corporations over small businesses. Pennsylvania must end special treatment for corporations, and allow small businesses to compete in a true free market and create jobs.

Small is aware that highlighting global warming is rare in the political discussion. However, she believes that the only reason to run for office is to make a difference. Global warming is the most important challenge of our time, and corrupting corporate money in politics is the only reason we are not acting to meet it.

She is not accepting money to run for office. She will answer to only the voters if she is elected. She has a website, www.smallforstaterepresentative.com, which links to Facebook and Twitter so that voters may learn about her.

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Property Rights, Constitutional Rights and the Average Homeowner vs. Corporations

Posted on January 22, 2012 by Linda Small

When the average homeowner is forced to protect their property rights against corporations the bar is very high as they fight against high-priced lawyers. When the government becomes a protector of the corporation, as PA DEP has, homeowners have a very hard time protecting their constitutional right to clean water. The homeowners of Dimock featured in this article have a right to the clean water they started with.    EPA Water Deliveries Arrive in Dimock One has to wonder what constitutional rights really mean in PA if they can be ignored and thwarted for this long.  What is a property right if a corporation can use their vast resources against a homeowner who has been harmed by the corporation’s actions?

The fact that the EPA is acting now is good, but its a great example of government bureaucracy coming in late. Homeowners have been asking for help for years. Water testing is expensive, especially when one doesn’t know exactly what to test for. The average homeowner doesn’t have that kind of money.

The state and federal government must start testing wells before, during and after drilling. Relying on corporations with strong motives to deny any problems puts our citiziens at risk.

PA should have a strong Marcellus Shale tax. Taxpayers should not have to pay for testing, nor for the time of our court system where the corporation will seek every advantage and delay.  PA also needs to stop any new wells until the industry proves it can drill the wells it has now safely. Homeowners should not have to find themselves without clean water and fighting billion dollar corporations for their property rights, and a PA DEP entralled with Marcellus Shale corporations for their right under the Pennslvania constitution to clean water.

Cabot would have us believe that all of these homeowners water wells went bad coincidentally, for natural reasons. They are using the classic denier tactic, perfected by the tobacco industry and used by corporate polluting interests to this day, of saying the EPA doesn’t understand the science, or there’s not enough science. Meanwhile, the state DEP has not been rigorously testing wells, as it should have all along. That would have protected Cabot, by the way, if Cabot had been blameless.  It certainly would have helped the citizens DEP is supposed to be serving.

It is time PA government remembers that it exists to serve real people, especially those who don’t have the power to protect themselves against the huge corporate money machines of the Marcellus Shale gas drillers.  It is way past time a fair Marcellus Shale tax is imposed on the drillers, who are harming Pennslvanians every day despite their pious protests to the contrary.  It is time to put an end to Marcellus Shale corporations drilling new gas wells until they can prove they can do so safely.  It is time to take the burden off of homeowners living in rural Pennylvania to protect their property rights and the clean water they had before the Marcellus Shale gas drillers fracked their land and their lives.

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Speaking of trying to fight corporate money… PA Marcellus Shale Lobbyist Disclosure Some daunting numbers on the money these corporations have to throw at our legislators.  Average people can’t buy the access the drillers have.  That needs to stop.

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Damning Our Children to a Bleak Future

Posted on January 12, 2012 by Linda Small

Picture of Our Changing Ocean by Joan Kohorst

This is immoral. 10 Marine Species on the Brink of Mass Extinction Due to Ocean Acidification

We know how to stop it. We know going all out to conservation and renewable energy creates jobs, stops our dollars going to foreign countries, cleans up pollution that literally kills tens of thousands of people each year. Yet we tolerate it because our fossil fuel corporations want to profit from every last drop of oil and gas.

Along with the devastating forecast for global warming, we are ensuring that by 2050, less than 40 years from now, we and our children will face a much more hostile world.  It will be harder to find food.  The food we are used to getting from the ocean will be gone or dying.  The food we used to grow with ease will be much harder to get as drought and flooding rains cause havoc.  Science of Global Warming Impacts

Where are our politicians?  Where are the parents?  One reason I write this blog is in hopes of helping to spark the outcry that causes action to head off the worst of the crisis we are causing.

97% of scientists are telling us human caused global warming is happening, and its effects are many and scary.  It is ludicrous to take the risk we are taking with our and our children’s future.

Let’s get going on a renewable energy plan right now.  It will, quite simply, be a lifeline for our children.

More information:

The Real Debt We are Passing to the Next Generation

The Great Oyster Crash

 

 

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Redistricting Leads to Special Election in York County

Posted on January 7, 2012 by Linda Small

I was a Navy weather forecaster for most of my career, and I retired intending to spend time in my garden and find a nice place to volunteer.  I never expected to run for political office.  Yet here I am, running again.  How did this happen?  The way I see it, a funny thing happened during my 27 years with the Navy.  Politics, and politicians. went crazy.  Corrupting corporate money seeped into the process and twisted our politics so much that logic, history and science are ignored in favor of narrow ideology and naked corporate interest.

I have a niece and nephew.  They, and I’m guessing you, can’t afford their own lobbyists.  I owe it to them, and you,  to try to fix the mess that’s been created.

I am going to ignore political conventional wisdom to follow the polls and the corporate money interests.  I will highlight the most important political issue of our time, one that is affecting us now and will be vividly evident in less than 40 years.   We are putting our children into a very difficult positon.  Parents should be outraged at the risk we are taking with their future well being.  Global warming is real, getting worse, and its more than just hot summers.  My experience as a Navy weather forecaster showed me the importance of looking at the data, and the global warming forecast is sobering.

Global warming and ocean acidification are not only happening, but they are happening more quickly than forecast, and they follow the WORST CASE SCENARIO.  Global warming isn’t just warmer temperatures.  Global warming is a new Amercan dustbowl in just 40 years, and it’s starting in Texas right now.  Global warming is flooding rains at times, like York County and Glen Rock saw last year.  Global warming will make it harder to grow food.  Global warming makes the economy more uncertain, as we have to recover from more extreme weather disasters.  Check out this link and decide for yourself if we have the right to take even a small risk that this will not happen.  An Illustrated Guide to the Science of Global Warming Impacts: How We Know Inaction Is the Gravest Threat Humanity Faces

This must be part of our political discussion.

The details are not yet final, but the picture is getting more clear. Redistricting moved the 169th district to York County. There will be a special election and a regular election for the seat. The special election will be to fill out the term until the winner of the regular November 2012 is seated as usual next year. So the special election will go on at the same time as the usual election preparations go on.

As the details are set, I’ll update you.  I look forward to meeting the people of the 169th and working to make a difference!

Here’s a newspaper article with more information on the election.  2 Dems join special election race for 169th District

Here is the new list of municipalities in each district.  http://aws.redistricting.state.pa.us/Redistricting/Resources/GISData/Districts/Legislative/House/2011-Final/PDF/2011-Final-Plan-House.pdf

More on ocean acidification here:  The Real Debt We Are Passing to the Next Generation

 

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Addressing Symptoms and Ignoring Causes- Air Quality Alert

Posted on December 14, 2011 by Linda Small

There is an Air Quality alert today, Dec. 13, 2011 for York and other counties in the Susquehanna valley. The alert is great, but it reveals a glaring problem with how we deal with our polluted air. The alert addresses the symptoms. It doesn’t address the cause: air pollution. It doesn’t ask people to even think about changing their activities for the day to avoid pollution which contributes to the problem. Are we so in thrall to oil and gas corporations that we can’t ask people to avoid driving if at all possible today? To keep the leaf blower in the garage? Is King Coal so strong we can’t ask folks to conserve electricity until the air is clear?

We say we care about people in America. We say that nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our children. We say that we value our senior citizens. Yet what we do is the opposite. Poor air quality is something we create. We have the technology to create clean energy, or better yet, to conserve so we don’t have to use any energy. We choose not to do so. People suffer.

One very logical outcome of PA’s Marcellus Shale fracking gas rush will be more air compressors and air pollution. Other shale areas have seen their air quality worsen to the levels of Los Angeles.   EPA considering new air-quality rules for fracking sites

PA will have more poor air quality days if we don’t allow clean renewables like solar and wind a level playing field.

The cost of renewables is falling quickly. Technology to store renewable energy is getting closer. PA needs to drop it’s $2.9 billion in fossil fuel subsidies right now.   PennFuture Report Shows Dirty Fuels Get $2.9 Billion Per Year in Subsidies in Pennsylvania

The Pennsylvania constitution gives us the right to clean air. It is past time we honor that right and clear the air for everyone.

PA Constitution Article 1 Sec 27 from PA DCNR website quoted below:

Article I, section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution provides as
follows:

Sec. 27. Natural Resources and the Public Estate

The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of
the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment.
Pennsylvania’s public natural resources are the common property of all the
people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the
Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the
people.

This amendment, which was adopted in 1972, encompasses two basic principles.
First, Pennsylvanians have a right to a decent environment, and second,
Pennsylvania government has a trusteeship responsibility to protect that
environment on behalf of future generations.

 

 

 

The statute that creates the Department of Conservation and Natural
Resources, as well as the statutes that the Department is charged with
administering, implement this amendment.

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Death for $. Conservatives sell their souls, our health and economy.

Posted on September 24, 2011 by Linda Small

It boggles my mind how “conservatives” embrace pollution and ignore its health effects. They embrace the 150+ year old fossil fuel industry over the economy, conservative free market principles, and most importantly, the health of real people, babies included. Other than corporate dollars, I can’t explain it. I can, however, encourage everyone to work very hard to make sure the corporatists don’t succeed in taking away protections which have worked for over 40 years. The latest example is the GOP controlled House passage of the “TRAIN” act, which allows corporations to use business models which pollute without regard to the consequences.  If you haven’t seen the news, here is a link:  TRAIN Act To Limit Clean Air Protection Passes The House

How many deaths per job/dollar will we accept? We have technology available to avoid these deaths.  With this bill, the House ignores the economic return of clean technology and healthy Americans.  As for the deaths we know will occur, I suppose we can invoke Scrooge’s observation that they best do it quickly.    The US Senate will likely stop this bill, and the President has vowed to veto it.  Luckily, we won’t see this pass this year.

I don’t say this lightly, but conservatives have sold their souls.  They worship corporate power and money over everything else.  Here is a Union of Concerned Scientists look at the actual costs to babies health and in $:  TRAIN Act Colossal Waste of Money One highlight:  “Not only are EPA regulations critical to protect our health, but multiple cost benefit analyses have shown them to be incredibly cost effective. In its most recent annual report to Congress, the Office of Management and Budget concluded that the benefits of major EPA regulations far exceeded their costs. Between October 1, 2000 and September 30, 2010 estimated total annual benefits ranged from $82 to $551 billion, while costs ranged from $23 to $29 billion.”

I find the logic, morality and math of not allowing corporations (or anyone else, for that matter) to spew health-harming pollution at will into our neighborhoods compelling.  A “conservative” does not agree.

Here is one conservative view, which apparently comes from the alternate reality world, where there are no health consequences to pollution.  Any job is a good job, and the economic benefits to society of clean technology are outweighed by the perceived costs to fossil fuel providers:  http://www.freedomworks.org/blog/mkibbe/key-vote-yes-on-train-act

Rep. Todd Platts (R) PA-19 voted for CORPORATE interests over our health and the economy.  If we continue to elect him and folks like him, this law will pass, and real people will suffer. Here is a link to the vote:  http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2011/roll741.xml

We need to find some way to pull “conservatives” away from the corporate dollars and back to working for “WE, the people.”  We need to take science seriously, and not pitch it aside when it clashes with the narrow greed of the few.   We should lose fossil fuel jobs to renewable energy jobs- both from a free market and a public health perspective.  It’s time the fossil fuel folks get cut free from government and taxpayer support and pay their share.  That includes paying to stop the pollution they are spewing onto you and your family.

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Cold Beer…Compliments of Renewable Energy

Posted on August 23, 2011 by Linda Small

Neat story featuring a favorite subject for many Americans: Cold beer.

Read/watch here:  Sun Keeps Beer Cold

Now that this critical component of our energy needs has been addressed by renewable energy, hopefully it will be better accepted by those who have resisted it. The business owner expects an 8 year payback on his system. Looks like better odds than many Wall St. investments these days. Plus, consumers get to pick up a cold one at any time.

Cheaper Beer with Solar?

With zero energy costs after 8 years, maybe the beer prices will be lower, too.   Lots of wins are possible with renewable energy!

GOP wants expensive energy…and beer too

PA Gov. Corbett and many Republicans distinctly dislike renewables, however, and want PA consumers to get their energy from Marcellus Shale gas.  (Corbett quietly turning off the lights on renewable energy )  Here’s the problem I see with that concept.  Besides the known air pollution problems, health effects ( Wyoming Air Pollution Worse Than Los Angeles Due To Gas Drilling ) and potential water pollution, with Marcellus Shale gas Pennsylvanians will have to keep paying the corporations until the last bit of gas is taken from the ground, and then find another energy source to pay for.   Citizens will have to pay for the health problems caused by the drilling, which sadly are getting swept out of view while the Marcellus PR machine fights for the industry.  On the plus side for some politicians, but on the negative for our government, the gas $ translate into healthy campaign donations.

Solar Beer the Better Choice

So, all things considered, from an economic, environmental and democratic standpoint, solar and wind look better for Pennsylvania all the time.

Something to consider over your solar powered cold beer.

 

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Budget Cuts for Children Who Are Victims of Sexual Abuse and More.

Posted on May 16, 2011 by Linda Small

Pennsylvania budget proposals by the Governor and House Republicans put children last. The budgets feature:

Cuts for therapy for children who have been sexually assaulted. Cuts in education. Cuts to health care clinics which serve the poor. Cuts for neonatal and obstetrics services.

Tax breaks for Marcellus Shale gas drilling companies like Exxon-Mobil, Halliburton and Chevron. Tax breaks so that ¾ of PA corporations don’t pay any Corporate Net Income Tax. Tax breaks for smokeless tobacco and cigars.

Republican politicians won’t use $506 million in surplus tax revenue received this year and a $189 million legislative “surplus.” They won’t stop a $3 million automatic cost of living raise for Harrisburg politicians. They won’t take these and other funds on hand to provide essential services for the next budget. The Republicans are committed to a new vision of government, and cutting services for children and families fits right in.

The priority of the budget is to enact their ideology, even on the backs of children. House Republicans restore some money for education over the governor’s budget, but at the expense of critical health and human services. It’s not the economy and available revenue driving the cuts, that’s clear from their refusal to budge from their magic budget number despite a better revenue picture. Both Gov Corbett and House Republicans want to set aside the extra $1 billion dollars available next year for a “rainy day.”

Does that make sense? The PA budget must be balanced each year. If revenues for their future budget come up short, the Gov and legislature will have to…raise revenue, use the rainy day fund or cut the budget. Yet they happily choose to cut the budget right now, disgracefully including cutting services for victims of sexual abuse and education. If the Governor and legislature are correct, and the economy grows as a result of the giveaways to corporations and severe cuts eliminating services and teacher’s jobs, then PA won’t need a rainy day fund. The rainy day fund is only needed as a hedge against an unintended economic bust as the middle class and poor are squeezed, and as the true long term costs of the short-sighted budget cuts become obvious. Cutting things like health clinics, insurance for working families, and help for abused kids will haunt PA taxpayers in the coming years.

A budget balanced at the expense of children rips off the Republican fig leaf of lean revenues forcing tough budget choices. The budget also sacrifices women, the elderly, disabled and poor. Services to help people remain in their homes and out of nursing homes are cut. Emergency shelter for the homeless, cut. These cuts are never acceptable, but they are shameful when one looks at the resources PA has to help and who the budget showers with taxpayer money and breaks.

The Republicans choose cuts for help for abused kids over using nearly $1 billion in extra funds in hand. They choose cuts over fair taxes for the Marcellus Shale drilling corporations like Exxon-Mobil and Halliburton, which the corporations pay in every other state they drill in. They choose cuts over taking away a loophole the lets ¾ of PA corporations avoid the Corporate Net Income Tax. They choose cuts for help for abused kids in favor of building A RAINY DAY FUND war chest.

That’s an extreme ideology to enact. It’s a failed economic policy, these cuts won’t save money, taxpayers will pay more in the future as these cuts lets problems fester and get worse, costing more in the long run. Rather than a small government ideology, they’re enacting a corporate government ideology. Corporations are the only ones who benefit from these budget choices, and only in the short term. In the long term, a less educated, less healthy workforce with less buying power will hurt PA. Let us hope that PA wakes up before it walks too far down this road.

If PA truly values children, if it values families, if it values the middle class, then the Republican budget proposals will be changed to reflect a much more balanced approach. Services to help children who have suffered sexual abuse must be increased, rather than threatened. Full day kindergarten funding, as well as most of the 50% cut in higher education will be restored. Health care clinic funding will be increased, and obstetric and neonatal services will be saved. Corporations will pay a fair share. Most importantly, a budget reflecting the best of PA will not put children last. Children will be first. That isn’t a tough choice, it’s the only choice.

Less for Pa. shelters, hospitals in latest plan

Preserve state funding for human services by Bev Mackereth

 

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Women’s Right to Medically Safe Abortions Under Assault

Posted on May 8, 2011 by Linda Small

     The assault on a woman’s right to a medically safe abortion by Harrisburg and Washington Republicans intensifies.  A bill to make medically safe abortions virtually impossible in PA by changing requirements for facilities will be voted on in the PA House on Monday.  The bill takes advantage of the terrible Gosnell case.  By expanding excessive regulation to all of the safe clinics with proven track records, abortion opponents hope to end medically safe abortions without having to have a debate on the merits.  The Philadelphia DA’s office points out the overreach in the bill.  “The central message of the Grand Jury was that abortion facilities should be treated the same as other medical providers when it comes to licensure as ambulatory surgical facilities. Just as not all plastic surgeons’ offices have to be licensed as ambulatory surgical facilities, not all abortion providers should automatically have to be licensed as such.”1    The bill holds medical abortion care providing facilities to higher standards than other facilities doing certain types of surgical care.   No medical abortion providing clinic in PA meets those standards, thus putting access to medically safe abortions at risk if the bill becomes law.2  York County Reps. Saylor, Miller, Grove, Tallman and Perry cosponsored this back-door regulatory attack on safe medical access for women. 

     When medically safe abortions are not available, women will still have abortions, just at greater risk.  No matter what the circumstances of her pregnancy, a woman won’t have a place to go under the bill.  Are we going to pretend that rape is a blessing now, and a woman must accept any pregnancy that results?  Do we really want to send women back to the days of back alleys and coat hangers?  Is it your place, my place, or the government’s place to tell a mother with children that she must die rather than have an abortion to save her life?  

     Medically safe abortion opponents are apparently so certain of their view that a fetus is worth more than the mother’s life that they are willing to go to any length, except for being honest that they are trying to eliminate a woman’s right to control her own future.   In Washington, HR 3 puts a new tax on health insurance which covers abortion care.  It famously will allow IRS agents to question a woman on whether she was raped or a victim of incest to ensure she doesn’t use tax credits or deductions to pay for an abortion outside of the rape/incest rules.  HR 3 discourages insurance coverage even for a woman needing an abortion to preserve her health or her life.   Congressman Platts voted for HR3 along with every Republican present to let government abortion opponents dictate these restrictions to a woman’s abortion rights.    

     All of this is fascinating when considering the companion Republican moves to shred the social safety net for Americans.   Maybe they can allow a rape/incest exception for a child born under those circumstances to keep access to food supplement programs when the mother or adoptive families can’t afford to properly feed the baby.  Maybe Republicans can bend on their disdain for providing health care for those who can’t afford it for the unplanned children of sexual assault.  That truly would be the least Republicans can do to shoulder the responsibility they bear as they enact their agenda. 

     Ironically, family planning is also under Republican attack.  Access to contraception clearly helps prevent unintended pregnancies, and thus clearly helps prevent abortions.   This makes clear that their agenda isn’t just about abortion.

     So, the next time a Republican talks about death panels, or the government getting between you and your doctor, or about how burdensome regulation is, or how they will never increase taxes, don’t believe them.   Republicans are taking purposeful steps toward an extreme agenda, where women are subordinate to their government’s enforced pregnancy mandate.  No matter what the circumstance, no matter what the threat to one’s well-being, health or life, a woman will have no options.  Her biology is her destiny; the whims of men determine her fate. 

     Fathers and mothers should not have to have their daughter put in danger by the government’s elimination of medically safe abortions.  A husband should not have to lose his wife because the government decided to favor an extreme no abortion agenda over what he, his wife and doctor determine is best for his family.  It is time to protect our women’s rights, and push back on this move to take away medically safe abortions.

     The extreme agenda to eliminate medically safe abortions ignores that women who find they are pregnant under intolerable circumstances will then seek out unsafe abortions, and many will die as a result.  This is an extreme anti-life agenda for women, when all is said and done.  Let’s stop pushing women into the back alleys and allow them to stand up and make the right decision for themselves.   

1.  District Attorney\’s Letter on HB 574

2.  From Planned Parenthood Pennsylvania Advocates email May 6, 2011

For example – abortion is already the most heavily regulated medical procedures in Pennsylvania. But HB 574 would require costly, unnecessary changes to facilities; the most telling example are the significant structural changes to existing facilities, ?like tripling the size of a procedure room. None of the existing facilities in the state can comply with those regulations today.

Opponents of reproductive rights are pushing the bill to pass because it is the first step toward eliminating access to legal abortion in Pennsylvania and we need just a minute of your help to stop it. Regulation of abortion should keep women safe, not put safe providers out of business!

Planned Parenthood Statement on HR 3 passing US House

House GOP Unanimously Passes Anti-Abortion Bill

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Saving Money Can Be Costly

Posted on May 2, 2011 by Linda Small

     The Dallastown school district voted to change from a district run food service, which breaks even, to a privately provided food service. (News aritcles linked below.)  That is a mistake. School board members are not paid, and have been given a difficult job to run the district with an outdated state funding formula and unsupportive state government. Until the state takes its constitutional obligation to education seriously, our dysfunctional school funding system will drive bad decisions like this.
     If the purpose of government becomes to save money or even make money, we are in trouble. For business and government, the mission drives programs. Saving money is not a mission, it’s only one part of what should happen as business or government goals are met. In the case of a school district, providing a quality education to children and caring for them during the school day is the mission. But our current economic situation is causing us to lose sight of that, changing it to balancing the budget, or not raising taxes while using a foolishly expansive definition of what raising a tax means.
     Most people will agree that paying the least the least for something is not always best. The danger for America is that lately we are making “least cost” the only measure of success, and confusing privately provided with most effective. We must look at what is the best value, and when that is the measure, government services are quite often the best for citizens.
     In the case of education, the workers in the schools impact the children every day. There is great value in having a stable, respected pool of employees in the schools that are dedicated to helping the children succeed. Having quality food service contributes to the overall school mission. Paying a fair wage for work is an important part of what the district should be doing not just for the children, but for the community. The new food service contract takes these things away and more.
     The school district currently breaks even on the food service. The superintendent says a meal cost hike would be required to stay that way. The new private contract will pay the district $977,000 over 5 years and keep school lunch prices the same over that time. The district will have to buy computers for the company at a cost of $20,000 to 30,000 dollars. The superintendent sees it as a “no-brainer.” Is it really?
     One way the company will manage to cut costs is a significant slash to wages. Wages for the food service workers lower to the minimum wage of $7.50 up to $9.50, down from the current average wage of $13.08. Simply put, that does not reflect the value of their work. For a school district to make money on the backs of employees is unethical, and will likely be short lived. If our society succeeds in driving down wages for all, government revenues will fall. The “extra” money it seems that the district is being given will be balanced by a loss of revenue from working citizens. There is no free lunch!
     Privatizing will likely narrow the food service mission to providing cheap food with cheap labor. The contract will have to be very specific on benchmarks for quality food and results to avoid that pitfall. If the district is not careful on where the “savings” come from, it could lead to lower quality food, which is very costly in future health outcomes. (Overweight, diabetes, poor nutrition.)
     It is interesting that the company promised a payment to the district for 5 years for the right to contract. Government simply should not operate this way. It should be illegal, it looks like a bribe. What will happen after 5 years, when the district will not have a food program to be in competition? Will costs rise, and by how much?
     One of the disturbing trends in today’s politics is “leaders” telling us that they have tough decisions to make in letting people go or cutting their wages, while they themselves are well paid with great benefits. This is undemocratic, and as noted before, a path to starving the government of tax revenue as the workforce pay spirals to the bottom. Starving the government is a common political philosophy for some. Their goal is to eliminate government services or replace them with private ones on the grounds that this is better. A starved government ignores how America’s economy and people have been stronger for public schools and services through history. If we value public education and good government, other districts will reject this model and Dallastown will go back to taking its rightful role by providing food service as soon as it can.

York Daily Record/York Sunday News Article on Outsourcing

York Dispatch article on outsourcing

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