Education activists ask Council to hike school funding

AS CITY COUNCIL gaveled into session yesterday, a group of education activists gathered across the hallway to call on the lawmakers to increase funding for the School District of Philadelphia.

To make his point, Bright Hope Baptist pastor Kevin Johnson, representing the interfaith group POWER, quoted the prophet Hosea, who said, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge."

"Today our children are destroyed not just because of a lack of knowledge, but also because of a lack of funding," said Johnson, who earlier this year briefly flirted with running for mayor. "We will continue to apply the pressure on the governor and all of our state and elected officials. However, home must take care of home, and now it is time for the City Council to do what is needed."

Council can expect a lot of this in months to come, as advocates for increased education funding - seeing little hope in persuading Republican-controlled Harrisburg - are turning up the heat on local officials during the spring budget season.

Superintendent William Hite has called for $195 million in new funding from local sources: $120 million from a proposed extension of a city sales-tax hike, plus an additional $75 million from anywhere they can find.

Mayor Nutter, Council President Darrell Clarke and other local officials continue to point out that the city has stepped up to the plate by increasing taxes several times in the past few years, while new state resources have largely been absent.

"The reality is there's been a significant reduction in funding for schools, not only in Philadelphia but across the state, by the General Assembly," Clarke said yesterday. "For the last three years, we have in fact put revenues on the table, revenues that were asked [for by] the school district. But that money was not forthcoming from the state."

The primary issue before Council now is whether to permanently extend a 1 percent sales-tax increase (to 8 percent) that was set to expire this summer. The state last year authorized the city to do so, with $120 million going to the district and whatever's left - a much smaller amount that would grow over time - going to the pension fund.

Clarke took a stand against that arrangement last year and called on the state to allow a 50/50 split between school and pension funding.

Nutter last year pressed Council to pass the sales tax as is. But this year, he's siding with Clarke's strategy and calling on Harrisburg to act first.

Clarke and Nutter also want the state to approve a $2-per-pack tax on cigarettes that could give the district more than $80 million next year. Council approved the measure 16-0 last year, but it requires state authorization, which few Harrisburg observers believe will happen.