Need Plan B on city schools

I recently went to City Council to speak about the devastating effects the School Reform Commission's "Doomsday" budget would have on my two children's education at Meredith Elementary School in Queen Village.

To make up for a budget shortfall of $303 million, the SRC requested $60 million in additional funding from the city, $120 million from the state, and $123 million in union givebacks.

Even though I arrived an hour early, the person in front of me in line was the last person let into the Council hearing. I was told I could wait and possibly be let in as others left. I waited.

Two and a half hours later, I finally was allowed in and took my seat in the row of speakers. After the speaker who had been sitting next to me finished, I approached the podium. I stated my name and where I lived, and began my pre-written words.

Council President Darrell Clarke cut me off. I was not on the list of speakers, so I could not speak. I protested that I had followed the exact procedure Council staff had told me. Clarke responded by lecturing me and everyone in the room (who started chanting, "Let him speak") about decorum, procedure, and wasting time with repetitive comments. Peppered amid his remarks, which lasted much longer than I would have spoken, were pleas for everyone to understand that Council had done everything it could to help the schools.

However, what Council did on its last day before its summer recess was insufficient. It pledged to collect an additional $28 million in delinquent taxes and passed a cigarette tax that would raise an additional $45 million. That sounds great - $73 million is more than the requested $60 million - but the cigarette tax relied on the state legislature's approval. Parents and school advocates preferred an increase in the city's use-and-occupancy tax, which would raise $32 million without the need for Harrisburg's approval.

Clarke refused to allow a vote on the use-and-occupancy tax. Instead, in the media, he tried to reassure parents. He said he was optimistic that Harrisburg would help, and that a use-and-occupancy tax increase would discourage the state from doing so. He also assured us that Council would have a "Plan B" if Harrisburg didn't come through.

It's time for Plan B.

The cigarette tax is dead. In its place, Harrisburg allowed the city to borrow $50 million on a continued increase in the city sales tax, allocated a $45 million refund from the federal government to city schools, and increased its own contribution by just $2 million. Along with the city's slightly increased $30 million estimated from increased tax collection, that brings the combined government contribution to $127 million, about 70 percent of the SRC's request from government.

The schools cannot function with this insufficient amount of money. The state House, not usually overly generous with Philadelphia, understands this and met in a rare recess session last week to hammer out the kinks in the state plan. The overall state plan is inadequate, but Harrisburg at least showed the urgency needed to tackle this problem.

Our City Council? The one that recessed in June without voting on the one tax proposal it could implement on its own? The Council that actually represents Philadelphia parents? The Council whose president assured us its plan would work? The Council that wouldn't let a father speak about his sons' education because its president had heard enough?

Advocates have called on Council to call a special summer session to address school funding. But all we've heard in response is that Clarke inexplicably still hopes that anti-tax-increase Harrisburg approves the cigarette tax. Otherwise, silence. While the Republicans in Harrisburg came back from their recess to help us, our city representatives are doing nothing for the schools.

President Clarke, City Council must act. It's time for Plan B.