Call to Action – A State Budget that Restores Funding to Social Services and Public Education
A couple of weeks ago, I was invited to a meeting of the Philadelphia Delegation of House of Representatives. Present were 22 House Representatives, Secretary of Education Edwin Rivera, Secretary of Human Services Ted Dallas, Mayor Michael Nutter, City Council Chair Darrell Clarke, SRC members, and School District of Philadelphia Superintendent Hite, among many others. The topics were the discussion of the state budget impasse and highlighting budgetary goals. In the audience were several social service providers from City and State levels. They included services for: child care/ foster care, food equality, juvenile justice, people with disabilities and different abilities, legal support, immigrant, poverty, homelessness, and education advocates. What is important is that these organizations provide essential services for many people who depend on them. This is an amazing group of organization led by extraordinary people who require state funding to continue to operate.
For all of the presentation, all of the difficulty with passing a realistic budget that supports public education and all of the social services, there still is been no observable progress. It has been 89 days since the budget should have been passed. Nearly three months – for organizations that typically have barely enough funding to cover their operating budgets. Government does not and cannot attempt to do the great work at: ARC, PCCY, SHARE, Education Voters, PILCOP, Congreso, and many others. We are now in a major crisis. Many of these organizations have drawn on credit lines to keep their services going, their employees working, and populations served. Those credit lines are dwindling. Their money is running out, fast. As the budget impasse continues, there will be higher and higher consequences which will likely include the closures similar to those during the 2009 budget impasse.
We were told of the political difficulties of moving a republican held legislature. We agree that representatives were “preaching to the choir”. We understand that it is critically important to ensure that government restore critical funding eliminated during the Corbett administration. What we did not hear was an effective Call to Action. Yes, we were told to contact our legislators… who happened to be many of the very same people in the room. We were asked to make alliances with service organizations in other counties, in the attempt to persuade their Call to Action – A State Budget that Restores Funding to Social Services and Public Education | Parents United for Public Education: