It's interesting to see Jules' and my messages placed in juxtaposition to one another, suggesting that we are on opposite sides of the K-12 budget issue. Our votes were different, but our messages are the same. Jules is right on target in everything he says about why sending more money to schools is a smart investment. The K-12 budget that we passed is inadequate and will require that local school budgets, which have already been cut to the bone, will need to be slashed further. We need to keep fighting to get more money to schools, at the same time that we need to get more money to colleges, universities, and human services. That's why he and I both signed on to the bills to take more money out of the reserves as soon as we can. You'll be hearing more about them over the next few weeks, and I hope that Blue Oregon readers will flood their representatives with messages of support.

I have problems with any level of funding for the existing educational system. It’s outdated and second-rate, and not just for lack of adequate funding. At no additional costs it could be sending high school students to study abroad. It’s not. It could be, like Utah, mainstreaming foreign language immersion programs (especially more Mandarin). It’s not. It could have online learning opportunities that expand student learning options, reduce costs, and provide a platform for a proficiency based educational system. It doesn’t. The legislature could be implementing such changes and more. It’s not. It can’t even find $30,000 for a pilot program to send five Oregon high school students to China for the school year 2012-13. So exactly why should any, or more, of my state or local tax dollars go for this educational system. Why shouldn’t I hold out for something better?

Yes, of course, we need to invest much more in education. But show me the changes first!

Sorry if I was unclear; this is not an either/or. The operative phrase is "as soon as we can." What I meant was that we should dip further into the reserves as soon as we can do so with confidence that the reserves won't be needed just to get us through the current economic downturn. In May we'll be getting our next revenue forecast from the state economist. It's the big one, the one that's generally used in order to build the next biennial budget.

We're hoping that the forecast will show positive signs that we can safely take additional money from the Education Stability Fund and the Rainy Day Fund for education and other needed services, as the two bills call for. I believe that it would be premature to do so before the forecast but am hoping that we can do so before this legislative session comes to an end in June. That's what I meant by "as soon as we can."

For a Republican-controlled Legislature that voted to increase taxes and fees by $2 billion two years ago, the bipartisan boos over Gov. Rick Scott's proposed spending cuts might not be too surprising.

But the teeth-gnashing and hand-wringing continued this morning as a panel of Senate K-12 budget writers took their turn picking apart Scott's proposal to spend 10 percent less on public school students this year.

Sen. Evelyn Lynn, R-Ormond Beach, cast doubt on Scott's suggestion to plug some of the hole with stimulus money districts were given to spend for the current school year.

The reality no one is arguing with so far is that, with or without Scott's recommendation, lawmakers will have to plug a tax shortfall of at least $3.6 billion in the upcoming budget. Simmons has indicated that a cut to school spending is possible, if not likely.

Andy