Let there be blog!

A good friend of mine has recently started a blog about this life and in turn, encouraged me to start writing again (Thanks Mike!). I had a few people ask me a while back why I stopped because they found my posts insightful, so I shall humor them once more with my ranting about the world around us, and maybe even throw in a few thoughts about my life into the mix.

For those that don't know, me and my wife are expecting our first little one this Thanksgiving, and we are super excited about it. Not sure of the gender yet, but we get to find out on July 2nd. Wife thinks it's a boy, and I think it's a girl, guess we shall see! I'll keep you guys informed.

Now on to my political subject that has been bothering me lately. Oklahoma Lottery and Education funding. This thing is complete and utter BS! Okay, maybe its not that bad, but it's still a big mess. For those that don't know, the lottery is split 45/35/20(%), which goes to Prize Money, Public Education, Administration respectively. 35% is quite a bit for public education, all those commercials the public sees says public education get all kinds of stuff with that money. Here's how it really works: Of the 35% public education gets from the lottery, 85% of that goes into the general education fund, essentially, where it gets lost. (The other 15% go to misc. education funds) The lottery money is combined with all the other tax money that public education gets, so we don't really know where the money goes, or who it goes to. There are estimates out there available, but again, these are just guesses. Here's where it gets messed up, since 2005, the funding for public education from the state has declined according to Sandy Garrett, it was 37.5% of the states total budget in 2005, and in 2008 it had declined to 35.5%. Consequently, they gave public education teachers a much needed $3,000/year salary increase in 2007, but decreased funding. So..increasing salaries, and decreasing funding...a 4th grader could figure out what's going to happen here. The money to pay the teachers had to come from somewhere, and guess where it came from! Your right, the lottery money. So...we are effectively taking the taxpayers money dedicated for education, allocating it to other parts of the state's needs, and letting the lottery (read: tax on the poor) pay our educators. That just seems like a bad idea to me.

What can be done? Well, let's indulge Mrs. Garrett with her request to separate the money from the lottery out of the general funds assigned by the state, so we can at least track it. Then maybe lets at least stop cutting funding (or heaven forbid, increase) from the Public Education system. And last, but not least, maybe investigate why we increased funding to Public Education, and now are having to lay educators off.

Sources: Urban Tulsa Newspaper, Oklahoma Lottery Numbers, Oklahoma Legislature, Oklahoma Lottery Commission