Subscribe to Dollars & Sense magazine. Recent articles related to the financial crisis. Tax Cuts and the California Education CrisisFrom Peter Phillips, founder of Project Censored:The Higher Education Fiscal Crisis Protects the Wealthy Police are arresting and attacking student protesters on University of California (UC) campuses again. "Why did he beat me I wasn't doing anything," screamed a young Cal Berkeley women student over KPFA radio on Friday evening November 20. Students are protesting the 32% increase in tuition imposed by the UC regents in a time of severe state deficits. The Board of Regents claims that they have no choice. Students will now have to pay over $10,000 in tuition annually for a public university education that was free only a few decades ago. Labels: California, protests, Student protests, tax evasion, Tuition
Comments:
Phillips is right about the fact that our state needs some serious tax reform before we can break free from this downward economic spiral. It's been said many times that California doesn't have a revenue problem; It has a spending problem. Tax reform is important, but it's not the only remedy. We can start on local levels by encouraging our elected officials to spend our tax dollars wisely. I live in Los Angeles County, and we're seeing the process begin with our Board of Supervisors. Recently, they reissued an RFP for vendor services to operate the county’s GAIN case management services (a welfare-to-work program). I expect the same two companies will submit proposals as last year – Maximus Inc. and Policy Studies Inc. (PSI).
Maximus has maintained its contract with the county for many years now, but its cost to the taxpayers keeps skyrocketing. If the new bids resemble those from last year, we can expect that the Maximus bid will cost taxpayers almost a million dollars more than PSI’s. What’s more, Maximus has a track record of poor performance. Under its latest three year contract, Maximus has been cited repeatedly for failing to meet required goals in 5 of 8 categories (according to the LA Times). Last year, the Department of Public Social Services favored PSI based on scoring done on the two companies by a neutral third party. PSI scored 9,082 out of 9,616 possible points in the procurement process, whereas Maximus scored 7,824 of 9,616. PSI won by a 13% margin on technical score and also submitted the lowest bid, which was 6% cheaper. Even worse, Maximus has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to buy the support of the Board of Supervisors through lobbying and campaign donations. I, for one, am grateful that the BOS reissued the RFP and am confident they will select the right choice for LA. In these tough economic times, we need our local elected officials to scrutinize how every tax dollar is being spent and eliminate waste wherever possible. I hope we see a changing of the guard here very soon.
Students are aiming their anger at the wrong people. Blame instead the residents and politicians of California who refuse to raise taxes to balance the budget and instead sit by while the greatest higher education system ever (UC, CSU and community colleges) are destroyed. Students should be marching on Sacramento, not on Yudof and the Board of regents. Read more at blog.jimgogek.com
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