Recap: 2006 General Assembly and Scorecard
How did your legislators vote in the 2006 General Assembly? Did they support pension improvement? Where were they on school funding? Get the answers from MSTA's 2006 Legislative Scorecard.
Click here to download the scorecard.
2006 in brief …
It may have seemed that MSTA was all about the Push for Pensions campaign last year, but there were plenty of other issues of interest to Local Associations and MSTA. Take a look at the roundup on some of last year's important education issues:
Thornton Funding
Former Governor Ehrlich provided none of the required allocations of the Geographic Cost of Education Index (GCEI), a critical component of the Thornton legislation. The GCEI recognizes the higher costs of living and working in 13 designated counties, which serve 86 percent of Maryland 's students. There were several bills in the General Assembly that would have required Gov. Ehrlich to begin funding the GCEI in 2008 to the tune of $72 million. None of the bills passed the General Assembly.
School Construction
Last year, as in the past, Gov. Ehrlich proposed less than the recommended funding for school construction, including only $157 million of the $250 million minimum recommended by the Maryland Task Force to Study Public School Facilities. The legislature acted to add the additional $93 million to reach the amount recommended.
This year, Gov. Ehrlich proposed $281 million. The legislature increased the amount to $322 million. The figure is still less than the $400 million recommended by the Maryland Association of Counties to make up for Gov. Ehrlich's repeated funding shortfalls for construction, renovation and modernization of Maryland schools.
Charter schools
MSTA supported bills in the House and Senate which aimed to prohibit public charter schools from seeking waivers from current charter school laws that safeguard, among other basic employee rights, the right to representation in a collective bargaining unit.
