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Highlands Today

State Teachers Union President Calls For Sales Tax Increase

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By MARC VALERO | Highlands Today

Published: October 17, 2008

SEBRING - Saying that public education cannot endure another year of budget cuts, Florida Education Association (FEA) President Andy Ford on Friday proposed a short-term increase in the state's sales tax, dedicated to all levels of public schools.

Speaking at the FEA's annual Delegate Assembly in Tampa, Ford noted that public schools had undergone drastic cuts over the last two school years and that the temporary sales tax increase would tide public schools over until the state economy improved.

Ford proposed raising Florida's sales tax by a penny for three years.

"This will immediately inject $3.5 billion into the state's public schools the first year and will act as the financial lifeline our children need," he said. "We need to make this investment today so that when the economy improves and funding levels return to normal, we can be proud that we didn't sacrifice our students on the altar of supposed fiscal responsibility."

Highlands County School Board Chairman J. Ned Hancock said the state needs revenue, but it's not a good time to be increasing taxes.

"I would need to see specifically what they would do with that penny [sales tax] for three years," he said.

Every time the state puts new money in education it's offset by money that is taken out of the education budget, Hancock noted. It's kind of like the lottery - they took money out of the general revenue side and took it away from education.

"In this case, I would be very skeptical right now the way things are," Hancock said. "I think they can do some things for education by making it an extremely high priority."

He would prefer to let the counties collect an additional half-cent in sales tax for education as opposed to a state-wide increase, Hancock said.

Ford noted that in the best of times, public education in Florida was severely underfinanced in comparison with other states and that the past two budgets had made the situation far worse.

"We know that Florida's tax structure is broken," Ford said, noting that though this is not a high-tax state, the tax structure burdens some Floridians far more than others.

Marc Valero can be reached at 863-386-5826 or mvalero@highlandstoday.com

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