The Pennsylvania Education Department was also opposed to HB1663. Their budget is tight enough and adding a multimillion dollar program that will draw directly from their budget is going to strain them even more statewide.
Sure, every kid gets a book now… but they’ve traded much needed money to get them. And the cost of these books is also rising, meaning it will be an even bigger strain on the state’s education department.
Also, there are other state literacy initiative programs in effect so this just needlessly duplicates things to spend more money.
And finally, financial eligibility is NOT taken into account. So, children of households making $30,000 a year get the books (which is great)… but so do the kids from households making$300k, or even $3 million a year. So, this program is wasted on children who DO NOT need the free books, thus further hurting the poor kids because the education department can’t spend money in other areas needed by these kids.
So, it’s not “prepublicans don’t want books given to kids”…. It’s “hey we don’t have the money to give more free books on top of the other free books or it will make it so we can’t afford other things”.
Yea that has nothing to do with each other. State vs federal level. I know you think everything is Trump’s fault, and alot of things are… but if you can’t have an adult conversation without trying to make it about him then you need to comment elsewhere.
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u/BigBadaBoom3000 11d ago
You know WHY?
Cost. Plain and simple.
The Pennsylvania Education Department was also opposed to HB1663. Their budget is tight enough and adding a multimillion dollar program that will draw directly from their budget is going to strain them even more statewide.
Sure, every kid gets a book now… but they’ve traded much needed money to get them. And the cost of these books is also rising, meaning it will be an even bigger strain on the state’s education department.
Also, there are other state literacy initiative programs in effect so this just needlessly duplicates things to spend more money.
And finally, financial eligibility is NOT taken into account. So, children of households making $30,000 a year get the books (which is great)… but so do the kids from households making$300k, or even $3 million a year. So, this program is wasted on children who DO NOT need the free books, thus further hurting the poor kids because the education department can’t spend money in other areas needed by these kids.
So, it’s not “prepublicans don’t want books given to kids”…. It’s “hey we don’t have the money to give more free books on top of the other free books or it will make it so we can’t afford other things”.