Kingwood Texas Resident Letter To State Rep Dan Huberty On His Decimation Of Our Schools

Charlotte H. Coffelt
Kingwood, TX 77345

June 24, 2011

The Honorable Dan Huberty
Member, Texas House of Representatives
4501 Magnolia Cove, Ste. 201
Kingwood, TX 77345

Dear Representative Huberty:

With the 2011 legislative session drawing to a close, no doubt you’ll be hearing from many of your constituents regarding the net effect of your representation in the Texas Legislature. Yes, you’ve been recognized by Texas Monthly magazine for being the “rookie of the session” because of your ability to work with at least one Democrat “in hopes that someday the era of Washington-style partisan gridlock in the Texas House will come to an end”. But, from this individual’s viewpoint, your devotion to Grover Norquist’s mantra of no more revenue for any purpose—even to help pull our public schools out of the financial hole they’re in—has made it very plain that you deny the damage that the final financial bill has caused public schools across Texas. Before your recent service as a state legislator, I feel quite sure that you were acutely aware of the fact that earlier legislatures and Governor Perry authorized a property tax cut that was not matched by the means to recoup the lost dollars through a new business tax, resulting in the financial hole Texas government is in. Your determination to support a budget which continues the pretense of school reform by denying state funds to our public schools is not what your local constituents will support.

Having served two terms on a public school board of trustees myself a generation ago (Spring ISD in the 1970s), I can distinctly compare what the level of state financial support by the state of Texas means to a local public school district—in one generation, the level of financial support from the state of Texas has decreased from 2/3 of local public school budgets to the paltry 1/3 that the state of Texas now contributes to local public schools. Although I firmly believe that the Texas Constitution requires the Texas Legislature to honor their commitment to fund our public schools, you would be hard pressed to justify what you’ve just voted for—a continual decrease in funding from the state of Texas for our public schools. I can’t wait to listen to you justify the wisdom of having forty students per class in our elementary grades.

I communicated with you earlier in the spring regarding my distain that you and Governor Perry believed that requiring a sonogram of young women who have chosen to conclude an unwanted pregnancy was the “emergency” that was facing the Texas Legislature. But, then, I readily admit that your priorities and mine are not the same. You were elected by your constituents because they believed that you were devoted to the cause of public education. The budget that you’ve just supported undermines that claim.

Sincerely,

Charlotte H. Coffelt

Cc: Dr. Guy Sconzo, superintendent of schools, Humble ISD