U.S. House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa convened a hearing today on the "tough choices" facing state governments. But instead of focusing on real solutions to state budget crunches, Issa invited Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker to tell members of Congress that attacking teachers, nurses, and other middle class workers is a good thing.
The hearing was not the inside the beltway coming out party that Walker planned. Cleveland Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich and Milwaukee's Congresswoman Gwen Moore made sure of that by taking Walker to task for scapegoating Wisconsin's public employees and stripping them of their rights while cutting taxes for the rich and corporations while raising them on the working poor.
Showing posts with label Congresswoman Gwen Moore. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Congresswoman Gwen Moore. Show all posts
Friday, April 15, 2011
Monday, November 8, 2010
NPR correspondent predicts defeat of for-profit college regulations
On Friday, Cokie Roberts, senior news analyst at NPR, predicted that Democratic lawmakers, in particular, will be reluctant to aggressively regulate for-profit colleges because of their ties to the Washington Post, one of the nation’s most powerful newspapers. The Washington Post Co. owns Kaplan University, among other for-profits.
“But I have to tell you, the biggest objection to [regulation] has come from the fact that The Washington Post would go out of business if Kaplan went out of business – yes, I see Peter Smith waiving,” Roberts said with a chuckle. “Because The Washington Post money all comes from Kaplan and the Democrats don’t want The Washington Post to go out of business, so I think there are a lot of forces militating against those rules at the moment.”
While the Post maintains the independence of its newsroom, its editorial page has argued against new rules such as the "gainful employment" regulation proposed by the U.S. Department of Education.
The gainful employment rule is a quality measure that restricts federal financial aid to those for-profits that have a student repayment rate of 45% or better in an effort to ensure that the education students pay for results in employment with adequate compensation.
Currently, many for-profit colleges such as Everest College, do not meet this standard. As a result, students who are frequently paying $20,000 to $70,000 for their educations graduate with debts they have no possibility of repaying.
Iowa Senator Tom Harkin and Milwaukee Congresswoman Gwen Moore are among those who support the gainful employment regulation
“But I have to tell you, the biggest objection to [regulation] has come from the fact that The Washington Post would go out of business if Kaplan went out of business – yes, I see Peter Smith waiving,” Roberts said with a chuckle. “Because The Washington Post money all comes from Kaplan and the Democrats don’t want The Washington Post to go out of business, so I think there are a lot of forces militating against those rules at the moment.”
While the Post maintains the independence of its newsroom, its editorial page has argued against new rules such as the "gainful employment" regulation proposed by the U.S. Department of Education.
The gainful employment rule is a quality measure that restricts federal financial aid to those for-profits that have a student repayment rate of 45% or better in an effort to ensure that the education students pay for results in employment with adequate compensation.
Currently, many for-profit colleges such as Everest College, do not meet this standard. As a result, students who are frequently paying $20,000 to $70,000 for their educations graduate with debts they have no possibility of repaying.
Iowa Senator Tom Harkin and Milwaukee Congresswoman Gwen Moore are among those who support the gainful employment regulation
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Wisconsin's unemployed need jobs!
The nation lost another 36,000 jobs last month bringing the total job loss to 8.4 million jobs since the recession began. More than 15 million Americans are officially unemployed!
Forty percent of the unemployed have been without work for more than six months. If we include those working part-time because they cannot find full-time employment and those who have given up looking for work (discouraged workers) 29 million (16.8%) are either unemployed or unemployed. And that's only part of the story.
We are short another 2.7 million jobs, positions that are needed to absorb the 100,000 workers entering the labor market every month.
Last week Republican Senator Jim Bunning, who lost his fastball years ago, held up 100,000 Americans' unemployment checks because he claimed to be concerned about the growing federal deficit.
And Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, the second-ranking Republican in the Senate, defended Bunning arguing unemployment relief “doesn’t create new jobs. In fact, if anything, continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work.”
There are more than six unemployed workers for every job opening and the number of long- term unemployed is greater than at any time since the Great Depression. Yet Kyl feigns concern that extending unemployment benefits discourages people from working. This is truly amazing!
Republicans like Bunning and Wisconsin's own Paul Ryan, and moderate Democrats helped create the nation's river of red ink by supporting President Bush's $1.8 trillion high income tax cuts and the trillion dollar invasion of Iraq. Now they in the name of fiscal responsibility they want to ignore the more pressing 11.1 million jobs deficit. To fill that hole, while keeping up with a growing work force, requires the creation of more than 400,000 new jobs a month for three years — wildly in excess of even the most optimistic projections.
America's working people and their families are hurting and no one in Washington DC or Madison seem to be listening.
Congress is working on a very modest bill that will provide tax credits, at best an ineffective form of stimulus, to businesses that hire new workers. But as Milwaukee's Congresswoman Gwen Moore said when she voted against the bill:
I’ve talked with employers and small business owners in Milwaukee, and they resoundingly told me that the tax credits in this bill will not help them hire new people. What they need are customers – customers with money to spend. And customers need jobs.
Job creating legislation needs to be targeted to areas with persistent unemployment like we have in Milwaukee, and I’ve been advocating to make sure that we focus on the areas that need it most. This bill does exactly the opposite.
I am working with my colleagues to make sure that no one forgets about the folks in communities where unemployment is more than double the national average.
A jobs bill needs to actually create jobs.
The nation needs a real jobs bill that includes an extension of unemployment benefits which account for only 0.07% of the GDP and direct aid to state and local governments. Extending unemployment benefits is not only the right thing to do for people who are unemployed through not fault of their own, but it is one of the best forms of economic stimulus because the money will be immediately spent. Without increased federal aid to the states and local governments, they will be forced to slash their spending and lay-off even more workers, including firefighters, police officers, other first responders and teachers, further depressing consumption and private sector growth driven by government purchases.
The Wisconsin Legislature has also done very little to address the state's job gap. At a minimum it ought to help low-wage and part-time workers by passing an increase in the state's minimum wage which it has been sitting on for over a year.
A jobs bill should, as Moore said, create jobs. There is important work that needs to be done in this country, rebuilding the deteriorating infrastructure of roads, bridges, levees, parks, urban water system, and schools, and there are unemployed workers who want to work! Public investments like these would not only put people back to work, but lay the basis for long term economic growth. What are our elected officials waiting for?
When politicians say they are focused on jobs, jobs, jobs they should mean more than their own.
Forty percent of the unemployed have been without work for more than six months. If we include those working part-time because they cannot find full-time employment and those who have given up looking for work (discouraged workers) 29 million (16.8%) are either unemployed or unemployed. And that's only part of the story.
We are short another 2.7 million jobs, positions that are needed to absorb the 100,000 workers entering the labor market every month.
Last week Republican Senator Jim Bunning, who lost his fastball years ago, held up 100,000 Americans' unemployment checks because he claimed to be concerned about the growing federal deficit.
And Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, the second-ranking Republican in the Senate, defended Bunning arguing unemployment relief “doesn’t create new jobs. In fact, if anything, continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work.”
There are more than six unemployed workers for every job opening and the number of long- term unemployed is greater than at any time since the Great Depression. Yet Kyl feigns concern that extending unemployment benefits discourages people from working. This is truly amazing!
Republicans like Bunning and Wisconsin's own Paul Ryan, and moderate Democrats helped create the nation's river of red ink by supporting President Bush's $1.8 trillion high income tax cuts and the trillion dollar invasion of Iraq. Now they in the name of fiscal responsibility they want to ignore the more pressing 11.1 million jobs deficit. To fill that hole, while keeping up with a growing work force, requires the creation of more than 400,000 new jobs a month for three years — wildly in excess of even the most optimistic projections.
America's working people and their families are hurting and no one in Washington DC or Madison seem to be listening.
Congress is working on a very modest bill that will provide tax credits, at best an ineffective form of stimulus, to businesses that hire new workers. But as Milwaukee's Congresswoman Gwen Moore said when she voted against the bill:
I’ve talked with employers and small business owners in Milwaukee, and they resoundingly told me that the tax credits in this bill will not help them hire new people. What they need are customers – customers with money to spend. And customers need jobs.
Job creating legislation needs to be targeted to areas with persistent unemployment like we have in Milwaukee, and I’ve been advocating to make sure that we focus on the areas that need it most. This bill does exactly the opposite.
I am working with my colleagues to make sure that no one forgets about the folks in communities where unemployment is more than double the national average.
A jobs bill needs to actually create jobs.
The nation needs a real jobs bill that includes an extension of unemployment benefits which account for only 0.07% of the GDP and direct aid to state and local governments. Extending unemployment benefits is not only the right thing to do for people who are unemployed through not fault of their own, but it is one of the best forms of economic stimulus because the money will be immediately spent. Without increased federal aid to the states and local governments, they will be forced to slash their spending and lay-off even more workers, including firefighters, police officers, other first responders and teachers, further depressing consumption and private sector growth driven by government purchases.
The Wisconsin Legislature has also done very little to address the state's job gap. At a minimum it ought to help low-wage and part-time workers by passing an increase in the state's minimum wage which it has been sitting on for over a year.
A jobs bill should, as Moore said, create jobs. There is important work that needs to be done in this country, rebuilding the deteriorating infrastructure of roads, bridges, levees, parks, urban water system, and schools, and there are unemployed workers who want to work! Public investments like these would not only put people back to work, but lay the basis for long term economic growth. What are our elected officials waiting for?
When politicians say they are focused on jobs, jobs, jobs they should mean more than their own.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Congresswoman Moore challenges Governor on MPS
Earlier this week Gov. Jim Doyle reiterated his support for a mayoral takeover of the Milwaukee public schools.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel which continues to blur the line between reporting and editorializing began its initial coverage: “Jim Doyle said Monday the state must give control of Milwaukee schools to the mayor to put in a 'good faith' application for federal economic stimulus funds.”
Wispolitics was more measured when it wrote: “Doyle hedged on whether mayoral control of the MPS will be part of the application, though he continued to voice support from the governance change.”
Doyle's position contradicts that of the Obama administration.
In a letter to Congresswoman Gwen Moore, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan acknowledged that dismantling elected school boards was not a Race to the Top requirement. He wrote: Although we have not yet released the final priorities and criteria for Race to the Top, mayoral control was not a criteria included in the proposed priorities...."
According to the Journal Sentinel: “Doyle said the education reforms he and Evers are advocating would require the steady push only a mayor can provide. Otherwise, school policy could "vacillate from year to year" with changes on the School Board…”
That’s a particularly interesting observation since Mayor Barrett is actively considering a run for Governor, hardly a recipe for continuity.
It also contradicts the argument that mayoral run school districts are more accountable to the public than elected school boards because of higher voter turn-out. By acknowledging that the mayor of Milwaukee is as close to a life-time position (continuity is assured) as one can find, Doyle undermines the electoral accountability argument.
Today in a letter to the editor Congresswoman Gwen Moore challenged the Governor’s position. She wrote:
“… Doyle's contention that mayoral control of the Milwaukee schools is critical to receiving these Recovery Act funds is inconsistent with multiple assurances I have received from Secretary of Education Arne Duncan that mayoral control of MPS is not a prerequisite to Wisconsin receiving Race to the Top funds (Page 1A, Oct. 20).
In a letter dated Oct. 7, Secretary Duncan wrote, 'Mayoral control of the public schools was not a criterion included in the proposed priorities (for Race to the Top funding) that were released for public comment in July.'
I agree that the Milwaukee schools face serious challenges - the achievement gap and 69% graduation rate among them. But I have yet to see evidence that placing the School Board under any mayor's control will magically erase the problems that have long plagued our public schools.
To wrongly suggest that the badly needed Race to the Top funds will not be awarded to Wisconsin unless Milwaukee wrests control away from a democratically elected School Board and hands it over to the mayor is unfair. And wrong on the facts.
To advocate for mayoral control of the Milwaukee schools is one thing; to suggest that not making the switch will restrict Wisconsin's access to a pot of money is simply untrue."
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel which continues to blur the line between reporting and editorializing began its initial coverage: “Jim Doyle said Monday the state must give control of Milwaukee schools to the mayor to put in a 'good faith' application for federal economic stimulus funds.”
Wispolitics was more measured when it wrote: “Doyle hedged on whether mayoral control of the MPS will be part of the application, though he continued to voice support from the governance change.”
Doyle's position contradicts that of the Obama administration.
In a letter to Congresswoman Gwen Moore, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan acknowledged that dismantling elected school boards was not a Race to the Top requirement. He wrote: Although we have not yet released the final priorities and criteria for Race to the Top, mayoral control was not a criteria included in the proposed priorities...."
According to the Journal Sentinel: “Doyle said the education reforms he and Evers are advocating would require the steady push only a mayor can provide. Otherwise, school policy could "vacillate from year to year" with changes on the School Board…”
That’s a particularly interesting observation since Mayor Barrett is actively considering a run for Governor, hardly a recipe for continuity.
It also contradicts the argument that mayoral run school districts are more accountable to the public than elected school boards because of higher voter turn-out. By acknowledging that the mayor of Milwaukee is as close to a life-time position (continuity is assured) as one can find, Doyle undermines the electoral accountability argument.
Today in a letter to the editor Congresswoman Gwen Moore challenged the Governor’s position. She wrote:
“… Doyle's contention that mayoral control of the Milwaukee schools is critical to receiving these Recovery Act funds is inconsistent with multiple assurances I have received from Secretary of Education Arne Duncan that mayoral control of MPS is not a prerequisite to Wisconsin receiving Race to the Top funds (Page 1A, Oct. 20).
In a letter dated Oct. 7, Secretary Duncan wrote, 'Mayoral control of the public schools was not a criterion included in the proposed priorities (for Race to the Top funding) that were released for public comment in July.'
I agree that the Milwaukee schools face serious challenges - the achievement gap and 69% graduation rate among them. But I have yet to see evidence that placing the School Board under any mayor's control will magically erase the problems that have long plagued our public schools.
To wrongly suggest that the badly needed Race to the Top funds will not be awarded to Wisconsin unless Milwaukee wrests control away from a democratically elected School Board and hands it over to the mayor is unfair. And wrong on the facts.
To advocate for mayoral control of the Milwaukee schools is one thing; to suggest that not making the switch will restrict Wisconsin's access to a pot of money is simply untrue."
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Congresswoman Moore: mayoral control won't help MPS
Milwaukee Congresswoman Gwen Moore has an excellent op ed in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Crossroads section.
She writes:
There's no question that the Milwaukee Public Schools district has challenges to overcome; not a person in this debate would argue otherwise. But MPS's achievement gap and a 69% graduation rate are borne of our city's vicious cycles of poverty, joblessness, skyrocketing teen pregnancy rates and the perverted public policies that send millions of Milwaukee's state education dollars to the suburbs.
I wish a simple change of governance could fix these challenges. But I have yet to see evidence that placing the board under the mayor's control - any mayor's - is a magic wand that will eviscerate the achievement gap, which has been caused by factors well outside the control of the elected School Board.
The entire article is linked here.
She writes:
There's no question that the Milwaukee Public Schools district has challenges to overcome; not a person in this debate would argue otherwise. But MPS's achievement gap and a 69% graduation rate are borne of our city's vicious cycles of poverty, joblessness, skyrocketing teen pregnancy rates and the perverted public policies that send millions of Milwaukee's state education dollars to the suburbs.
I wish a simple change of governance could fix these challenges. But I have yet to see evidence that placing the board under the mayor's control - any mayor's - is a magic wand that will eviscerate the achievement gap, which has been caused by factors well outside the control of the elected School Board.
The entire article is linked here.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Moore questions proposal to dismantle MPS board
Congresswoman Gwen Moore (D-Wisc.) issued the following statement about the future of Milwaukee Public Schools:
I’m glad that so much public attention is being focused on Milwaukee Public Schools, but I’ve yet to see evidence that changing the way that the school board is chosen will somehow wave a magic wand and fix the challenges our education system faces. It’s no secret that we need to see improvement within MPS – but we overcome those obstacles by working together, not by tearing each other down.
We will not rectify the challenges facing MPS unless we talk about poverty, teen pregnancy and the perverted policy initiatives that have exacerbated this problem for our city’s public schools. MPS is working with a flawed state funding formula that sends our public dollars to private schools outside of the city. Many of our students live in serious poverty, yet according to the Education Trust, Wisconsin spends $1,118 LESS per student in districts like ours than it does in the rest of the state. How are our kids supposed to concentrate on algebra when their stomachs are rumbling? How do we expect them to earn a diploma when too many school-aged kids are having kids themselves? And how do our teachers increase classroom achievement when we also ask them to play school nurse, counselor, and gym and art instructor?
I fully believe that the Governor and the Mayor have the best intentions for MPS; however, I have yet to hear a credible explanation of how these difficult challenges get fixed by simply changing the way that our school board is chosen.
I’m glad that so much public attention is being focused on Milwaukee Public Schools, but I’ve yet to see evidence that changing the way that the school board is chosen will somehow wave a magic wand and fix the challenges our education system faces. It’s no secret that we need to see improvement within MPS – but we overcome those obstacles by working together, not by tearing each other down.
We will not rectify the challenges facing MPS unless we talk about poverty, teen pregnancy and the perverted policy initiatives that have exacerbated this problem for our city’s public schools. MPS is working with a flawed state funding formula that sends our public dollars to private schools outside of the city. Many of our students live in serious poverty, yet according to the Education Trust, Wisconsin spends $1,118 LESS per student in districts like ours than it does in the rest of the state. How are our kids supposed to concentrate on algebra when their stomachs are rumbling? How do we expect them to earn a diploma when too many school-aged kids are having kids themselves? And how do our teachers increase classroom achievement when we also ask them to play school nurse, counselor, and gym and art instructor?
I fully believe that the Governor and the Mayor have the best intentions for MPS; however, I have yet to hear a credible explanation of how these difficult challenges get fixed by simply changing the way that our school board is chosen.
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