Local Officials Discuss Education, Immigration

Immigration, education and transportation were hot topics at the town hall meeting Tuesday night at that was organized by local state representatives and senators.

“We are in a fortunate position that we have the tax-base that we do and that we are able to adequately fund education in the system,” Atlanta Public Schools Board of Education District 3 Representative Cecily Harsch-Kinnane said.

Harsch-Kinnane along with City Council member Alex Wan, State Representative Kathy Ashe, State Senator Nan Orrock and State Senator Jason Carter spoke with the crowd of roughly 40 residents and updated them on the highlights from the legislative session, which ended last month. Wan and Harsch-Kinnane addressed specifics about the city of Atlanta and Atlanta Public Schools.

Harsch-Kinnane said Atlanta Public Schools is in “good financial order” because of strong planning within the system. She said the system is “reaping the benefits” of planning and can avoid drastic cuts that many school districts around the state and nation are facing.

The budget for next school year has yet to be officially approved, but it is expected to be around $578 million — a $10 million decrease from last year.

The proposed budget includes two furlough days for district employees and an increase in the number of students in each classroom.

“There’s just not a lot of ways that you can play with the budget of a school system without affecting what goes on in the classroom," Harsch-Kinnane said.

She said that roughly 80 percent of the system’s budget goes toward salaries.

Twenty percent of the money for Atlanta Public Schools comes from the state and 80 percent comes from local taxes, she said.

“I think we’ve done a good job of protecting things like that arts... school nurses, and those kind of things,” she said. “There’s only so long you can protect them as the money gets scarce.”

Atlanta Public Schools may be in a good place financially, but a third party accrediting agency put the system on a  in January due to board governing issues. If the board fails to resolve the issues by September, high schools in the school system including  could lose accreditation.

Just a few months after being put on probation, the legislature passed Senate Bill 89, which gives the governor the power to remove school board members from their positions.

“My bottom line was for me, it was difficult to leave the capitol without some alternative to the loss of accreditation for the 49,000 kids who go to APS (Atlanta Public Schools),” State Representative Kathy Ashe, who represents more than 20 neighborhoods from Midtown to Capitol View, said Tuesday night.

Harsch-Kinnane said she “understands and respects the need for a safety net,” but is confident the board will do whatever it takes to keep Atlanta Public Schools accredited.

“I think we’re gunna get it done. There is no choice,” Harsch-Kinnane said.

Senator Orrock, who represents the Fulton county portion of the city of Atlanta, spoke Tuesday night about the controversial immigration bill passed at the end of the session that will potentially crackdown on illegal immigration and hiring of immigrant workers.

“I think that a very ill-conceived policy has been put in place,” Orrock said. “There’s a lot of pride on the part of the authors and the major drivers behind it that they have passed an “Arizona type bill,” which they say won’t be unconstitutional like Arizona’s is and won’t cost us money to enforce and won’t cost us money to defend in court, and of course it will do all of those things.”

Orrock said she believes that the country is “operating in a broken immigration system” that the federal government is ultimately responsible for.

“We are attempting as a state to do something the state is charged with doing,” she said.