Friday, December 19, 2008

Measure J: Another Wasted Effort

Looks like Eureka will be fighting to defend Measure J- that local anti- recruiting initiative that was recently passed. Fortunately, the city attorney has been told she'll be given no additional resources with which to defend it. That's a good thing.

The whole thing seems silly to me as Measure J was basically fixing something that wasn't broken in the first place.

As I said before, as un- libertarian as it might seem, I wish the Feds would have handled it differently. Instead of taking Arcata and Eureka to court, couldn't they have withheld federal funding that the cities receive for various things, education being one?


I would of really gotten a kick out of it if the Feds would of done something like that.

6 Comments:

At 8:26 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Could you explain exactly what kind of federal funds the City of Eureka receives for Education. I'm going to go with by estimate of $0.00.
Maybe there is funding for the School District which has no relationship to the City.

 
At 8:33 AM, Blogger Fred Mangels said...

Maybe the school district. I'm not sure. I've just heard from various sources about federal funding for schools. I think they're usually referring to money sent for the states to redistribute, as seems to be that case with most things nowadays. I suspect the city gets some money from the state that also originated from the Fed, although I can't claim specifics.

And I think it would be totally appropriate for the feds to target school funding. After all, this measure was meant to keep recruiters out of the schools, wasn't it? A little tit- for- tat in this instance would be downright fun.

 
At 9:48 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Write to Obama Fred. Maybe he'll entertain the thought.

Probably not. Anyway, I'm not sure the Feds have the power to just cut off funds arbitrarily, not without some sort of legislative mandate.

 
At 2:03 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

My understanding is that it has to do with conditions attached to the funding - if you accept federal money, you agree to allow recruiters access to the pool of potential recruits. The thing is school districts are usually distinct from the city. That is, the school district is a separate political entity from the municipality. So if the district obeys the law it may lose funding, even though it isn't responsible for the law.

 
At 7:08 PM, Blogger Fred Mangels said...

"So if the district obeys the law it may lose funding, even though it isn't responsible for the law.".

If that's true, it makes no difference to me. The people that voted for Measure J have their kids going to school in that same district. So, the school district loses because their constituency- those paying taxes and sending their kids to those schools- voted for the measure.

Regardless of the district's responsibility, the district should lose because of the people that make up that district.

 
At 6:04 PM, Blogger Richard Parish said...

The Feds are definitely in charge of the propaganda taught in local schools. There are Federal guidelines concerning content. The continuing adventures of Christopher Columbus are a case in point. Not very popular in Hoopa, yet year after year, the lies are again put into the minds of children in early grade levels.
One question I have about the federal mandated school curriculum, is why do we have to wait until college to hear the basic "Truths" of our history and social structure?

 

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