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City must be cautious when cutting education
Editorial Board
Issue date: 11/14/08 Section: Ed-Op
Mayor Nutter announced Nov. 6 significant cuts to the City's budget. According to the Associated Press, Philadelphia is expecting a deficit of $108 million by the end of this year, and that number will likely increase to $1 billion over the next few years.
Some City services will be affected, including libraries, The Community College of Philadelphia, swimming pools, city jobs and residential street cleanings. The City plans to close 11 libraries and eliminate Sunday hours for another three.
In these times, though, we must ask if closing libraries is the right answer to Philadelphia's problems, especially after Nutter and other City officials have spent so much time and energy trying to revitalize Philadelphia's school system. Perhaps this marks a deeper problem - that libraries were not being useful enough for the City to keep them open.
The City also plans to close 62 of the 81 swimming pools in Philadelphia this summer, as reported by AP. Out of the 23,000 people that the city employs, a little over 200 of them are expected to lose their jobs while over 2,000 seasonal and contractual jobs are also cut. Mayor Nutter stressed that no police and firefighters should expect layoffs, but the planned hiring of 200 officers will be canceled.
While layoffs seem like a downfall of the City, we must commend Nutter on his proposal that he and other cabinet officials and administrators face salary cuts of around 5 percent. This is a much-needed change in our city leadership, after we watched the last mayor get paid for a day's work while standing in line for an iPhone.
Philadelphia is facing the same budget issues that other big cities in the U.S. are facing, including Los Angeles, Chicago and New York.
According to The New York Times, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced Nov. 11 that New York City will have to eliminate 3,000 positions in order to deal with the financial crisis.
The state of Pennsylvania will also be cutting $311 million from the state's budget. One of the leading causes for the budget deficits are due to the nation's struggling economy.
We all understand the struggles of current times, whether on an individual or city scale. It is a shame that the institutions that are hit the hardest are the ones that attempt to provide educational opportunities to the people of this City and state.
We urge the City and state governments to remember that a cut for the City impacts each and every person here. Eliminating the chances for educational opportunities will not benefit anyone, and will only serve to further weaken our ability to weather a financial crisis.
Some City services will be affected, including libraries, The Community College of Philadelphia, swimming pools, city jobs and residential street cleanings. The City plans to close 11 libraries and eliminate Sunday hours for another three.
In these times, though, we must ask if closing libraries is the right answer to Philadelphia's problems, especially after Nutter and other City officials have spent so much time and energy trying to revitalize Philadelphia's school system. Perhaps this marks a deeper problem - that libraries were not being useful enough for the City to keep them open.
The City also plans to close 62 of the 81 swimming pools in Philadelphia this summer, as reported by AP. Out of the 23,000 people that the city employs, a little over 200 of them are expected to lose their jobs while over 2,000 seasonal and contractual jobs are also cut. Mayor Nutter stressed that no police and firefighters should expect layoffs, but the planned hiring of 200 officers will be canceled.
While layoffs seem like a downfall of the City, we must commend Nutter on his proposal that he and other cabinet officials and administrators face salary cuts of around 5 percent. This is a much-needed change in our city leadership, after we watched the last mayor get paid for a day's work while standing in line for an iPhone.
Philadelphia is facing the same budget issues that other big cities in the U.S. are facing, including Los Angeles, Chicago and New York.
According to The New York Times, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced Nov. 11 that New York City will have to eliminate 3,000 positions in order to deal with the financial crisis.
The state of Pennsylvania will also be cutting $311 million from the state's budget. One of the leading causes for the budget deficits are due to the nation's struggling economy.
We all understand the struggles of current times, whether on an individual or city scale. It is a shame that the institutions that are hit the hardest are the ones that attempt to provide educational opportunities to the people of this City and state.
We urge the City and state governments to remember that a cut for the City impacts each and every person here. Eliminating the chances for educational opportunities will not benefit anyone, and will only serve to further weaken our ability to weather a financial crisis.
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