Key Issue: Public Education

Helen believes that all children deserve a high-quality education and she is already delivering for Bucks County schools by voting for the highest level of public education funding in state history, without raising taxes. Additionally, she helped to secure $60 million in funding for school safety.

Helen would like to see us do more to ensure our children and young adults have the education and skills they need to succeed in the 21st century. Of particular importance are increased funding for Pre-K education to ensure all children are ready to learn and investments in career training and apprenticeships for those who don’t go to college.  Strengthening our higher education generally will ensure that more students stay in Pennsylvania once they graduate, thus attracting new businesses and expanding our economy overall.  When the economy expands, so does the revenue to fund these investments.

The system for funding education in Pennsylvania must be fair to every child if our dream of a high-quality education for all is to be achieved. Currently, the state government spends too little on education, leading to a near-total reliance on property taxes, which are onerous for many. While proposals to eliminate all property taxes would threaten that predictable revenue stream, property-tax reform is clearly needed to make the financing of our schools more equitable. Compounding the issue is the penchant of the state to pass unfunded mandates that fall on the local government to finance.

The bottom line: we need to increase state funding to pay for mandates they impose and to eliminate large inequities in the system. We can do this without raising taxes on families, by imposing a severance tax on oil and gas companies and dedicating this tax to school funding.