LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Padget in favor of extending sales tax

To the editor

I’m passionately supporting the continuation of the ½ cent sales tax; this is not an increase. This tax can only be used for equipment our students need such as upgraded computers, increased wi-fi bandwidth, cloud computing, digital infrastructure and other school capital projects.

I’ve seen specific deficiencies during the last two months. After launching   <Monroe /> COMPUTE$ in August, it was disappointing to learn that some equipment and software has been superseded by newer, faster versions not yet universally available in Monroe County.   The objective of <Monroe /> COMPUTE$ is to educate all students in basic skills, and proceed with higher level computing courses enabling all students to “Learn Here/Work Anywhere.” More tools from Apple, Adobe, Cisco, as well as Microsoft, will need to be acquired and upgraded year after year, for the foreseeable future.

Establishing a strong “computing culture” in Monroe is essential to our economic future. With 25,000 open computing jobs locally and across Florida, our students need to be ready to get these higher-paying jobs.

This is the right time to extend the sales tax. Our district leadership is more stable and united than at any time in its history. The days of political friction between an elected superintendent and five elected board members are history. Superintendent Porter’s contract has just been extended until June 2017, two board members (Andy Griffiths and Capt Ed Davidson) will serve at least until the 2016 elections, and three board members (Bobby Highsmith, Ron Martin, and John Dick) have just been elected and will serve until the 2018 elections.

The financial debacles over recent years in the school district can be traced to continual leadership turnover. Now, and at least through 2018, taxpayers have a pretty clear idea who is going to be allocating and spending our money.

Most importantly, after the half-cent is approved, our six leaders can focus all their time and energy, laser-like, on student outcomes and student success. This is an opportunity to be relished by all citizens of Monroe.

John R. Padget, Vice-Chair

Florida’s State Board of Education

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