The Well is Dry

But the CTU thinks the money tree is flourishing:

• The Chicago Teachers Union slammed Gov. JB Pritzker on Thursday for shutting the door on more state funding for cash-strapped Chicago Public Schools, deriding his thumbs-down as the “wrong answer.”

  The two-term Democratic governor laid down a marker that the CPS path to balancing its budget wouldn’t be coming through Springfield anytime soon because of the state’s own financial strains, aggravated by federal funding cuts.

  “What CTU and the mayor are talking about which is, you know, providing another billion or billion six for Chicago Public Schools, that’s just not going to happen,” Pritzker said Wednesday. “And it’s not because we shouldn’t. We should. We should try to find the money. But we don’t have those resources today. And we’re not going to see the resources from the federal government level either.”

  At a South Side school Thursday, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates seized on the governor’s message of financial sparsity, asking incredulously whether Pritzker really meant to deny more state resources for CPS.

There are no "state resources" left. The cupboard is bare, the well is dry. Any money is either going to come from massive tax hikes, which will drive out businesses and taxpayers or from cost cutting. 

Someone pointed out yesterday that Taft High School on the Northwest side has SIX assistant principals. SIX? For what? Obviously, to pay off political favors, but we can only imagine that this is system wide. And we still haven't seen Step One taken closing down underutilized buildings which would provide tens of millions in savings at a minimum.

You know, it's financial irresponsibility like this that might trigger a panic attack in someone who isn't even qualified for the position of grade school teacher who was suddenly stuck in a executive role.