Debt service to crowd out education spending – and everything else

12-17-2009

http://educatedguess.org/blog/?p=800

Over the years, Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell has developed a sixth sense for steering clear of political potholes. So it was puzzling to hear him call for $9.9 billion worth of bonds for school construction one day after state Treasurer Bill Lockyer warned that California is already bonded up to its eyeballs — at its peril. “There is an obvious need to improve school facilities throughout California, and we cannot afford to wait to meet this need,” O’Connell said in a press release after testifying at a Senate hearing on school facilities. But wait we probably will. According to Lockyer’s lastest report on debt, by 2013, a record $10 billion in interest and principal on state debt will eat up a whopping 11 percent of estimated $91 billion in state revenue. Most of the money will pay off general obligation bonds, but more than $2 billion will cover short-term borrowing that bailed the state out of this year’s financial crisis. (more...)

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Debt service to crowd out education spending – and everything else

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