On June 15, the Board of Trustees of the Konocti Unified School District in Lower Lake adopted Resolution 19-10-11, “Support of America’s Weapons Rebate To Education Act.” 

Byron Giese, president of the 160-member Konocti Education Association, submitted the resolution to the board and recommended its adoption.

Konocti Unified School District serves nearly 3,000 students in 11 public schools in the cities of Clearlake, Clearlake Oaks and Lower Lake. 

America’s Weapons Rebate to Education Act is a bill proposed by the 25 Teachers’ Salaries campaign, based in Davis.  It would re-allocate a percentage of the Department of Defense weapons budget (currently more than $200 billion annually) to the states for hiring teachers and other educators.

The school board resolution asked the California Legislature to pass the joint resolution, which asks Congress to pass the AWREA.

 According to the resolution, “Too much money is being spent on the military, especially weapons. Too little money is being spent on education, especially teachers’ salaries. This imbalance threatens our potential for peace, the quality of education available to K-12 students across the country and their future.”

The resolution stated:

* In California the average starting teacher’s salary is $40,000 per year. It’s less in other states.

* For $1 million, the government can either buy one bomb or the states can pay 25 teachers’ salaries for one year.

* California public education is in a “state of emergency.”

*The United States had spent more than $1 trillion on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as of June 2010.

* The Department of Defense financial statements have not been audited since 2001. See DODIG (Report No. D-2010-002), Oct. 19, 2009, pages 1-2, http://www.dodig.mil/Audit/reports/fy10/10-002.pdf

The Pentagon budget is $685 billion this year. Just 1 percent of that amount would enable the states to pay for more than 100,000 K-12 teachers’ and other educators’ salaries, including benefits.

Konocti became the second school board to adopt such a resolution. The first was the Jefferson Elementary School District Governing Board in Daly City, which adopted Resolution 11-05-25 on May 25. 

The resolutions can be found on www.25TeachersSalaries.org under “News.”

Pamela S. Nieberg

Davis

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