The House adjourned for the weekend without taking up the teacher pay raise conference report for a vote. Thank you for your calls to representatives – there are strong indications that the House plans to pass the pay raise next week and send it to Gov. Reeves for his signature. That is good news, but another threat still looms: income tax cuts that would eviscerate the state budget and make it impossible for local school districts to cover the cost of the pay raise.
We cannot afford to have school budgets slashed due to senseless income tax cuts. Why on earth would Mississippi strip hundreds of millions of dollars from the state budget – or billions of dollars under the House plan – in one of the most uncertain economic times we have seen in decades?
It simply is not possible to eliminate such a huge chunk of our state revenue without a devastating impact on state budgets – including public schools. Local school districts would almost certainly be forced to slash budgets and eliminate teaching positions in order to meet the higher salaries mandated in state law.
Please call your legislators with this important message:
VOTE NO on ANY income tax cut, which would devastate public schools!
Capitol Switchboard: 601.359.3770
Send the same message to:
House Speaker Philip Gunn: 601.359.3300
Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann: 601.359.3200
We will keep an eye on the teacher pay raise conference report and its progress in the House. In the meantime, we must not allow legislators to pass an income tax cut that would take us backward.
Please call your legislators today and urge them to protect our public schools with a NO vote on any income tax cut. Ask everyone you know to call. Share this post with your school board members and ask them to call. Your voice matters, and together, we’ve got this!
