Parents’ Lobby Seeks More Education Funds

A delegation of 26 parents from Orange County is flying to Sacramento today to lobby the Legislature and the governor’s office for more money for elementary-secondary education.

The group is part of a countywide organization, Citizens Action to Save Education, that was formed in 1983 to lobby the Legislature for passage of reform measures for education.

“We were successful with the passage of SB (Senate Bill) 813 in 1983,” said Diane Langer, one of the CASE parents going to Sacramento. “Now we want to restore money to the education budget to keep school reform intact.”

Langer and most of the other CASE members are from south Orange County’s Saddleback Valley Unified School District. But she said the membership is spreading out to many other school districts in the county.

“We’ll be divided in groups of three in Sacramento, and each group will visit up to nine legislators during the day,” Langer said. “We have a total of 60 appointments during the day, and that includes a meeting with aides in Gov. Deukmejian’s office.”

CASE is seeking the same legislation sought by Bill Honig, state superintendent of public instruction. Honig has said the governor’s budget next year must have $900 million more for education. Deukmejian, who has called Honig “a demagogue,” has said the state doesn’t have that extra money.

Another CASE goal is to “seek an updating of the Gann Amendment,” Langer said. “We don’t want to do away with the limit on government spending, just put a better indicator in the limit.” The Gann Amendment currently limits government spending to factors geared to population and inflation, Langer noted. She said CASE favors having the limit geared instead to personal income averages, which is what Honig has suggested.