Border gets short shrift from the state — again
June 1, 2004
Legislature fails to provide millions in funding for important educational institution.
Written by Editorial, San Antonio Express-News
The Legislature's failure to overhaul the school finance system was bad enough, but state lawmakers did not stop there.
If public education got short shrift, higher education fared no better, especially along the border, where learning is an important weapon in the battle against poverty and low expectations.
While legislators were busy wrestling with vital legislation such as the "anti-cheerleader" bill, they failed to provide the funding for two key educational institutions on the border — a pharmacy school in Kingsville and a medical school in El Paso.
The Irma Rangel School of Pharmacy, virtually complete after receiving $17 million for its construction, cannot open without operating funds — funds the Legislature failed to provide.
El Paso suffered a similar fate when the Legislature withheld $50 million for the medical school, part of the Texas Tech University campus in the border city.
"All of us were shocked at what happened," Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, told the El Paso Times.
Other border institutions fared just as badly, including Texas Southmost College and the University of Texas at Brownsville, which had hoped for millions of dollars for projects that included the renovation of aging facilities.
While the border continued to be the forgotten stepchild of the state, House Speaker Tom Craddick's hometown of Midland received $13.5 million for a Texas Tech University OB/GYN program and a physicians assistant program.
Both may be worthy projects, but the state cannot keep funding such programs at the expense of the border, where low expectations are driven even lower by a Legislature that does not care.
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