Additional funds should have been secured for asylum seeker children to attend Saco schools
To the editor,
Did everybody see the Saco School Department’s notice about the children of asylum seekers Augusta is relocating to Saco? Mayor
William Doyle reposted that memo on his Facebook page. It looks like Saco will most likely have to provide funding to educate these
children.
Why wasn’t funding to cover the educational costs of these families secured ahead of time from the federal and state governments while they were flush with billions in economic recovery money? I don’t feel a lick of confidence in the mayor’s assurance that he and our school superintendent may be successful “advocating” for state funding to cover the cost of about100 extra students. I have no confidence in our Democratic Party-controlled state government to pay for these children that they unloaded on Saco. I remember how the former Baldacci administration never reimbursed Maine hospitals the $750 million they promised as part of their ill-fated Dorigo Health Program.
Where was federal representative Chellie Pingree when Washington was divvying up billions of Covid recovery dollars when these families showed up at our doorsteps? Where were Saco’s Augusta representatives Margaret O’Neil and Lynn Copeland, along with Senator Donna Bailey when Augusta debated what to do with the millions of left-over federal dollars at their disposal? Shouldn’t they have lobbied to make Augusta pay to educate these children before handing out $850 checks to the rest of Maine?
As an immigrant myself, I’m looking forward to welcoming these new neighbors and their children. I just hope my fellow Saco taxpayers don’t blame these new families if our taxes increase to cover the additional cost of educating their children. The fault for that increase will lie solely on the shoulders of our federal and state elected legislators, and our state senator for not securing funding for this program while Washington and Augusta were awash in billions of economic recovery dollars.
Ted Sirois
Saco
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