Dear Friends:

Many thanks for all your calls to the Senate today.  The operators said the

phones were ringing off the wall -- it was often very difficult to get through.

 That's exactly what we wanted.

Unfortunately, what we REALLY wanted didn't happen.  The Bryan Amendment was

defeated (21 senators voted in favor, we needed 27), so the Senate's education

funding bill remains at the level passed by the Senate Appropriations

Committee -- it underfunds the MAEP by $200 million.

The debate on this bill was intense, and many who opposed the Bryan amendment

are still claiming to be education supporters.  I, for one, am skeptical of

that position.  Every Senator there had the opportunity to fully funded the

MAEP, and they failed to do it.  Most who opposed the amendment did so in favor

of "going to conference."  As Senator Mike Chaney (chairman of the Senate

Education Committee) and others claimed, "The Senate has a process for this."  The

process he refers to is rejecting the House Bill and proposing a bill they

know the House will reject.  When the two chambers don't agree, the bill goes to

a Conference Committee made up of three members of the House and three members

of the Senate (the conferees).  This committee negotiates a deal which each

chamber must vote up or down (no amendments).  This takes the power away from

the full Senate, those who represent all of us, and puts it in the hands of a

few.

I will receive the official docket report tomorrow and will email it to you

as soon as I get it.  Please contact your senator as soon as you know his/her

vote.

Please do not give up hope; this is not over.  There are still things we can

do to affect the final outcome of MAEP funding.

1.  Continue to hold our legislators accountable.  Do not buy flimsy excuses,

and politely let them know you don't.  They had a chance to bring us very

close to full funding today, and they didn't.  Let your Senator know that you are

paying attention and that you still hold him or her accountable for the final

outcome of this funding bill.  If this "process" really works for the

taxpayers, and if the Senate really wants full funding of the MAEP, full funding

should be the outcome of the conference report (what comes out of the conference

committee).  Anything less than what the Bryan Amendment proposed will

represent a failure on the part of the Senate.

2.  Urge your Senators to insist that the Senate conferees accept nothing

less than full funding in the final conference proposal.  We will let you know

who the conferees are as soon as they are named.

3.  Encourage the House conferees to stick to their guns and accept nothing

less than the House proposal -- and take more if they can get it!

Let's ratchet this up a notch.  From now until the end of the session is

where the rubber really meets the road.  Ask everyone you know to call their

senators and speak with them or leave a message. A perfect example: a Clinton mom

called her senator this evening to ask if he would like to explain his

opposition to the Bryan Amendment as she would be sending a memo to all teachers in

the district informing them of his position.  She politely told him she would be

watching all his votes and reporting them to his constituents.  He was VERY

kind to her and encouraged her to call him anytime. 

These folks work for US.  Let's make sure they understand that we are holding

them accountable.  Let's send the clear message that we will not sit idly by

while they threaten our children's futures.  We are the taxpayers of this

state, and it is our responsibility to see that our tax dollars are spent as WE

see fit.  Keep the faith.  Keep fighting for our kids.  We can still win this

thing -- it's not over yet!