Allyson Schwartz said her experience of bringing people together to craft and pass legislation both in Harrisburg and Washington, D.C., makes her the best candidate to take on and defeat Gov. Tom Corbett in November.
Indeed, when speaking to the New Pittsburgh Courier Editorial Board in a May 7 conference call, she never referenced any of the other three Democratic Primary contenders—only Corbett, and his evisceration of public education funding.
“A billion dollars was taken out, and people across the commonwealth know it’s hurting them,” she said. “We need a fair funding formula that takes need, the size of the tax base and poverty into account for these districts. Charter schools need to be held to the same academic and accounting standards as public schools. And no public money for cyber-charter; we’ve spent $366 million on that.”
As her unmentioned rivals would, Schwartz would increase education funding largely through imposing a 5-percent severance tax on Marcellus Shale wells, but would leave the current 2 percent extraction fee in place to compensate effected local communities and to fund Department of Environmental Protection inspection and enforcement.
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