A Wonderful Idea that Will Just Never Take

The good people (er, person) over at Treasured Valley today have reposted an opinion piece by a local educator, Steve Hauge, "Sports should be considered when cutting education budget. Incisive, thoughtful, practical, and all-around right. Which means the idea will go nowhere.

Now that Gov. Butch Otter has spoken, let the bleeding begin.

He proposed to amputate part of the budget on education. I suggest it be the testosterone, not the brain. Or rather, the weight room, not the classroom. Bleachers, not desks. Playbooks, not textbooks.

Surely we will hear some claim that football and basketball are financially self-supporting and underwrite other sports, save coaches salaries.

But that is misleading. Multiply the number of coaches by the number of sports by the number of schools in any district by the salary amount, and the figure climbs. Though coaches are underpaid, collectively it all adds up. And don’t think for a moment a varsity sport subsidizes feeder programs at the junior high level. No, it’s the taxpayer again.

I suspect public school sports simply eat up a lot more cash than taxpayers assume. At the very least, taxpayers ought to demand that the financial books are opened and proven otherwise.

Go read the whole thing.