As we head into the election cycle for November, we should all follow the advice of the detectives on the old show “Dragnet,” when they asked for “just the facts.” With the Big Lie and all the political disinformation out there, one has to listen to how candidates spin their “truths.”
Case in point: Former Gov. Paul LePage’s record on education funding. He says his administration achieved the 2006 legislative requirement of funding 55 percent of public school costs. This is emphatically not true.
According to the Maine Department of Administrative and Financial Affairs (cited by WMTW political reporter Phil Hirschkorn), LePage’s administration did increase funding of education, from 46 percent in fiscal year 2012 to 49.6 percent in fiscal year 2019. If you factor in pension and health insurance, as he did, you still don’t get to 55 percent.
Gov. Mills, on the other hand, has achieved 55 percent for fiscal year 2022 and 55.06 percent for fiscal year 2023, according to the Department of Administrative and Financial Affairs statistics referenced by Hirschkorn. And that is not including pensions and health care.
Not bad for the “big spending liberal Democrats,” who, by the way, managed a budget that was also able to give back $850 apiece to Maine citizens. “Just the facts.”
Jake Hawkins
Arundel
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