Q&A: State Sen. Kelash Talks Education, Responds to Gov. Dayton's Budget

Richfield Patch briefly talked with the city's representative, State Sen. Ken Kelash (D-Richfield), about the passing of SF 56, which would freeze public school workers salaries for two years, and Gov. Mark Dayton's budget proposal from Feb. 15.

Richfield Patch: What is your overall opinion about the governor's 2011 budget he presented on Feb. 15?

State Sen. Ken Kelash: The number one thing for me is that he's making the adult effort to get some of the structural problems of the state budget under control. Some of his tax increases were higher than I would've liked to see, but his options on cutting are limited. He's not happy with the budget, because he’s cutting stuff he believes in, and its unfortunate we have to do this.

Richfield Patch: Now that salaries has passed in the Senate, what do you have to say about it?

Kelash: [Teachers] know there's less money to pay for teachers and students in general, and between them and school boards, they can figure this out without having a law like this in place. [The need for wage freezes] depends on the area ... Especially for starting teachers, that freeze is a cut. All of this is predicated on costs, especially the rising costs of health care.

Richfield Patch: How has the education system changed?

Kelash: Class sizes are getting bigger, [there are fewer kids coming through] and ... experiential things that cost money [such as field trips] we're unable to do because we chose to cut taxes on people instead of making sure we had enough money to pay for quality education that guys my age grew up with. Our grandparents had enough foresight to build infrastructure, to build all these community colleges, to expand universities, to contribute. We're turning our backs on our own kids. [Building infrastructure] goes back to when we had a more progressive tax system. At least [Dayton's] gone to a more progressive tax system.