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Damon Political Report

Fight for CSN funding akin to fight for freedom in Egypt?

By (contact) Anjeanette Damon

Click to enlarge photo

Sam Morris

Senators Ruben Kihuen and John Lee confer during a meeting of a meeting of the Senate Select Committee on Economic Growth and Employment on the third day of the 2011 legislative session Wednesday, February 9, 2011 in Carson City.

Will boisterous demonstrators fill the streets of Las Vegas to fight for increased funding for the College of Southern Nevada the way demonstrators filled the streets of Cairo to fight for freedom?

One lawmaker thinks so.

Sen. John Lee, D-North Las Vegas, warned a committee making decisions on higher education funding that the people would do what they have to do to make sure CSN is equally funded.

“This is going to get to a point that the regents are going to have to take advantage of working with us or we are going to do what we have to do as they did in Egypt and fight for these rights,” Lee said.

Egypt?

Lee didn’t back down when talking to reporters in the hallway after the hearing.

“I’m serious,” he said. “The people need and are dying for the opportunity to figure out how to feed their families. The world’s on fire and now this is something that could cause the same sort of uprising.”

Lee, who owns a plumbing business and just closed a tile business, said he had to lay off “80 guys.” He worries about how they will be retrained to find new work.

Lee believes the funding formula used by the state to distribute funds to each of the higher education’s system discriminates against CSN.

“This body concluded in 2005, CSN starts in a $20 million hole because of the discriminatory treatment of the formula,” he said.

He was further angered by Gov. Brian Sandoval’s decisions to direct county property tax revenue to UNLV and UNR, leaving the community colleges out of that funding stream.

The property tax revenue replaces state funding to those institutions, it doesn’t augment it under Sandoval’s budget.

Discussion: 5 comments so far…

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  1. By Turrialba
    March 3, 2011
    11:34 a.m.
    Flag

    Tony V:

    Well said.

    Nevertheless it is important that people should be involved and speak their views. This is important, but not Egypt important.

  2. By mred
    March 3, 2011
    11:56 a.m.
    Flag

    Good comparison. Sandoval, put in by an elite and Mubarak...yes birds of a feather. Both need to leave office.

  3. By MikeLange (Mike Lange)
    March 3, 2011
    1:13 p.m.
    Flag

    Well, in all fairness, have you been to the CSN campus on Cheyenne? He may well have to take a bullet.

    On a more serious note, I agree with what everyone else is saying... well, except what I think Birdiedreamin was trying to say after I deciphered his posts. Yes, the education situation in this state looks grim, but comparing it to what went on in Egypt is odd at best.

  4. By SunJon (Jon Becker)
    March 3, 2011
    5:07 p.m.
    Flag

    WANT A PROTEST? I HEAR THERE IS ONE FORMING IN FRONT OF THE BELLAGIO AT 12PM THIS SUNDAY. COME AND COMPLAIN.

    The catalog of classes for the Community College is filled with the most incredibly useful, realistic, community oriented and worthwhile courses I have seen. Their cooking labs with the huge stoves at the Cheyenne Campus are a 100x more useful then Play writing at the University level.

    Take a look yourself and download:
    http://www.csn.edu/uploadedfiles/Admissi...

    If that address can't be copied, see the pdf download link at:
    http://www.csn.edu/pages/660.asp

    HVAC, welding, accounting, tax prepare prep, CAD drafting and software graphics, auto mechanics & repair, building inspection, building technology, clinical Lab techniques, physical therapy, communication, criminal justice (YEP), culinary arts, internet LANS, nursing, dental tech, - these are a small fraction of the topics.

    CSN is the most COMMUNITY ORIENTED EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCE IN NEVADA. John Lee has got it nailed spot on.

  5. By Turrialba
    March 3, 2011
    5:54 p.m.
    Flag

    Ed---only a moron would possibly try to make a comparison between our legally elected governor and a dictator, who ran a police state torture and all. You make me sick as birdie boop does with his racist slurs about the governor.

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