School Board member questions county’s free tuition grant
School Board member questions county’s free tuition grant
Dear Editor:
As the only elected official I know who came out, not against the scholarships, but against the County Commission for this, I am going to write a rebuttal.
First, as many have pointed out, this is not the county’s money, although from their political cir cus, you’d think they were emptying their bank accounts to send kids to college. They are not, this is the public’s money and this is nothing more than a desperate attempt to buy votes, and a shameful one at that.
What do they do when you’re not looking? They pass out contracts to friends and family. What does the county commission do during nonvoting years? They cancel the public forum. What do they do during election years? They give out scholarships.
The residents of St. Cloud don’t even have clean water to drink. The residents of Poinciana spend hours per day back and forth to their neglected community. We have the highest impact fees in the state, but in nearly every respect our community is underfunded when it comes to infrastructure and services.
Our teachers and firefighters have to beg constantly for increases that do not come close to providing them with a living wage, much less our paraprofessionals in schools. And our school district in general is in shambles with a similarly sized population to Seminole, but we have a budget $700 million larger, not that our scores reflect it.
Why doesn’t the money follow the student? It’s a leader’s job to question that, but leaders were not given the opportunity. And then when citizens ask questions, they are told to ignore what they know about Osceola, smile, and say thank you.
Ask yourself what the enrollment numbers look like at Valencia, and you’ll see maybe there is more than a group of students benefiting. They may acting out of the interest of completely different agendas.
This is a blessing and a great opportunity for those kids, and I hope they use it, appreciate it, and benefit from it, then take their knowledge and make our county better for it. But I’m not going to applaud the county, which is one of the most corrupt, abusive, and feckless groups of elected officials I’ve ever seen in action. The fact that they had a press conference highlighting themselves says everything you need to know about their motives.
There is nothing righteous about gaslighting hundreds of thousands of people, but there is a tone of self-righteousness not acknowledging that the cynicism and skepticism is extremely well deserved in Osceola when viewed through the lens of a citizen who deals with the county officials’ sins.
People say they love Osceola County. So do I, but I love the people of Osceola even more, and protecting them does not involve advising them to drink the Kool-aid and be happy about it.
As an elected official, I do not have the luxury of being distracted by free candy from sketchy vans or even more dangerous, free pork from politicians. I have to keep my eye on the ball.
Jon Arguello
Kissimmee
School Board, District 3
