Cutting these schools would be a bad move

A city of 300,000 residents does not need the same number of classrooms as a city of 640,000. That said, bigger is definitely not better in education, just cheaper.

You beat me to it Kevin.

Funny thing is, the population drop doesn't reduce the library branch needs, because proximity is extremely important to library utilization, especially with kids. We used to have the Bookmobile in the city  neighborhoods, like mine, that didn't have a library, but the funding in the city for those dried up years ago.

As a hard-core reader in a poor family with no car that Bookmobile was a very big deal in my early childhood.    

I agree with you all that funding is a part of any equasion.  I get crazed when I see folks send letters and on the blogs wanting things with no concept of paying for them.

I also noticed these folks always want to cut peoples wages as if that would pay for what they want.

My wife worked for the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh system for 29 years, and I can assure you that salaries in that organization are pretty.low. When my wife got hired there as a page (honest, that is the lowest entry level position) she came home excited and told me she had gotten the job. My first question, of course, was "How much does it pay?" She said something like $3.07 an hour. I told her she must be mistaken, that was below minimum wage, but she explained that they had an exception allowing them to pay below it.

HOPE & CHANGE.

Chico, I do hope you change. :)