Everyone needs to stop and do some yoga. The education levy has this town on its head. As a
property manager, taxes are not my friend. Married to a teacher, education is a mainstay in my home. She
doesn’t make anywhere near $80,000.There are some great BG residents on both sides of this issue. The
two prevailing winds are "landlords are against it so they must be greedy" and "teachers
are for it so they must be greedy and wasteful". I think neither is true. The way I see it, there
is a financial issue in the schools. So far the only way I have heard to solve it has been cutbacks and
a levy. I have seen the cutbacks for several years. In fact my wife’s job at the high school was one of
those cutbacks, but I understood that the cuts had to be made.I also understand in order to maintain our
great schools that the money is needed. I have not done any research to find the alternative nor have I
heard any suggestion for alternatives so I will support the levy. My kids go to St. Al’s because I want
religion in their classroom and I pay for that choice.I went to South Main, then my parents made a
similar choice for me and I went to St. Al’s then St. John’s. My parents sacrificed a lot for my
education, but always supported every educational levy on the ballot. They, as I do, believe that an
education it the most important thing to any child and should take the highest priority in any
community. When looking at the numbers, our community pays our teachers only slightly better than the
average. We spend about the average for Ohio communities. But we have an excellent school system. This
is the reason I wanted to raise my family in Bowling Green. I have lots of friends and colleagues that
received an outstanding education at BGCS and are on both sides of this debate. I truly love this
community. I’m supporting the levy because I think that it is right and what must be done. And when it’s
all done levy or not, I hope we all come together to solve the issues, not always financial, that our
schools and children in the community face. By the way Bob Maurer is a nice guy.Chris OstrowskiBowling
Green
