LANSING — Gov. Gretchen Whitmer presented her budget recommendations today for the 2019-20 fiscal year to a joint meeting of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees. Among her recommendations were significant increases in revenue sharing to local communities, and increasing school funding by $507 million — the largest increase since 2002. In response to the recommendation, state Rep. Joe Tate (D-Detroit) issued the following statement:

“Our students and our schools have been set up for failure for years. Underfunding and neglect meant our teachers were forced to make due with less and our students were expected not to learn but to survive. No child should be put in that position, or robbed of their opportunity to succeed later in life.  That’s why I am proud to stand by Gov. Whitmer’s proposal as a starting point to provide the biggest increase in education funding in a generation and begin righting this wrong.”

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