The Pasco Parents for Quality Schools group emerges as a force in the debate on the penny tax increase.
By REBECCA CATALANELLO
Published January 15, 2004
Look for Amye Cox in the school bus loops. Listen for her on the other end of the phone. Expect to see her on the doorstep of your business. And if she sends you an e-mail, don't be surprised if she's recruiting your help.
Cox, a 51-year-old mother of two elementary students who are poised to attend the already overcrowded Land O'Lakes High, desperately wants you to vote in favor of the Penny for Pasco sales tax initiative March 9.
"You can't leave it to the future," Cox said in an energetic explanation of why she got involved in the protax movement. "You have to step up and fix it now."
In an effort to generate grass roots support for the proposed 1-cent-on-the-dollar tax increase, a group called Pasco Parents for Quality Schools announced Wednesday that it is mobilizing parents to spread the word to other parents.
"You know parents and how they network," said Cox, one of three co-chairs heading up the movement. She maintains the tax is necessary to help the district keep up with the facilities needs of the state's fifth-fastest-growing school district.
With parent volunteers in every school in the county, Pasco Parents for Quality Schools is distinguishing itself from the protax political action committee Pasco's Citizens Committee in that the parents group is not a fundraising body.
Although Cox said the parents group might draw on the materials, speakers and information provided by the other group, it is most concerned with getting out the word.
Though Pasco's Citizens Committee co-chairman Allen Altman said he wasn't completely familiar with the parents group, his experiences with parents who favor the tax have been memorable: "I will tell you, these parents are fired up," he said.
Tax opponent Bill Bunting of the Citizens Against the Penny for Pasco was skeptical Wednesday.
"Are they doing it out in the school system and are they doing it with taxpayer facilities?" Bunting asked when told of the group's emergence.
The antitax group has been critical of the protax side's ability to tap into school resources. School officials maintain that they are within the law, giving parents factual information about the tax's impact on the district.
The proposed tax would bring in $437-million over its 10-year life, if passed. The bulk of the funds would be used for new school construction and county roads projects.
In a related development not specifically tied to the new group, PTAs from seven New Port Richey schools are planning a joint meeting at 6:30 tonight at Ridgewood High, 7650 Orchid Lake Road, to hear from school officials and protax leaders about the Penny for Pasco.
