The republican state budget plan’s clearing another statehouse hurdle today as the House Appropriations Committee wades through the details of the four-point-six million dollar outline. Governor Tom Vilsack, though, says the plan falls short in several areas, and needs at least 21 million dollars more for education programs. Vilsack says he’s explained his concerns to republican lawmakers in private, and will continue to hammer away at them in public, too. Vilsack did today’s verbal hammering at a construction site in Des Moines where a college education center’s being built. Vilsack says “it is important and essential if we’re going to transform the economy of this state to continue to invest in education.” Vilsack says he hopes legislators “do the right thing.” Vilsack says Iowa’s reputation as a national leader in education is endangered and “the nation is watching.”
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