The list is ludicrous. I think the intelligent voter would look at this and say this is so far off, it's incredible.

It's ludicrous. I think that if anyone should take the heat for this, it should be me.

We met with Senate and House leaders, and they felt they could cure it during the session. I'm very confident [schools] will be able to use co-teaching.

We have tremendous concerns in three areas: transportation, because of rising fuel costs; utilities, because of rising fuel costs; and increases in health care costs. We could have given teachers a 7 percent pay raise instead of taking those things away. We could have hired more of those teachers at a higher salary.

Overall, it's a very good budget, especially looking at his proposal for teacher recruitment and retention.

I have seen it time and time again. You dictate what you want that leadership to do. When that happens, you will see an improvement in education in this county.