Governor Pat Quinn addressing the Illinois General Assembly on his budget.

One of the cuts made by Governor Pat Quinn was $15.7 million for a so-called “Hold Harmless” provision in the State Aid to Education formula.

He get my praise because the program resulted in giving money to school districts to subsidize empty classroom seats.

If a school district can’t get less money than the year before, then when student population declines, it continues to get the same amount of money that it got before.

This makes absolutely no sense to me.

Yes, I have heard the arguments, first from officials at Northern Illinois University in the late 1970’s when enrollment was dropping.

“We still have the same number of classrooms and other fixed costs,” they argued. “That’s why we need the same amount of money.”

When enrollment increased, I pointed out, they asked for more money. After all, there were more students to educate.

But, the educators seemed oblivious to the possibility that costs would not increase for a while. After all, one could put more students into the same classrooms.  There was not immediate increase in fixed costs and not much in variable costs.

The argument led to the “Hold Harmless” approach.

It, of course, allowed tough choices to be delayed.

Complete nonsense, in my opinion, as I argued on the House floor when Democrat Julie Curry of Decatur passed the bill with suburban votes.