Santa Rosa teachers get "stimulated" ... but are they still wingnuts?

Last week, I mused on the curious phenomenon taking place in Santa Rosa County, a highly wingnutty outpost deep in America's Taint™, wherein a number of teachers who, based on extrapolation from personal observation, largely are far-right Republicans would have their jobs preserved by the stimulus money provided by President Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress. I asked rhetorically whether or not those teachers might revise their dislike of Obama and Democrats somewhat, seeing as they were responsible for saving their livelihoods.

Well, yesterday the county school board officially voted to scale back planned personnel cuts, restoring almost 100 positions that would have been lost but for the stimulus funding made possible by Democrats.

"We have added back 70 teacher positions and 27 educational support positions because of the American Recovery and Reinvestment funding," said Lewis Lynn, assistant superintendent for human resources.

The new staffing plan is an opportunity to bring back more people, said Superintendent Tim Wyrosdick.

"As we evaluate stimulus dollars and begin to put them to use, our focus is to recommit to as many teachers and educational support personnel as we can," he said.

The district has been allotted $7.5 million for Title I schools and Exceptional Student Education. That allowed board members to create 51.5 positions earlier this month.

While it's true that these positions are funded for just two years, making them uncertain beyond that point (and raising the concern of the local teachers' union), the fact is that 97 people ultimately have President Obama to thank for saving their jobs. And based on what I know, again, from personal observation, of those 97, it would be a conservative estimate (no pun intended) to conclude that 70 of them are staunch, anti-Obama Republicans. Even though the 97 have yet to be identified, I think that's a statistically sound presumption.

I'd sure love to hear from the 70 teachers and staff how they feel about the president now.