01-06-2011, 04:21 AM
Beware of "Lottery Funded" lies - the Florida Lottery has "raised $10B for education" - over 20+ years, so $500M/year average (the annual budget for Dade county schools alone is over $4B per year, it's a big county, but there are 66 other counties in Florida - total public school budget in FL is likely about $40B), and what it really has done is relieve the counties of levying that same money in property taxes, putting education funding on a (slightly) less predictable footing, and giving the state additional power over the county school districts since they control more of their funds.
Oh don't worry, even without the lottery the State controls the flow of federal funds to the counties, to the tune of several billion per year.