Marathon Pundit: Obama war on coal will cost school district 25 percent of its budget

Coal barge, Guttenberg, Iowa

When taxpayer dollars go to schools, liberals are quick to say that it's "for the kids."

Well, the kids' allowance just was severely cut, as the Cincinnati Enquirer tells us--thanks to President Obama's radicalized Environmental Protection Agency.

NEW RICHMOND - School officials in this 2,400-student district fear they'll lose a quarter of their annual operating budget - $6 million to $7 million a year - when Duke Energy Ohio closes its coal-fired Beckjord plant by January 2015.

Duke officials announced earlier this week that it would cost too much to bring the 60-year-old plant up to 1990 Clean Air act specifications. Instead it plans to close the plant, which employs 120 people, and get electricity from other sources to maintain power for its 685,000 southwest Ohio customers.

"Due to the age and physical limitations of the Beckjord facility, the (new environmental rules) would require hundreds of millions of dollars - to which our customers would be exposed - to bring the plant into compliance," the company said in a statement.

New Richmond school officials said Wednesday that they are shocked by this decision.