I can't argue with any of the suggestions made by the Mayor in this FOI'd letter. My bet is that the BOE will pay little or no attention. What do you think?
31
comments:
Anonymous
said...
This letter to the BOE is nothing more than political posturing by a mayor who is very good at politics but short on substance. If she truly wants to reach out to the BOE she should meet with them behind closed doors, in a neutral location. This would be much more amenable to accomplishing something that is win win for everyone. Writing a letter that she knows will be made public accomplishes nothing more than backing them against a wall . . . most folks do not respond well to that tactic.
Referring to people as "ignorant" is very much similar to what the mayor did . . . most folks don't respond well to those tactics.
The sit down was in the mayor's office with people present who probably should have not been there.
Try it in a neutral location! Public letters that have nothing more than a political motive will never work with either the intelligent or the ignorant.
There will be reasons (read excuses) to not implement most of these items.
I would be truly impressed if they made a good effort though.
But my gut tells me they will turn their collective nose up.
"Writing a letter that she knows will be made public accomplishes nothing more than backing them against a wall . . . most folks do not respond well to that tactic."
JBK, you are right. They met last night and "turned their collective noses up at it." Except for Wellman. He also made a motion to cut 750,000 from the proposed increase. Guess who voted with him? Julie Turk. All others voted against it including Miss RINO, Wendy Faulenback.
The Mayor and RTC hand-picked Ms. Faulenback for 2 terms on the Board of Education. Having to deal with the fallout of endorsing RINOs to run on the Republican ticket serves the mayor right. The mayor chose her bedfellows, now let her lie with them.
The mayor failed to lead by example in proposing a budget that's even LESS responsible than the BoE's. Her political posturing isn't fooling anybody. At this rate, she'll be as popular as Peitler in a few months.
To the person who noted those in the meeting with the Mayor & BOE:
You conveniently forgot that Mr. Gutman was in the room. He had no business being there. His temper and recurring legal sqabbles with the schools made him the worst choice possible of BOF members to attend.
It should be noted that this letter was emailed to the BOE after 5:00 pm yesterday (Tuesday), just 2.5 hours before the BOE meeting.
This does not show leadership on the part of the Mayor - but why should that surprise anyone? She doesn't show up for BOE meetings, yet claims to know what the school system needs. Did she graduate from college?
FYI, the BoE budget has never been "cut". There have sometimes been insignificant/highly publicized reductions made to the BoE's proposed massive increases, but never any "cuts"... Don't believe the hype!
A) Generate more revenue to offset(cover) your increases. B) Provide better service to make the increase palatable.
So my examples: Ask the town for sidewalks to the schools and require kids within 1/2 a mile to walk to school to minimize busing which is 7% of your budget.
Do not allow anyone to drive to school without carpooling(including the teachers). Better for the environment and saves everyone money.
Charge parents who parent pick-up their kids. The school needs to staff this unfunded mandate.(Unless it is medically necessary for a kid to be picked up and dropped off).
Solar panels, windmills, geothermal???? Green can make you money.
Do we require the buses to be the most efficient? Or do we just pay for fuel increases?
The school needs an MBA in charge.
Unfunded mandates is BS. We all have unfunded mandates.
Suspended kids need to be in school. Those are probably the kids we need to keep in school vs being with their parents or home situation. Being a thug/druggy or dealer is not the way to go through life. It is the schools job to make kids into productive adults even if their parents don't care.
No Child Left Behind - god forbid schools can be measured vs one another and superintendent and principal performance has an objective number. SNIS, SMS maybe have an argument that it's JPS, Northville or Hill& Plain that didn't prepare the kids, but that is simplistic because you can analyze which school is best, which is worst and the BOE should fire the principal of the worst.
So the longest a bad administrator would be in their job is 6-7 years not 20-30. If you are making $100K+ perform or get fired. Like the real world.
The mayor seems to think that if she bemoans the bloated BoE budget, people won't notice her bloated (town) budget.
This will get her nowhere because her budget is already pissing off everybody, from the town's average (overtaxed) citizens to the BoE bureaucrats/PTO fanatics (no matter what she does, she'll never please the latter).
The mayor needs to quickly decide which side she wants to appease, because she isn't pleasing anybody with a 4.9% tax increase...
Here are some "cross training opportunities" the mayor can apply to her "town side" budget.
Police can perform road repair. Finance can maintain the parks. Tax assessors can perform police duties. Public works can be the Mayor for 1 or 2 hours a week.
To use a metaphor, Pat Murphy jumped on the back of a fast-moving train 4 years ago and she hasn't made her way up to the locomotive yet. The train has been barreling along without direction and with nobody at the controls for many years (Furman, Peitler and Gambino never made it there either). Unless she takes charge very soon, a catastrophe is imminent.
Unfunded mandates: Why are we doing anything that is not mandated by the state or federal govt'?
Are we doing more than we have to? Why? Generally, people complain that government is too restrictive and in this case we are saying they aren't restrictive enough???
Our kids need more. Why?
Why is an unfunded mandate a bad word? Does it mean their are school districts which need to be told to do these things? YES Would ours do things if they weren't mandated? Apparently we are doing things which aren't mandated, yet our results(Test scores) are low. Why?
Mandates are horrible. - Desegragating schools - background checks on workers - class size limits - asbestos removal - providing school buses - certified teachers - immunization requirements Oh the humanity.
Should we rely on people(BOE and others) to do the right things? No
Why do we need the police? Why do we need the military? Because people don't do the right things and we need to protect every student.
Just because it's a mandate does not mean you can't satisfy it in a cost efficient manner.
We are a large school system. We inherently should be more efficient than a small one because we should have staff and specialists and the funds to do the right things cheaply.
If a school has 100 kids you still need a principal. If a school has 1000, maybe you need a principal and 2 Vice Principals.
Why don't they just do what needs to be done and combine the duplicate services and overhead that those services entail? This is not that complicated for most people to understand. What do we have to do to get this to happen? What do the PTO nazi's have against this concept? Do they not understand it? Is it because someone would have to stop being a cheerleader for a minute, put down the pom poms and actually be a leader? Can one of you explain what your objection is to this, or do you have one? Are waiting on Paddyfote to come up with this and enact it on her own so you can support it and not rock the boat? Please explain!!
It's not the PTO, the BOE, or Teachers Union against sharing services - it's the Mayor!
Read this blog back on Sept. 12 (the infamous "walkout" meeting). Jay notes that Chair Faulenbach was summoned to a meeting that day with Paddyfoote and others to meet with the Mayor about sharing services. As Jay noted, "Stay tuned."
However, the subsequent meeting was cancelled by the Mayor, and NEVER rescheduled. That's right, NEVER rescheduled by the Mayor.
Basicly, it was all a political stunt to seem bi-partisan during an election season.
Currently, the town and schools acutally do buy some things together, including healthcare and workers comp, diesel fuel, and probably a few other things.
Anyone who blames the schools for not cooperating is blinded by the fog of Republican smoke... or they're smoking something else.
My gosh you are so terribly, terribly misinformed!
The BOE people refused to budge an iota, staking out its turf and saying "don't dare tread here."
Think about what you are suggesting. Does it seem likely to you or anyone that Queen Jean would want to give up any of her fiefdom? It's about C-O-N-T-R-O-L. And more, so long as she keeps those budget lines she has more money to play with and move from here to there like a game of shells. Like taking money from building maintenance to use elsewhere and then cry for more money for that line without accounting for what happened to it.
Please stop and take a breath and think about how absurd your ideas are. Please.
You never answered as to what your objections are. In the interest of the children, the taxpayers (the children’s parents) and the future financial health of the town why won't the BOE act on this? It makes sense on so many levels to combine the finance and maintenance functions and to not do it is snubbing your nose at obvious long term reoccurring savings year after year. It would take leadership and it would not be easy. But the majority on the board could make it happen and benefit the school system in our town. Stop bickering and get to work. Remember the two million in disappearing surplus from last years bear bones budget? Does this not make you ask any questions? There is nothing in this budget that cannot be managed and overseen to be reduced or eliminated with minimal impact on the total system? None what so ever? Really………..none? The administration has made it perfectly clear in the past that if push comes to shove they will take frustration out on our kids instead of making difficult and time consuming choices. If this is allowed to happen again you will not have a majority of evil Republicans on the BOE to scapegoat this time. Remember only Nixon could go to China. Do the community a favor. Dig in and find the waste. Quit blaming other people for the BOE’s total lack of initiative and leadership and take some responsibility.
What does that mean? Did LBJ lose his plane ticket? They wouldn't allow Agnew?
Actually, since the Mayor set the meeting - as a political stunt - then she needs to continue the process. If I read your analogy correctly, then she is the only "Nixon" in town. As the leader, she must take that step.
I do believe that the BOE would receive more support from the community if they presented us wth "actual" numbers. The public never gets to see those. Plus it was in very poor form for them to hold a meeting the same night as the Mayor was presenting her budget. After all, they are part of the process and should at least appear interested. Plus...the BOE has never been cut...only their wish list!
I do not believe that the Mayor set a meeting as a political stunt. That's not her style. She needed to pull some tricks to beat Larry Stillman?? C'mon. Provide some proof.
Google "only nixon could go to china..." if you do not understand what it means, but please for the the third time what is the BOE and PTO objection to combining the duplicate functions? The concept has been introduced, why does the BOE resist by not acting? The Mayor has broached the subject on numerous times. Is she not asking the right way? Does she have to say mother may I? Why is the BOE stalling. Where are the calls from the PTO to cut the waste and benefit the children with the savings? Don't tell me about how the PTO is not qualified to make such suggestions. Most of them are barely qualified to make balloon arches but it never stops them from endorsing canidates, endorsing the budget with high drama or calling for more hiring in the face of decreasing enrollment.
31 comments:
This letter to the BOE is nothing more than political posturing by a mayor who is very good at politics but short on substance.
If she truly wants to reach out to the BOE she should meet with them behind closed doors, in a neutral location. This would be much more amenable to accomplishing something that is win win for everyone.
Writing a letter that she knows will be made public accomplishes nothing more than backing them against a wall . . . most folks do not respond well to that tactic.
"Most folks" aren't going to respond well to your ignorance, either.
Have you read this Blog?
The sit-downs have happened and didn't work.
Referring to people as "ignorant" is very much similar to what the mayor did . . . most folks don't respond well to those tactics.
The sit down was in the mayor's office with people present who probably should have not been there.
Try it in a neutral location! Public letters that have nothing more than a political motive will never work with either the intelligent or the ignorant.
There will be reasons (read excuses) to not implement most of these items.
I would be truly impressed if they made a good effort though.
But my gut tells me they will turn their collective nose up.
"Writing a letter that she knows will be made public accomplishes nothing more than backing them against a wall . . . most folks do not respond well to that tactic."
We'll have to see...it's never been done before.
"The sit down was in the mayor's office with people present who probably should have not been there."
What are you talking about? Let's see...
Paddyfote
Diamond
Jankowski
Murphy
Art Cummings, Nancy Barnes and Ray Avery couldn't make it.
JBK, you are right. They met last night and "turned their collective noses up at it." Except for Wellman. He also made a motion to cut 750,000 from the proposed increase. Guess who voted with him? Julie Turk. All others voted against it including Miss RINO, Wendy Faulenback.
The Mayor and RTC hand-picked Ms. Faulenback for 2 terms on the Board of Education. Having to deal with the fallout of endorsing RINOs to run on the Republican ticket serves the mayor right. The mayor chose her bedfellows, now let her lie with them.
so you agree that she's a RINO?
The mayor failed to lead by example in proposing a budget that's even LESS responsible than the BoE's. Her political posturing isn't fooling anybody. At this rate, she'll be as popular as Peitler in a few months.
To the person who noted those in the meeting with the Mayor & BOE:
You conveniently forgot that Mr. Gutman was in the room. He had no business being there. His temper and recurring legal sqabbles with the schools made him the worst choice possible of BOF members to attend.
Amen! To the previous post. Hope she enjoys her last term.
It should be noted that this letter was emailed to the BOE after 5:00 pm yesterday (Tuesday), just 2.5 hours before the BOE meeting.
This does not show leadership on the part of the Mayor - but why should that surprise anyone? She doesn't show up for BOE meetings, yet claims to know what the school system needs. Did she graduate from college?
Remember the year when the bananahead PTO terrorists and the BOE urged everyone to vote the BOE budget down BECAUSE IT WAS TOO LOW??
And then it was cut even more??
Maybe we can count on a similar exercise this year too!
FYI, the BoE budget has never been "cut". There have sometimes been insignificant/highly publicized reductions made to the BoE's proposed massive increases, but never any "cuts"... Don't believe the hype!
2 things for the school:
A) Generate more revenue to offset(cover) your increases.
B) Provide better service to make the increase palatable.
So my examples:
Ask the town for sidewalks to the schools and require kids within 1/2 a mile to walk to school to minimize busing which is 7% of your budget.
Do not allow anyone to drive to school without carpooling(including the teachers). Better for the environment and saves everyone money.
Charge parents who parent pick-up their kids. The school needs to staff this unfunded mandate.(Unless it is medically necessary for a kid to be picked up and dropped off).
Solar panels, windmills, geothermal???? Green can make you money.
Do we require the buses to be the most efficient? Or do we just pay for fuel increases?
The school needs an MBA in charge.
Unfunded mandates is BS. We all have unfunded mandates.
Suspended kids need to be in school. Those are probably the kids we need to keep in school vs being with their parents or home situation. Being a thug/druggy or dealer is not the way to go through life. It is the schools job to make kids into productive adults even if their parents don't care.
No Child Left Behind - god forbid schools can be measured vs one another and superintendent and principal performance has an objective number. SNIS, SMS maybe have an argument that it's JPS, Northville or Hill& Plain that didn't prepare the kids, but that is simplistic because you can analyze which school is best, which is worst and the BOE should fire the principal of the worst.
So the longest a bad administrator would be in their job is 6-7 years not 20-30. If you are making $100K+ perform or get fired. Like the real world.
The mayor seems to think that if she bemoans the bloated BoE budget, people won't notice her bloated (town) budget.
This will get her nowhere because her budget is already pissing off everybody, from the town's average (overtaxed) citizens to the BoE bureaucrats/PTO fanatics (no matter what she does, she'll never please the latter).
The mayor needs to quickly decide which side she wants to appease, because she isn't pleasing anybody with a 4.9% tax increase...
Here are some "cross training opportunities" the mayor can apply to her "town side" budget.
Police can perform road repair.
Finance can maintain the parks.
Tax assessors can perform police duties.
Public works can be the Mayor for 1 or 2 hours a week.
To use a metaphor, Pat Murphy jumped on the back of a fast-moving train 4 years ago and she hasn't made her way up to the locomotive yet. The train has been barreling along without direction and with nobody at the controls for many years (Furman, Peitler and Gambino never made it there either). Unless she takes charge very soon, a catastrophe is imminent.
Unfunded mandates: Why are we doing anything that is not mandated by the state or federal govt'?
Are we doing more than we have to? Why? Generally, people complain that government is too restrictive and in this case we are saying they aren't restrictive enough???
Our kids need more. Why?
Why is an unfunded mandate a bad word? Does it mean their are school districts which need to be told to do these things? YES Would ours do things if they weren't mandated? Apparently we are doing things which aren't mandated, yet our results(Test scores) are low. Why?
Mandates are horrible.
- Desegragating schools
- background checks on workers
- class size limits
- asbestos removal
- providing school buses
- certified teachers
- immunization requirements
Oh the humanity.
Should we rely on people(BOE and others) to do the right things? No
Why do we need the police?
Why do we need the military?
Because people don't do the right things and we need to protect every student.
Just because it's a mandate does not mean you can't satisfy it in a cost efficient manner.
We are a large school system. We inherently should be more efficient than a small one because we should have staff and specialists and the funds to do the right things cheaply.
If a school has 100 kids you still need a principal. If a school has 1000, maybe you need a principal and 2 Vice Principals.
100 kids = 1 secretary
1000 kids = 3-4(5)? secretaries
100 kids = 1 gym teacher
1000 kids = 6 gym teachers
We are more efficient than a small school, are we more effective?
"To use a metaphor...."
This statement is not a metaphor....it is an analogy.
"Police can perform road repair.
Finance can maintain the parks."
They'd probably do a better job of it.
Why don't they just do what needs to be done and combine the duplicate services and overhead that those services entail? This is not that complicated for most people to understand. What do we have to do to get this to happen?
What do the PTO nazi's have against this concept? Do they not understand it? Is it because someone would have to stop being a cheerleader for a minute, put down the pom poms and actually be a leader?
Can one of you explain what your objection is to this, or do you have one?
Are waiting on Paddyfote to come up with this and enact it on her own so you can support it and not rock the boat? Please explain!!
It's not the PTO, the BOE, or Teachers Union against sharing services - it's the Mayor!
Read this blog back on Sept. 12 (the infamous "walkout" meeting). Jay notes that Chair Faulenbach was summoned to a meeting that day with Paddyfoote and others to meet with the Mayor about sharing services. As Jay noted, "Stay tuned."
However, the subsequent meeting was cancelled by the Mayor, and NEVER rescheduled. That's right, NEVER rescheduled by the Mayor.
Basicly, it was all a political stunt to seem bi-partisan during an election season.
Currently, the town and schools acutally do buy some things together, including healthcare and workers comp, diesel fuel, and probably a few other things.
Anyone who blames the schools for not cooperating is blinded by the fog of Republican smoke... or they're smoking something else.
My gosh you are so terribly, terribly misinformed!
The BOE people refused to budge an iota, staking out its turf and saying "don't dare tread here."
Think about what you are suggesting. Does it seem likely to you or anyone that Queen Jean would want to give up any of her fiefdom? It's about C-O-N-T-R-O-L. And more, so long as she keeps those budget lines she has more money to play with and move from here to there like a game of shells. Like taking money from building maintenance to use elsewhere and then cry for more money for that line without accounting for what happened to it.
Please stop and take a breath and think about how absurd your ideas are. Please.
Ask why the meeting between BOE and the Mayor was cancelled - and why the Mayor (who called the meeting) never rescheduled it?
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm???
You never answered as to what your objections are. In the interest of the children, the taxpayers (the children’s parents) and the future financial health of the town why won't the BOE act on this? It makes sense on so many levels to combine the finance and maintenance functions and to not do it is snubbing your nose at obvious long term reoccurring savings year after year.
It would take leadership and it would not be easy. But the majority on the board could make it happen and benefit the school system in our town. Stop bickering and get to work.
Remember the two million in disappearing surplus from last years bear bones budget? Does this not make you ask any questions? There is nothing in this budget that cannot be managed and overseen to be reduced or eliminated with minimal impact on the total system? None what so ever? Really………..none?
The administration has made it perfectly clear in the past that if push comes to shove they will take frustration out on our kids instead of making difficult and time consuming choices. If this is allowed to happen again you will not have a majority of evil Republicans on the BOE to scapegoat this time.
Remember only Nixon could go to China. Do the community a favor. Dig in and find the waste.
Quit blaming other people for the BOE’s total lack of initiative and leadership and take some responsibility.
Amen!
"Only Nixon could go to China?"
What does that mean? Did LBJ lose his plane ticket? They wouldn't allow Agnew?
Actually, since the Mayor set the meeting - as a political stunt - then she needs to continue the process. If I read your analogy correctly, then she is the only "Nixon" in town. As the leader, she must take that step.
Bet she won't do it...
I do believe that the BOE would receive more support from the community if they presented us wth "actual" numbers. The public never gets to see those. Plus it was in very poor form for them to hold a meeting the same night as the Mayor was presenting her budget. After all, they are part of the process and should at least appear interested.
Plus...the BOE has never been cut...only their wish list!
I do not believe that the Mayor set a meeting as a political stunt. That's not her style. She needed to pull some tricks to beat Larry Stillman?? C'mon. Provide some proof.
Google "only nixon could go to china..." if you do not understand what it means, but please for the the third time what is the BOE and PTO objection to combining the duplicate functions? The concept has been introduced, why does the BOE resist by not acting? The Mayor has broached the subject on numerous times. Is she not asking the right way? Does she have to say mother may I? Why is the BOE stalling. Where are the calls from the PTO to cut the waste and benefit the children with the savings?
Don't tell me about how the PTO is not qualified to make such suggestions. Most of them are barely qualified to make balloon arches but it never stops them from endorsing canidates, endorsing the budget with high drama or calling for more hiring in the face of decreasing enrollment.
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