Fiscal Rangers

Fiscal Rangers Alert: Political & Government Events This Week in Lake County, FL

Tavares, FL - Sept. 11, 2011 - Here are upcoming events this week and calls for action (especially for the SECOND Hospital District meeting this Wednesday evening). Yes, I know it is late notice for School District meetings today, so next time, check out their agendas yourself on their website!! Monday, Sept. 12: Lake County School District - THREE meetings today - find them at the School Board website HERE - scroll down to see the "Calendar Events" but ALSO click at the TOP of the left column on "Board Docs" to get the detailed agendas and attachments. The Calendar and Board Docs are two separate systems, and they may not be consistent. 2:00 pm today: School District Workshop at the LCSD HQ on HWY 441 (The Calendar says 2:30 and no agenda will open, but the Board Docs agenda says 2pm - they rarely reconcile these to be consistent) They will be reviewing Charter School applications for two proposed charter schools (you can actually see and download the applications from the Board Docs agenda section), an update on the Florida Virtual (online) School program, a budget review (the final approval is tonight at 5:30 pm), a Reorg of the... Read more →

Lake County Redistricting for Lake County & School District - See maps here

Note: This report is a work in progress - I will add more details to THIS page during the next week, including dates of public hearings, link to news articles, additions to the "issues" lists. If YOU have a comment regarding the proposed district boundary maps, post it under this article and I may add it to the article. My intention is to include all issues and info so residents can use it to send comments to the respective board members or make public input statements at the public hearings that will be scheduled in about two weeks to select district boundaries. I would also recommend you ASK your elected official what they think, because there may be other considerations they know about. Tavares, FL - August 19, 2011 - This article is about the LOCAL Lake County district boundaries that will be changing for the County Commissioners AND for the Lake County School Board. Political boundaries must be changed every 10 years per State law to equalize the current population in the new districts. Lake County now has about 280,000 residents, so district boundaries must be redrawn so each of the five districts is about one fifth of the... Read more →

Lake County Upcoming Government Issues for this Week - August 8

Tavares, FL - August 8, 2011 - Below are issues to be discussed by the Lake County Board and the Lake County School Board at their meetings this week, with my comments thrown in... Today - Monday - Lake County School District - go to their website HERE and view the "Board Docs" section for agendas and attachments, if any. A-1. School District Workshop at 2pm, TODAY, Monday, at School District building on HWY 441 This is a short workshop with the following topics, with my comments, if any: 2. TOPICS 2.01 Transportation Update From Lake County Public Works (Ross Pluta and Seth Lynch, Engineers) 2.02 Update to Capital Budget (Harry Fix, Director of Growth Planning) - NOTE: There IS an 8-page attachment which is a revised 2011-2012 Capital spending budget on the online agenda page in "Board Docs" It basically defers several construction projects due to the lack of funding. 2.03 Restructuring of Auditing Department (Susan Moxley, Superintendent) - This is interesting - the Board just last week agreed (I think) to continue the contract of the existing District Auditor, but attendees at the meeting said that two Board members said they could't understand his presentation. For the last... Read more →

Lake County School District's Local SEIU Union is part of Questionable National Union

Tavares, FL - July 20, 2011 - The Lake County School District has two unions, the LEA or Lake Educators' Association, and the SEIU, which is part of the large national government employee union that is known for aggressive tactics and pro-communist demonstrations in some states. Florida is a "Right to Work" state, thus workers cannot be forced to join unions and pay dues. Here in Lake County I heard at one meeting that perhaps 55% of School District workers are union members, but I haven't seen any official counts. The local SEIU Union is fairly reasonable, and not known for the questionable tactics used in other states. But, being part of the SEIU "family", they DO get information from the National that is questionable. Read this article about how the SEIU National Union has a "Contract Campaign Manual" that "encourages union members to use coercion and scare tactics to intimidate managers and corporate authority figures in the private sector." This is one reason why elected officials and administrative staff, AND voters need to be aware of intimidation tactics distributed by the SEIU parent union. It is really important to realize that many SEIU chapters and the National Union believe... Read more →

Channel 9 TV Quotes FiscalRangers in Report on Impact Fee Waivers by Lake County Governments

Tavares, FL - July 20, 2009 - Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose. Here is a Channel 9 report by Bernt Petersen on the issue of the value of waiving impact fees by local Lake County Governments. They got me questioning the value of the waivers, and they have quotes from local officials and staff supporting the waivers. http://www.wftv.com/news/28601741/detail.html What this all comes down to is whether you believe developers of new homes and business buildings should contribute impact fees EARLY towards the roads, schools and other infrastructure growth needs caused by that construction. Or should there be no impact fees attached to new construction, and ALL existing taxpayers keep getting taxed via sales taxes, property taxes and fuel taxes to pay for additional infrastructure needed by residents of the newly constructed buildings. Keep in mind that "new Infrastructure" is not the same as maintenance costs on existing roads, etc. which SHOULD be paid by property taxes, fuel taxes and sales taxes. Developers don't want to pay for any of those upfront costs, they want you to pay for it. Read it and post a comment. The video clip would not work on my computer, but the text is there... Read more →

Fiscal Rangers blog author to Host Lake County Roundtable Radio Show Wednesday

Tavares, FL - July 11, 2011 - Vance Jochim, author of this FiscalRangers.com blog will be the host for Ralph Smith's Lake County Roundtable weekly radio program this Wednesday at WLBE AM 790 at 11am to noon. WLBE is on Radio Road in Leesburg near the Lake Shopping Center. Ralph is on a road trip to the rockies, and I will be hosting the program, and naturally, focus on local Lake County government issues. Topics to be decided, and I will post them here sometime tomorrow, Tuesday. vj Read more →

Yippee!! Lake County School Board Unveils New, Better Budget Format

Tavares, FL - July 11, 2012 - Until now, the only way to look at the details for the budget of the Lake County, FL School District was to pay over $100 to get a printed copy. Otherwise, you could only look at a gobbledegook 20 page summary, or visit the Florida State Education Dept. and look at their 40 page summary version. But, today, the School Board had the first in a series of budget review workshops and CFO Carol MacLeod unveiled a new version, all online (see link below) or go to the main LCSD website at http://lake.k12.fl.us and click departments, then Finance, then 2011-2012 Budget to see a page listing all the sections with links to each section. Not all sections are available yet, and only some were covered today as an introduction for the Board. I will add my summary of the presentation HERE later this week or by the weekend. NOTE: Tomorrow, July 2, the School Board will have a "retreat" to talk about other issues I described in another recent posting on this blog. Or, get the agenda from the Calendar or Board Docs section of the School District website HERE. Important: This workshop... Read more →

Lake County Government Update - Upcoming Workshop & ACTION REQUESTS

Tavares, FL - July 7, 2011 - UPDATED Jul 9 to add more School District meeting info This is an update on: 1. The recent meeting of the Lake County, Florida Board of Commissioners 2. Next week's Lake County Board workshop on Tuesday, July 12. BE SURE to READ my ACTION requests and go to the meeting. 3. A brief update on the Lake County School Board issues and all THREE meetings for them next week. READ the next meeting section below on the July 12 workshop, PLAN to go to it, AND act on our ACTION REQUESTS described below. Important issues will be discussed at the workshop. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Recent Lake County Board Meeting - last Tuesday, July 5th - Find the agenda HERE with attachments, if any, under "tabs" Tab 23: Firefighter's Union Agreement - The Board snuck through an approval listed in the agenda tab 23 as "Recommend approval ... of the attached Collective Bargaining Agreement" for a new one year fire fighter's union wage and benefit agreement without any prior public meetings. The Board had several SECRET "executive sessions" to discuss the contract, but no public meetings. They posted the 55+ page contract, but NO INDICATION... Read more →

Are Ethics of Elected Officials and Government Improving in Lake County?

Tavares, FL - July 7, 2011 - Ethics may slowly be improving in Lake County... So there was this high level official in the State of New York who forced internal staff to issue a $100,000 grant to a firm that had hired his wife as a consultant. But, he got caught, and was fired after the IG started their investigation. And, we have read about Orlando officials on a Board steering large service contracts to their own firms. Gee, it reminds me of a local Lake County official who I was told funneled campaign funds to a firm that employed his wife. But, knowing Florida, maybe it is legal here? Or, the rumors I hear about another elected official who got a house or land for much less than the owner paid for it? Perhaps for ruling on important issues? Of course, that could only be a rumor from political opponents... Or, the elected official who works full time for another government agency, but still takes time off for election campaigning and elected duties. Taking time off from your own business is one thing, but doing it while an apparent full time government employee is another thing. We don't... Read more →

Will Florida Teacher's Lawsuit to HALT 3% Pension Contributions Cost Lake Governments $6 to 9-million?$

Tavares, FL - June 28, 2011 - A recent Teacher's union lawsuit might increase local Lake County and School District budget shortfalls by an estimated $6-9 million dollars. The Florida Teacher's Union just sued Florida State to halt the planned 3% pension contribution by all employees, which is required by a new law initiated by Florida Governor Rick Scott. Previously, that expense was paid by the employer, such as local County governments and School Districts. As a consequence, they planned to save the estimated $6-9-million because employees would be paying the contribution, and have already factored the savings into budget plans. Now those savings might vaporize. HERE is the latest news on the lawsuit - court date set for October. I estimate that the lawsuit, if successful, could increase budget shortfalls for the Lake County school district by $3-4 million and Lake County government (including Constitutional officers) by an estimated $3-5-million (they have fewer employees). I use estimates because I don't have the actual dollar effects, but the lawsuit causes a number of "dominos" to fall in local (as well as State) government budget plans and could significantly raise current budget shortfall predictions. The School District made it extremely hard... Read more →

Maryland County's Inspector General to Examine School Budget Systems after Failure to Disclose $14-million Surplus

It seems that School District staff in Montgomery, MD failed to notify County council members BEFORE they approved the new annual budget of a $14.5-million surplus in funds due to savings in employee benefit expenses. And, they found that the staff knew of the surplus cash before the budget agreements were reached. Most times we hear about fiscal fiascos where government agencies later discover more expenses than planned in the budget, but this is a surplus. Why would they hide the surplus and not disclose it to elected officials setting the budget? - Plain mistakes. - Plans to save the funds for some favored project or wage hikes later in the new budget year. - Prevent elected officials from allocating the funds to projects not supported by staff or other elected officials. But, by not disclosing the surplus funds, credibility of budget and financial processes and reports from staff are questionable, which is why the County Inspector General (no such position exists in most Florida Counties) decided to review the Districts financial reporting. Budget methods are NOT standardized like annual financial statements, and it is easy for staff to snafu, or purposely not disclose certain items since independent oversight on... Read more →

FiscalRangers.com Weekly Alert on Local Lake County Government Activities

Tavares, FL - Monday, June 13, 2011 - This was sent out yesterday by email, but I have included some important revisions: - Tuesday School District Board 1PM "Retreat" CANCELED: I was notified this morning that the School Board retreat on Tuesday afternoon was CANCELED since the funeral for Tod Howard's son is Tuesday. However, last night it was still on the School Board website, and is still there this Monday morning. - Former Florida Senator Carey Baker will be speaking at the Wednesday evening Tea Party meeting, not Alan Hays. Hays postponed his appearance last week. Baker currently does not have a political office, but rumors are he is running for a local County Constitutional office. - I revised the wording in the discussion of overhead on the Lake County Fire Assessment District discussion in the County section below to clarify it. - The numbering is off due to this blog software not converting properly. Sorry 'bout that. vj Lake County School District Board a. Condolences to School District Board Member Tod Howard and his wife Ginger for the loss of their son in a car accident last week. See article HERE. Last week, the Board approved a new... Read more →

Florida Government Workers gripe about paying 3% towards Pensions, but in Louisiana, it is 11%

Florida Governor Scott recently passed a budget that included a requirement that Florida State and most local employees, who all belong to a central pension fund, finally start contributing 3% of wages towards the pension fund. Maybe they haven't checked other states before they gripe - Louisiana government employees were paying 8%, and now it has been bumped up to 11% in a budget plan by the Louisiana governor, Bobby Jindal. They also stopped giving automatic 4% merit increases. Both changes are in the budget plan, but we don't know if it will actually pass. "Under the ( Louisiana State ) plan, state workers would pay more toward their pension plans, with their contribution rising from the current 8% to 11%, a move anticipated to save $24 million.[18]" vj http://sunshinereview.org/index.php/Louisiana_state_budget Read more →

How do Lake County Schools Compare to South Carolina in Spending Transparency?

Updated 8:30 pm with new information from the CFO of Lake County Schools. Tavares, FL - May 24, 2011 - A South Carolina blog just reported that South Carolina last year required that School Districts disclose their budget details and spending details, and now, all but two districts are doing so. One of the two holdouts has a $195-million budget, but refuses to pay the $2000+ setup and $2000+ annual costs to produce the reports unless the State Controller pays the costs. In comparison, until last year, Florida had not implemented any such budget or spending transparency requirement of School Districts, although a pilot program was being planned. Before March of this year, the last time I asked, the Lake County School District's (LCSD) CFO refused to even provide us a DETAILED electronic version of the pending budget or the final version from the current year. She only published a short budget summary about 20 pages in length. She would only SELL you a printed version of the pending or final budget details at a cost of over $100. I wrote an earlier article on the lack of local School District transparency and provided examples of other Districts that WERE... Read more →

Lake County School Board Will be Asked to SUPPORT the Orlando Sunrail program, considered to be a tax boondoggle by many

Updates added at 5 and 8pm Friday. Tavares, FL - May 20, 2011 - The Lake County School Board has been asked by the local MPO (Metropolitan Planning Organization) to discuss issuing a resolution at their Monday evening meeting (May 23) supporting the Sunrail railroad corporate welfare program (my opinion) and sending it to Governor Scott. Lat night, the City of Eustis killed a similar resolution brought to them. Here are the details and what you can do about it, if you have concerns about Sunrail. The Lake County School board posts the agenda for their next meeting on their website in the “Board Docs” section. That agenda can be found by clicking the May 23 date HERE: http://www.boarddocs.com/fla/lake/board.nsf/Public Some members of the Tea Party, who do not support Sunrail, noticed that agenda item 4.04 was for a resolution related to supporting Sunrail, which is not favored by many locals. If you use Board Docs, and click on agenda entry 4.04, you will see some background, plus a cover memo and a draft resolution are attached. READ them first to understand what the Board is being asked to approve. Update 8:30 pm: If you want more background on why Gov.... Read more →

Today's Lake County School Board Meeting Covers Important Issues

Tavares, FL - May 2, 2011 - Below is an early alert I sent out to FiscalRangers insiders. The topics at today's Lake County, FL School Board meeting are School Uniforms (at left is one option for school uniforms -our nomination), Budget Updates & new staffing levels, the "no body will say the true cost" wellness centers, and new Charter school policies where staff also fail to disclose how much they have lost per kid in charter schools by not charging for various services. (At left is one option for school uniforms -our nomination). I since have been able to review attachments on the District website for some of the issues, and have added updated comments in RED below. I will post more comments AFTER the meeting in GREEN. vj Here is a link to the agenda: http://lake.k12.fl.us/lakeschools/lib/16511033164838940%5C_CalAttachments%5CAGENspecial2011.05.02.pdf If you want document supporting the agenda items, you have to go the the Board menu, select Board Docs, ( http://www.boarddocs.com/fla/lake/board.nsf/Public )then click the agenda for today’s meeting. Any supporting documents (not always provided) for the agenda items will be available as attachments. I have NOT had a chance to review the supporting documents, so my text below might not match what... Read more →

Lake County School Board Avoids Screaming Grassy Hill Mob and Saves $2-million

(Note: This is from memory, but I think most of it is accurate...vj) Monday, April 18, 2011 - Tavares, FL - It isn't easy, but today, at a 2pm Lake County School District workshop, your Lake County School Board, the School Superintendent Dr. Moxley and several staff members including Harry Fix, found a way to avoid a Grassy Hill elementary parent riot and still save $2-million. The parent riot picture at left is not from Grassy Lake elementary! Remember that issue of Grassy Lake elementary, and how they were over capacity, and initially staff wanted the School Board to spend $2-million to add more class space? The Board was ready about two months ago to approve the $2-million based upon staff recommendations, and school staff talked about how they couldn't use the music room, and other reasons. Then Board member Tod Howard, a true fiscal conservative and Fiscal Ranger hero, used out of the box thinking and asked why couldn't they re-assign the excess 100-125 kids to nearby schools that had available space. Board member Jim Miller agreed. It took Tod several meetings before Board member Kyleen Fischer, rather than voting with big spending Rosanne Brandeburg and Debbie Stivender to... Read more →

Understanding Local Corporate Welfare & Identifying True Fiscal Conservatives

Tavares, FL - April 13, 2011 - Today, I gave a presentation at the Lake Federation Republican Women's Club in Tavares. It was on these two topics: - Understanding Corporate Welfare and Local Lake County Examples - Identifying Behaviors of True Fiscal Conservatives (vs liberals or Republicans in Name Only). Attached is the Powerpoint slide presentation. It has over 20 specific fiscal conservative actions that I recommend for elected officials to show they actually are fiscal conservatives. Download 2011-04-13 LFRWC Preso Enjoy. Vance Jochim FiscalRangers AT Comcast DOT net Read more →

Florida Government Agencies should be Mandated to Use Charts Like This

Tavares, FL - Apr. 11, 2011 - In Lake County, FL , I have been watching union negotiations for wages. I have been preaching for maybe two years that the Administration and Board of the Lake County School District (and the Board of the County Commissioners) should develop statistics like the chart referenced on the link below. http://thathero.com/2011/04/11/oea-shared-sacrifice/ It is about Ohio wage patterns, and shows average wages of both union and private industry workers. Such charts should be mandatory for use when any government agency starts setting wage and benefits for government workers. Now, the chart is for Ohio, which is not a right to work State (Florida is), so the disparities between union and private wages are larger than you would find in Florida, but the idea is that no goverment elected officials should approve any wage and benefit increases without comparing trends like this, and for unemployment, benefits, pensions, etc. Government employees need to be paid within reason, and not excessively. vj Read more →

Lake County Board Approves Builder Welfare 15 month School Impact Fee Moratorium

7pm update - added estimates of potential lost revenue to the School District. 2:20 pm - Updated with added thoughts in a PS section at the end of this document. Tavares, FL - Apr. 5, 2011 - The Board of Commissioners (BCC) of the Lake County Government, after a one hour discussion, voted 5 to 0 against existing property owners and the School Board by more than doubling the length of time for a proposed moratorium on School impact fees. The approved time frame is from Jan. 1, 2011 (retroactive) to April 1, 2012, or 15 months. The Board essentially voted for Builder welfare over homeowner and education interests. School impact fees are around $9,324 per NEW residence, and the funds are intended for school construction due to increased population allowed by the addition of new homes. They are a major source of funding for the Schools to build new schools and to meet demands of population growth. HERE is the link to the list of all impact fees. The value of existing and foreclosed homes was therefore just reduced by $9,000 or more because new homes can be sold for lower values to compete with the existing and foreclosed... Read more →

Quote from Plato for taxpayers

One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors. Plato Subscribe to fiscalrangers.com and "Like" our "FiscalRangers" Facebook page, and add it to your favorite links. Read more →

Why I have stopped monitoring the Lake County School District - the Morlocks are coming...

Note: If you want to get early notice on our blog posts, and you are a Facebook member, search on "FiscalRangers" to find our page on Facebook, and BOTH "Like" it, and add the page to your favorite Facebook page list. Tavares, FL - March 17, 2011 - I have given up on monitoring fiscal issues for the Lake County, FL school district. I can’t do much more after 4 years of attending Board meetings, giving public input and posting analysis on this blog without being on the inside. A fiscal Tsunami is heading their way… and I keep comparing the School District staff and practices to the book Time Machine by HG Wells, where the flower children Eloi lived on the surface, and at night the cave dweller Morlocks came out and ate them. Hounding the School District are Fiscal Morlock projects to: - reduce property taxes under local control to sales taxes revenues under State Control, - complaints from businesses about education quality (which may or may not be justified - I personally think it is partly a marketing problem), - unrealisting demands from unions from "missed" step increases not based upon current economic trend data, and continuing... Read more →

Seattle School Board FIRES School Superintendent for LACK of Management Oversight

So, you think as a government Senior manager you can't get fired? Well, after being rocked by a construction contract scandal, the Seattle School Board fired their Superintendent for not adequately supervising a manager who skimmed all sorts of funds. They ALSO fired the CFO. The firings took place after the Washington STATE auditors issued a report. Some of the findings included: - A manager over a "small business" setaside program created a company with the same name as the program, then cashed a check for $35,000 from the District school funds. - The audit found that, through the District's small business program that the unsupervised manager managed, the District paid: $1,519,965.34 for services with a questionable public purpose $280,005.25 for services it did not receive and for services that benefitted a private company. Apparently, they had really loose controls over payments less than $35,000. READ the blog report from a construction consultant HERE about the firing. READ the EARLIER blog posting HERE that lists more details and lists many weblinks to articles about the scandals. Favorite Quotes: "The school board's action of dismissing Supeintendent Goodloe-Johnson, came as the board attempted to restore the public's confidence in a district shaken... Read more →

Local Lake County (FL) School Teachers Should NOT get "Makeup" Step Increases

I was not at the recent Board meeting of the Lake County School District Board, but heard many teachers showed up to support their demands to "makeup" automatic step increases. These are basically a hidden increase that is normally automatic for many government agencies. You always hear about the annual wage hikes as a percent (like the 1.5% wage hike that was pushed through last year, even though we were in a recession), but there are also "step increases". You might say they are based on seniority, and higher paid teachers get significant increases. But, two years ago, the School Board, in a moment of fiscal sanity, put a hold on the step increases to reflect the reality of a down market, and lower revenues. In the years I have been observing government activities, the unions almost always consider the amount on hold to be an IOU, and demand it be "made up" later. This is not reality. Corporations do not do that, unless they have strong unions who force them - then employess wonder why the products made by their company are not price competitive and their work is moved overseas. In the past few weeks, I have attended... Read more →

Lake County Schools Could Improve transparency like these four school districts

Tuesday, Mar. 1, 2011 - Tavares, FL - Today is Tuesday, and after 3 hours at a County Board meeting and my mind turning to fudge after listening to rhetoric about why the taxpayers should spend $9-million on a new Emergency Ops Center (which passed 3-2 - see my next blog posting), I thought I would write about School District transparency... One method of providing spending transparency is for a government agency to provide a copy of their "checkbook" ( aka check register or payables listing) online. Below, we provide three examples. Are you listening, Lake County (FL) School District? LCSD refuses to even provide an electronic version of their detailed budget online, much less their checkbook (records of all spending and payments). HERE is the only budget version we Lake County FL taxpayers can get online, which is only 21 pages long and in a "standard" regulatory format not understandable to 95% of taxpayers. In contrast, here are examples of 4 random School Districts with much better transparency, including the posting of more detailed budgets and checkbook registers online (for 3 of the 4). A. Wichita, Kansas School District Places Checkbook Register Online The article describing it is here:... Read more →

Wall St. Journal: California Government Workers Paid 30% More than Private Sector Workers

Finally, someone did an analysis reported by the Wall St. Journal that describes what the true differential is between Public and Private Workers, and calls the Public workers on the Gravy Train... The study was based on California public workers, and also identifies missing components not described in another study from Berkeley. Here is an overview: - Actual wages are below private workers in BIG corporations by about 4%, but just about even if you compare all private worker pay (small and large employers). - Value of defined benefit pensions is about 4% higher for government workers because they are promised SPECIFIC levels based upon 8% earnings vs most corporations use 401k programs where the employee gets maybe 4%, and it is not a promised amount (defined benefit). - Retiree health benefits - about 90% of public plans offer retiree health benefits while pirvate sector employees rarely get them, AND government workers can start getting them when they retire in their 50's, while private sector plans rarely cover anything until a much later retirement age. State actuarial reports for California indicate the retiree health benefits could another 8% in compensation value. - Adding the values of the above pension and... Read more →

Lake School District hasn't tracked costs and losses per child in Charter Schools

I attended an afternoon Lake County School District workshop today and it went for several hours which I will describe this weekend in another post here . But, for 3+ years I have been suggesting they needed to calculate the loss per child for charter schools, and today they had a presentation and the losses may be bigger than even I thought. The major reason is that State law says the School Districts can only charge a 5% admin fee and must pass through all the rest of the per chiid funding from the State to the charter schools. It turns out that for the 10 charter schools, the School District is only allowed by the State to keep 5% of the annual per child collections for the first 250 kids at a school. But several of the schools have up to 800 kids, so the School District doesn't get ANY funds for administration for various services they must provide to the charter schools for any kids over the 250 count Until last year the cutoff was 500, but now the law lowered the cutoff limit to 250. That State "unfunded mandate" cost the School District a reduction of about... Read more →

Ohio Schools Business Manager to be Sentenced for Bribery, Embezzlement & Theft

I add this article as a case study of one type of corruption possible in local government or School Districts. In this case, a School District Business Manager apparently was able to embezzle funds from the sale of school owned construction equipment. vj AKRON -- Former Maple Heights schools official Steve Canepa, who most recently worked for the West Geauga schools, will be sentenced Monday in federal court on Cuyahoga County corruption-related counts tied to his former Maple Heights job. Canepa, 43, of Mantua, was charged with three counts related to bribery, and one each for theft and mail fraud. He is admitting the theft charge but pleaded not guilty when he was first charged with all five counts. He will appear Monday before U.S. District Judge John Adams. His attorney, Mark Marein, said Canepa only committed one of the five crimes he is accused of. Prosecutors claim Canepa embezzled proceeds from the 2008 sale of a boom lift used for construction and owned by the Maple Heights school system. Canepa resigned from West Geauga on Aug. 23 but had been on medical leave since May. Canepa cited personal matters for his departure and thanked the school board and others... Read more →

Lake County Impact Fees - Should they be VARIABLE based on distance to infrastructure?

Note: If you are a Facebook member, and want to get frequent updates from our "FiscalRangers" facebook page, go HERE and "like" us.! In Lake County, our impact fees for new construction of houses and commercial buildings are fixed based upon sq ft and property type. The impact fee revenue is used to pay for added roads, schools, fire stations, and parks to handle the increased population. However, the impact fees are FIXED bacause there is no variable rate based upon distance from existing schools or defined population or commercial centers. Thus someone who develops a 400 unit housing development in a town near an existing school pays the same as someone who creates a new development in the boonies, 25 miles from existing schools or towns. The distance means that the County must build new schools and roads to handle the distant population. It seems to me that environmentalists want town centric development, and land owners, development attorneys, certain lumber yard owners and builders want the ability to create developments anywhere in Lake County, and not pay ANY impact fees. They want to shift the cost of new infrastructure to ALL taxpayers by using gas taxes or increased general... Read more →

Osceola County Board Fires Four Staff which costs $800,000 in Severance

It is interesting to watch how fast some officials can fire a government manager, without regard to the cost of severance to the taxpayers. Below is an article about how the Osceola County Board cost the taxpayers $800,000 in severance pay by firing four people recently. My thought is that taxpayers need protection not from dumb or inefficient staff, but from dumb officials who don't try a mediation or counseling process, or anything. Now, of course, it could be that issues had been festering for months or years, and if so, the facts need to be disclosed better than a few quotes in the newspaper. My primary issues with this process of elected officials firing people is: - The allowed severances are way too high. They should be much lower. Why is it that government agencies allow such high severances in comparison to business? Is it because "it is not their money, but the taxpayer's money? Severance and termination policies should match those used by similar size industrial or corporate firms. (not non-profits). The Orlando Sentinel editorial at the bottom of this document describes how one agency limited severance to three months in a new manager's contract. In the case... Read more →

When will Lake County, Cities & School District Integrate Purchasing Efforts?

Tavares, Lake County, FL: The picture at left shows a typical paperwork based purchasing process - and we ask: do we in Lake County need to repeat that convoluted process with duplicative and separate systems (and several may be manual, not computerized) in each Lake County government Agency? Why don't they all share a single, internet based purchasing system running in the "internet cloud"? Why don't they consolidate County wide purchases to achieve economies of scale like corporations do on a daily basis? Local government purchasing departments have an annual fair for vendors to talk to representatives from the purchasing departments of many local Lake County agencies. I have attended the last two. I registered as a vendor (consulting) at the first fair, but never heard anything for about a year, but now I get a notice about once every two months for a request for proposal that is not relevant. The "leaders" of the purchasing fair created a "Pooled Purchasing" website called "Procurement Offices of LAKE" (POOL) within the Lake County website at http://pool.lakecountyfl.gov/ , and it is listed on the County's "Doing Business in Lake County" website. BUT, if you look at it, it hasn't been updated at... Read more →

Cost Reduction Ideas We Have Submitted to new FL Governor Rick Scott

Florida Governor-elect Rick Scott has a transition website and a webpage to collect ideas from the public to reduce Florida government costs. It is HERE at http://www.scotttransition.com/send-your-ideas/ . Here are some ideas I submitted - I will add more as I do them. 2010-12-09 - Establishment of Independent and Elected County Auditors is Needed Florida counties have no County level department assigned full oversight over performance areas like efficiency, economy or effectiveness. The Auditor General does superficial, low quality financial audits, and the Counties brag about "award winning" CAFR reports and financial audits, but NO ONE is assigned independent review (unlike corporations) of operational metrics, efficiency, and effectiveness to reduce measurable costs. Florida needs to establish tough, mandatory departmental performance metrics, AND establish an independently elected County Auditor like other States have with authority to initiate performance audits of County, Schools, Constitution Officers, Special Districts and Cities. (Note: Some Florida Counties have had so many problems that they established their own County Inspector General - but they are usually run by ex-law enforcement or attorneys and are focused on after the fact investigations of wrongdoing, and not reviewing and improving performance measurement systems BEFORE problems can occur.) 2010-12-09 OPPAGA Needs... Read more →

Governator Elect Rick Scott Establishes High Level Education Reform Committee

In the past, we wrote about actions by then Washington DC Chancellor of Schools, Michelle Rhee, who was turning around the DC schools by firing poor teachers, using merit pay, standing up to union demands and other drastic actions. Now, Rick Scott has selected her as a member of the Education reform transition team for Florida. Wanna bet she is appointed head of the Florida Education system? I would think poor teachers, and teacher unions will get aggravated over this. So, wouldn't you know, the local Lake County School District unions are already asking to start bargaining sessions for next fiscal year's budget allocations for wages and benefits. Unlike businesses, which base wage increases on merit and comparison to economic and competitor statistics, the unions start out by asked how much is in the budget, then go after as much as they can get. It will be interesting to watch what happens, and see if Board members actually use REAL wage and economic data to evaluate the "merit" of any wage increases. (If they did, the wages would be rolled back or benefits reduced and employee contributions for benefits increased.) Here is Scott's transition website and the press release on... Read more →

Lake County School Board STILL Does not Provide an Electronic Copy of their Budget on their Website

I just tried to get an electronic version of the 700 page budget for the Lake County School District. The District only has an absurd, confusing 21 page summary on the website. I was told the detailed budget was not available in electronic file format, but I could pay about $105 to get a printed copy. It is time they put ALL detailed budget documents on the website, including interim working versions. In contrast, the Lake County Board provides their detailed 400 page budget on their website, and the School District Finance Office needs to do the same. Here is a link to the only budget provided by the School District, which is a confusing, "required State format" report of only 21 pages. I have worked for several large firms that always used print to file software (even from mainframe computers) to produce electronic printed versions of large computer reports. These days, most operating systems have print to pdf drivers to create electronic versions of computer reports, and the School District needs to start using them. For instance, HERE is the Palo Alto, California 418 page budget in 27 mb pdf format. HERE is the Chicago Public Schools GUIDE to... Read more →

Lake County School Board workshop today at 2pm - We Review the Agenda

Today's 2pm Lake County Board workshop meeting will discuss several issues and need clarity. You can see the Nov. 29th agenda and look at the agenda details HERE. Click the Nov. 29 agenda selection. The Board is being asked to approve a $2.6-million land purchase with incomplete justification data, and they are being given incomplete justification data on the cost of a proposed wellness clinic system (3 clinics). I found from my reading of the items and some supporting documents: - Item 2.01 - Purchase of two pre-fab toilet buildings for $72,000 ($36,000 each) - This request for approval is for two buildings from a firm in Washington STATE. The purchasing manager avoids any description why she did not get local bids to build these buildings, but instead wants to piggyback on another County (Leon) purchase order to buy buildings from the left coast. WHY? Wasn't there any attempt to see if local contractors could build the needed buildings at a price competitive to the stated cost of $36,000? - Item 2.02 - This is for an inter-local agreement to be discussed by the County attorney, but there are no explanatory attachments or overview or discussion of the purpose. WHY... Read more →

Here Is a Lesson for Lake County FL Government Managers - Don't Give Yourself a SECRET Raise!

About five months ago, the Hillsborough County Florida Commissioners fired their County Administrator after she gave herself and the County Attorney and others a 1% raise without notifying the Board. It took them awhile, but the Board fired the Administrator, Pat Bean, who had worked there 32 years, after discovering the hidden raises. So, local Lake County government managers, don't try to sneak through a staff raise without running it by the elected officials in a public meeting. Read two articles below with the details. vj Here is an early 2009 St. Petersburg Times article explaining the events that led to the firing - apparently the Board was not happy with the Administrator's management skills, saying she was a "reactive" manager. What is interesting is that many of the complaints listed were similar to those about a recent Lake County Manager who was fired last year, and another, still employed, local manager in another agency. However, they did not violate any regulations like in Hillsborough County. Below is an article when Pat Bean was fired around June, 2010. She was fired "with cause" indicating she violated terms of her agreement and not allowed to collect severance of over $220,000. That... Read more →

Lake County Superintendent of Schools Receives Annual Evaluation from Board and Our Comments

The Orlando Sentinel published a short article about a recent employee evaluation of School Supt. Dr. Susan Moxley by the Lake County FL School District Board members. See it HERE. One of the issues noted was the need for improvement of her communications with the media, which is interesting since two of the five Board members had previously voted NO when asked to hire a public information officer. However, the other three Board members DID approve the position, so it was recently filled. Here is an expanded version of what I wrote on the Sentinel's website in response: Regarding the issue of Dr. Moxley improving communications with the media, the District, with approval of 3 Board members, recently hired an experienced public information officer who is issuing first ever press releases, and updates on Board meetings. I know he has helped at least one department improve their presentations to the Board by describing techniques that resulted in the department staff furnishing a more complete, integrated report rather than a series of disconnected documents and background information that many people could not understand. I also expect the District to be more forthcoming with facts to offset incomplete reports in the press,... Read more →

Fiscal Rangers Voting Recommendations for Nov. 2nd Elections for Lake County, FL

Updated Nov. 5 - All our recommended candidates, even Mike Yost, were elected EXCEPT for two of the watchdog candidates for the North Lake Hospital Tax District, Richard Riker and Walt Dobruck. And, stupid voters didn't understand Amendments 5&6 and how they will give the liberal courts power over deciding gerrymandering of political boundaries, and Amendment 8 failed. AND, all the judges were retained, but maybe they got the message. Well, maybe next time! vj Revised and expanded - Wednesday, Oct. 27 - (added more info on FL 5th District Judges, School Board races and Lake County Water Authority races). As we get additional details, we will add them to this document. This document will remain at the top of the blog until after Nov. 2 elections, but scroll down to look for other issues posted after this page was written. vj Here are our recommendations for your votes for the Nov. 2nd ballot, whether you mail it in, vote early, or wait and vote at a precinct polling location on Nov. 2. I recommend you use your sample ballot and fill it in while reading this. You can find your Lake County voting precinct HERE. We do not have... Read more →

Lake County School District Annual Student Show & Innovations - PICTURES

Once a year, the School Board organizes an event before the normal Board meeting to celebrate the performing arts in various schools and to show parents some of the innovations in schools, such as the use of iPads for student work. Maybe they don't publicize it, because it was crowded anyway, and there was some FOOD, provided by the Lake County Schools Foundation. Tonight was that event, which was not publicized that much. I had to call the District offices to verify the location, which was in the Lake County Administration building rotunda. It was a great event to see some of the school innovation and also listen to some of the great performing groups of students in the large, acoutically interesting Rotunda. They had performing groups from several schools, as well as tables from several schools and departments showing innovative teaching and subjects used at some schools. Leesburg High has a science program focused on robotics. I talked to "Crystal" from Leesburg High about their science program, and asked if they have considered adding an optional curriculum in software technology. It is really cheap to get developer's packages for software platforms like Google Docs, or the Android operating systems... Read more →

Corporations are Passing More of Health Insurance Costs to Employees

So, who did the Democrat voters think would pay for THEIR health insurance when they voted for Obama and supported Obamacare? Well, the Wall St. Journal says now corporate employers are passing more of the cost increases on to employees, rather than split the cost increases. Now local, state and federal government agencies need to do the same. The day is over when government employees should get a higher subsidy for health insurance than employees of businesses. Favorite quote: Cost shifting has become the norm for many of the roughly 160 million Americans who receive health insurance through an employer. In the latest survey, 17% of workers at large firms had deductibles over $1,000, compared with 6% who paid that amount before their insurer started to pick up the bill in 2006. At small firms, nearly half of workers had deductibles that high this year, compared with 16% four years ago. vj from the Wall St. Journal HERE Employers Sharply Raise Workers' Share of Health Costs By AVERY JOHNSON Employers passed health-insurance costs onto employees at a sharply higher rate this year, and businesses' premiums grew more slowly than they have in a decade, according to an annual survey of... Read more →

NJ Schools Head Fired Over Lying About Grant Error in Race to Top Competition

In the recent "Race to the Top" funding competition for hundreds of millions of dollars initiated by the Federal Government, Florida recently won one of the top 10 spots to get about $700 million (details HERE). The State of NJ LOST about $400-million in education funds from being one of the top 10 finalists because their Education Dept team screwed up and inserted the wrong budget information in the application. Then, the head of the NJ Education Dept. lied and blamed the Obama Administration for not being flexible. HOWEVER, the Feds had a video of the meeting where the missing data was discussed, indicating that the problem was New Jersey's incomplete application, and not the Feds. So, the NJ Governor FIRED the Education Dept head. Just show, you can't ever trust the Feds to take the blame without some darned video showing up to show you are wrong. Lesson Learned" Don't lie about your mistakes to your government leaders. vj From the NY Times HERE August 27, 2010 New Jersey Schools Chief Fired After Grant Error By SHARON OTTERMAN Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey fired his education commissioner on Friday, just days after the governor said a clerical error... Read more →

Lake School District Better Get Ready for Obama Speech to Kids 2

Today's paper says Obama is going to give another online video speech to "the nation's students" on Sept. 14, so be ready for the controversy over allowing him to do so within school grounds, and the ground rules. He is so untrusted by more than 50% of the population, that this will be a controversy again. Since Obama normally doesn't care what other people think, look for the School Board to notify parents of the issue, and get caught in the middle. Will Obama's local supporters be more organized and try to force lesson plans on teachers to brainwash the kids? I don't know, but Obama opponents should be prepared, and not be surprised if the Democrats try to follow Saul Alinsky's Guide for Radicals and use this as a crisis to demand change in something they want. Just remember, Obama is the one that has not solved any economic issues, pushes funding for rebuilding mosques, pushed through Obamacare without letting people read it, and pushed funding for immigration of Hamas radicals into the US. Do you really believe he should be a role model for students? At the very least, concerned parents should educate their students with FACTS about... Read more →

FiscalRangers Recommendations for August 24 Primaries in Lake County, Florida - Sullivan, Metz, Campione, Parks, Miller, Howard, Fischer need your vote

Below are my recommendations for local Lake County elections (not cities) for: - Lake County Commissioner - Dist 2 and Dist 4 - Lake County School Board - three openings - Congressional Dist. 8 (Alan Grayson is the Dem. incumbent) - Florida State Rep. Dist 25 - Judges - nope - I don't have enough information because it is really hard to find information on Judges, and, they don't really affect most fiscal issues of local government. However, Hodges & Miller are incumbents, and if you don't want incumbents, then go for Lyn & Odette. I have written various postings on specific candidate recommendations, but now need to summarize them and make recommendations on all the positions up for local voters in Lake County to decide. I have attended most School District Board meetings AND workshops (i.e. for budgets) in the last four years, and I have attended most County Commission meetings in the last 18 months. I ran for a while for Lake County Commissioner, District 4, until I realized I didn't have the funds or "army" of supporters like Leslie Campione. My principle guidelines on selecting a candidate are: - They aren't naive or inexperienced in intelligently evaluating... Read more →

Lake County School District Candidate, JoAnn Jones, Has Not Paid Property Taxes since 2008

Updated Sunday, Aug 22 - See details at bottom. So today, there was another Orlando Sentinel article HERE about Lake County School District candidate JoAnn Jones and her not listing overdue property taxes of $65,000 on several properties on her candidate financial disclosure forms, and she has not made property tax payments on their $700k house since 2008. Her husband told them he would pay the fees today. Jones is a very nice lady and teacher who has consistently claimed she had sound business experience, but this doesn't sound good, especially one week before elections. I had been getting emails with links to "proof" on this issue for the last week, but it appears the Sentinel verified the information. Update Aug. 22: The Orlando Sentinel said that Mr. Jones paid $195,000 in overdue back taxes to the County tax collector, leaving only $4200 due on "seven parcels in a sub-division." vj Below is the article, or use the link above... Candidate didn't list $180K in back taxes By Denise-Marie Balona - Orlando Sentinel August 19, 2010 TAVARES — School Board candidate JoAnn Jones and her husband owe about $180,000 in back taxes on several properties they own in Lake, records... Read more →

Candidate Larry Metz Responds to Another Attack by Local Blog

Ok, class, remember these facts about local Lake County elections: - The local blog, "Right Side of the Lake" is written and supported by the CEO of Romac lumber, Don Magruder, and they "don't endorse" political candidates, but they DO attack the opponents of the people they want to be elected. Think of the blog as the voice of the Lake County Homebuilders and Land Developers. (and not all of them agree with his tactics) - Larry Metz is a local attorney who is on the Board of the Lake County School District, and he is running for the office of Florida State Rep for District 25. I have previously written that I support Metz because I have attended most School District Board meetings over the last 4 years and Metz has done a lot to provide direction to reduce costs, shift emotional decision making to fact based decisions, etc. But Metz is now running for Florida State Rep. for District 25, and his opponent is Rick Joyce. Joyce is supported by Magruder. Get the picture? So Right Side has been attacking Metz periodically to help Joyce. The developers want to do several things related to growth, and also shift... Read more →

South Lake Tea Party/912 Candidate Survey Matches my Own Perceptions

I think maybe the South Lake Tea Party siphoned off some of my candidate recommendations. They just had an online survey of their members HERE and seemed to agree with me on just about all Lake County election candidates. I don't know how they did that, because I don't go to their meetings, but we agree about 100% on their survey results. Maybe we are both drinking Niagara water? Go look at the results. Watch this blog for some of the reasons why I made my choices later this week. I do NOT agree with many candidate recommendations from the liberal Orlando Sentinel, but you can also see videos of their interviews of candidates, including the local ones for County Commission HERE (scroll down and look at the right column for the videos). Those are very instructive. But, I have had a problem viewing them because Adobe Flash CRASHES in the middle, then the stupid video player software they use won't let you fast forward back to where the crash occurred, so you have to sit through the entire first part of the interview again to get back to where you were in the video. But, unlike most candidate forums,... Read more →

Lake County School District to Spend $275,000 without any specific performance criteria or "deliverables"

At tomorrow's (Monday) 2pm School Board Workshop, the agenda item #2 HERE is a request for the Board to approve $275,000 for a grant to provide "Mentoring and Student Assistance Initiatives" services to poor performing elementary students over a 9-month period. But, like similar programs in the past, there are no required performance metrics that are measurable. There are no before and after stated goals that are measurable. Instead, there are vague "goals" like these: Goal #1 - Provide mentoring that will impact social development and reading and math achievement for 3rd, 4th and 5th grade most at-risk students. Goal #2 - Provide mentoring that will impact social development and reading and math achievement for 6th to 8th grade students who have been retained one or more years. Goal #3 - Provide mentoring that ensures middle-performing 6-12 students will succeed in rigorous curriculum, participate in school activities, enroll in advanced courses, graduate and be college-ready. Goal #4 - Create a collaborative vision of a community school framework that supports the social emotional development and academic achievement of children from the cradle to career. Goal #5 - Evaluate Mentoring for Success project to inform current and future practice. None of the... Read more →

Fiscal Rangers Alert: I give up on improving management of the Lake County School District

For four years I have gone to Board meetings and workshops of the School District, and given public input, sent emails, and posted ideas on this blog how the School District and the Board could improve management systems to ensure better efficiency, economy and effectiveness using techniques used by much smaller businesses. For the last few weeks, I have made recommendations ignored by the CFO and the Superintendent to provide transparency over budget discussions by providing online or printed copies of the specific budget documents to be discussed at workshops. CFO MacLeod, with or without the knowledge of Superintendent Moxley, has consistently ignored my requests, and she is known for never responding to public records requests from others. Last week, I gave them half a hurray for posting online documents in the "Board Docs" section for some agenda items, but the CFO once again did not provide requested links to the specific department documents to be discussed in the budget updates during workshops. I even sent more specific details to one Board member, who said the links would be provided. But, today I looked at the Board Docs online agenda system HERE for the April 9th School Board Workshop and... Read more →

Fiscal Rangers Endorses Larry Metz for Florida State Representative, Dist. 25

Yesterday, the main editorial board of the Orlando Sentinel endorsed Metz. Then today, the Lake Section had a "front page" article reviewing Metz and his opponent Rick Joyce. My endorsement is based not on what they said, but my observations of Metz as School Board member and Chairman while I have been attending School Board meetings for four years. The guy has a steel trap for a mind. He is able to mentally organize facts (just like an attorney, which he is), and describe the factors to make a decision in a logical manner, then make a recommendation based on those factors. Emotional reasons without substance don't get past him. I have also met and know Rick Joyce through the Republican Executive Committee, and his appearance at some candidate forums, although Metz attends many more REC meetings than Joyce. I have not been able to observe Joyce in leadership positions like Metz. Both Metz and Joyce have their own law firms and specialize in mediation. At Lake County School District Board meetings, I have watched as he Metz championed the creation of an internal audit function AND wrote the policies for both it and the related audit committee (which I... Read more →

New Government Method to Solve Budget Woes - Rollback Salaries

Until now, governments either laid off workers or gave them furloughs to reduce costs, but now, as major economic indicators drop, some are shifting to salary rollbacks. I mean, if property dropped in value, local salaries in business have dropped to 2000 levels, doesn't that mean government workers are overpaid in the current economy and should also be rolled back? And maybe the same tactic for other institutions like Hospitals? This is the next step to consider - salary rollbacks - to balance government budgets, and bring them in line with the private sector that has to pay taxes. vj from the NY Times HERE August 3, 2010 More Workers Face Pay Cuts, Not Furloughs By STEVEN GREENHOUSE The furloughs that popped up during the recession are being replaced by a highly unusual tactic: actual cuts in pay. Local and state governments, as well as some companies, are squeezing their employees to work the same amount for less money in cost-saving measures that are often described as a last-ditch effort to avoid layoffs. A new report on Tuesday showed a slight dip in overall wages and salaries in June, caused partly by employees working fewer hours. Though average hourly pay... Read more →