(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 spend the $2-million, demanded more than one alternative from staff.
At the same meeting, an expert on population growth described the lack of expected growth in the student population due to the economy, saying there would be minimal growth in new students for awhile. Keep in mind that new families may bring new students every year to new home developments, but also that another class of kids graduates from each school level and moves up. Thus growth in new, young students was not expected to exceed the loss of students moving up to other grades or graduating.
The next meeting, school district staff brought back several alternatives, with data, and an active charter school consultant furnished another alternative. The plan selected then was to re-zone part of the Grassy Lake students so they would be given a choice to transfer to Minneola charter school, or go to Astatula elementary which was about 12 miles away.
The Board was told that portables could not be used because available land was subject to some environmental regulation to protect "skinks". A skink is a LIZARD and one internet article says there are 600-800 types. So, this is also a lesson in how absurd environmental regulations are in Florida, that a school cannot expand in order to protect one of 800 types of lizards.
So, the plan was set, and a public hearing was scheduled for last Thursday at East Ridge elementary in a large room. Parents of 700 Grassy Lake students were sent letters explaining the plan and details on the meeting. I attended that meeting, and more than 100 parents attended, and 20 parents gave public input, some quite emotional, on reasons why THEIR kid shouldn't be rezoned. Reasons included:
- they only lived 1 mile from Grassy Lake, so why be transferred to a school 11 miles away?
- the parents bought their house specifically so their kid could go to Grassy Lake.
- Apparently, the School District cannot require students to attend a charter school, so it was only an option (which they knew), but parents didn't like the only other choice provided which was Astatula elementary which was 11 miles away.
- when Minneola school was opened, apparently many parents chose Minneola over Grassy Lake (I think), but were turned down, so why now reverse that and be sent back to Minneola?
- other schools were not given as an option, like Clermont and others.
- students at Grassy Lake included some who lived out of the area and had waivers to attend there. Why shouldn't they be transferred first.
and it went on... the emotionalism was high, especially when I and two other fiscal conservatives commended the Board for saving the $2-million and supported the expected decision.
At the same time, I heard conflicting information on how many parents had agreed already to transfer their kids to Minneola from Grassy Lake. At the end of the meeting, Kyleen Fisher once again asked for more information regarding some points made by parents.
So, the decision was put off until today's workshop, when staff members provided four new "scenarios", including an entirely new one, which was then approved by Howard, Fischer and Miller, then joined by Brandeburg and Stivender (under protest):
- No kids would be transferred.
- The School District would lease five portable classrooms to take care of the excess students.
- A new ABC (Advisory Boundaries Committee) would be established with two appointees from the Grassy Lake area from each Board member. It would take public comment and come up with a future, community generated plan for South County to handle capacity problems.
The result - the Board got out of any more screaming sessions and formed a committee to run them. But, they pushed off a $2-million expenditure. The cost of the five portables was $86,000 for the first year, and then $50,000 annually for a lease. They would be placed on the section of land originally intended for the $2-million construction. Magically, the skinks were no longer a problem - no one explained why, so now portables could be used. I am guessing that before, staff only considered extra land behind the school affected by the skinks, and not the space intended for the new construction, which is right next to the school. If so, that was another lession in using out of the box thinking.
Conclusion
- The series of meetings forced staff to provide alternatives to control costs and they found a number of them. Staff should be providing these alternatives to start, and shouldn't just arrive at meetings with a big spending plan.
- Thanks to Tod Howard for being persistent in trying to reduce school costs, and to Jim Miller for supporting his fiscal conservative approach to spending. Kyleen Fischer should be congratulated for twice demanding staff bring back alternatives, and they finally found a workable one.
- Thanks to the skinks for not being a problem for the new portables alternative.
- Thanks to the members of the South Lake 912/Tea Party and the North Lake County Tea party for attending meeting to give support to fiscal conservative Board members in controlling expenditures.
- Thanks to the process and parents who showed up at the public workshop last Thursday. By voicing new issues, rather than just emotional pleas, some facilitated the process that arrived at the final conclusion. Their feedback clearly generated the idea to create the ABC committee. But, hopefully, that committee will not be loaded with parents who do not consider the cost trade offs of school zoning issues vs developer demands to load up new schools with excess students.
- Not much thanks go to Board members Rosanne Brandeburg and Debbie Stivender who consistently refused the cost reduction alternatives. Instead, in this economy, with all the cost pressures on the School Board, they insisted to the last minute to blithely spend $2-million in tax funds vs portables or re-zoning. Brandeburg was even featured in the TV interview below, but it seems like spending taxpayer money is not a problem. You have to wonder whether they think they also represent the taxpayers, or only constant spending to make parents and teachers happy. Remember, if cost controls are important to you, both Brandeburg and Stivender are up for re-election next year. Or, if you like spending taxpayer funds without solid justification (in my opinion), then you know who to vote for.
- At today's meeting, one person researched why attendance was shrinking at Minneola elementary, and she said it was that most people were having to move out of Lake County to find work. Co-incidentally, I read a report where food price inflation was 6%, which was huge, and as more inflation occurs, more people will have shrinking incomes and may lose their homes. I have a separate post on inflation. Again, a reason not to spend $2-million in this economy.
The only news reporter at the meeting today that I recognized was Channel 9's Berndt Petersen, and here is his TV report:
http://www.wftv.com/countybycounty/27589226/detail.html
Vance Jochim
FiscalRangers AT comcast DOT net
