1. Plenty of money when it suits their agenda. Let's get Booth Gardner on this right away.

Posted by: Organization Man on January 13, 2007 01:31 PM

2. I always vote no on any public school levy as a matter of principal. I'm just doing my bit to destroy public education.

Posted by: Bill K. on January 13, 2007 10:26 PM

3. This is one of the most difficult analyses possible because unlike purely theoretical situations real people are involved. My intellect tells me, gasp, Shark is probably right, but my heart tells me otherwise. The kids left in the system are in effect being held hostage. This levy will probably help some students incrementally. The flaw is the insitutional structure. More money is not going to make a flawed institutional structure better nor will it educate a majority of children to the standard of basic education defined in the RCW, it is kinda like feeding the beast.

The argument for the levy is the same one I made on a prior thread regarding whether people should buy school supplies for low-income children. I believe a poster said many low-income people had cable and videos, so why fund their lifestyle. My counter is children can't pick their parents. I'm sure if they could they would make better choices of parents. Because a parent is brain dead, why deny a kid a chance. Take your $5 and put some supplies in the bin at Freddies. I guess that is the argument for supporting the main levy. Children didn't pick this failing system, they are merely collateral damage to the poor choices of adults. They are "useful idiots" for the politicos that are too involved with their power or too timid to enact school choice.

This is really a tough one because some children will be helped incrementally.

Posted by: WVH on January 13, 2007 10:54 PM

4. time for loser pays system. stop this insame sue-fest. especially against taxpayers themselves who fund the vary system.

aand not against the taxpayers--the plaintiffs' own personal accounts and land will be levied if case lost.

then--back to more rational spending, stiff performance audits & firing the incompenent school finance parties or others who fail to deliver & want a new levy every week. live within your means! cut programs or staff or freeze benefits!

Posted by: jimmie-howya-doin on January 14, 2007 07:40 AM

5. Okay, Prop 2, the operations levy, is almost 23% of the district's budget. Knocking every kid on their ass in the district is not the way to send a message.

Now Prop 1, at $490 million, the capital bond measure, that you should defeat. Building one building at a cost of almost $90M to a 25 year cycle (instead of the district's normal 50-year cycle), building another K-8 within a mile of an already existing K-8 (and that will make 5 schools in just over 1 mile), building an "alumni" room for a school just over 4 years old; now that you should defeat. This building plan (called Building Excellence or BEX ) has virtually no oversight. The last round, BEX II, was overbudget on at least 3 projects. The costs of construction have shot up but not enough to explain this mess.

Vote no on Prop. 1.

Posted by: westello on January 14, 2007 01:39 PM

6. Sorry to say, but if someones parents don't do the things necessary to get their children ready (by cable instead of supplies) then they lose...that is how our society goes. I wish the money we spend now goes to more to the classroom (on 42% now) and less ot non teachers (over 60%), but I don't have a say.

Parents need to do right by their children and our government needs to get out of the pocket of unions that don't care about children. They don't and most normal people think so. Ivan, tell me I'm wrong. Please tell me the unions care about the kids....I know you care..........

Posted by: Dengle on January 14, 2007 06:23 PM

7. Sorry Dengle, but I disagree with you in part:
"Sorry to say, but if someones parents don't do the things necessary to get their children ready (by cable instead of supplies) then they lose...that is how our society goes"

It depends on what you want to spend your dollars on. Of course, how you spend your dollars is your business. My argument is this: Like it or not there is a social compact among those that live in a society. In order to have order and in order to have a stable economic and political system, we need a population with basic skills. The way that people acquire basic skills is through a good basic education. I know that some here don't even want publically funded schools, but that has been done in many third world countries which is why they are third world countries. Why do you think there are so many migrants from Mexico? The ruling elite there and the social system does not fund or provide opportunities for a majority of their citizens. That is why they are coming here by the millions.

I'm assuming that you don't want this society to sink to the level of third world country status. If that assumption is correct, then supplies, mentoring or other time given to a child with brain dead parents is an investment. It is an investment in the child, not the parents, it is an investment in this economic sytem and political system. One thing Henry Ford understood that modern capitalists fail to grasp is that he paid his workers a premium, so that they could buy his cars. It was good business to make the workers stakeholders. I haven't done the research recently, but the cost of prison or county jail is far greater than the cost of one year of good basic education. My quarrel is the current system doesn't give a good basic education to most, even those children with loving and committed parents.

My argument is this, that $5 you or anyone else who feels that they are an island and that society and its ills doesn't touch or affect you could, drop in the box for school supplies, could be one of the better investments you make.

I think that school choice is the best investment, however.

Posted by: WVH on January 14, 2007 08:39 PM

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