County School Board Members: How Are They Doing?
We had several suggestions to focus discussion on our Marion County School Board, a group that is composed of five Republicans: Sue Moseley, Kurt Kelly, Ron Crawford, Steve Herring and Judi Zanetti.
The Board is faced with many challenges. Just to name a few: cost over runs on construction projects, low school grades, teacher shortages, overcrowding, parental concerns with the focus on FCAT, aging school buses, role of impact fees in school finances.
So here is our question for September:
What is your opinion of the job being done by our five Marion County School Board members?
Please click on Comments below and give us your thoughts.
Blog Master
posted by Blog Master @ 7:43 AM
44 Comments:
I have 3 children in the school system. I used to attend the board meetings but have given up on that. My frustration is that only Sue Moseley and perhaps now Judi Zanetti seem at all interested in parents and children. The other members really seem indifferent to our desire to have a quality education for our kids. How about a bit more listening to us?
I’m really waiting for the school board to come forward with a bold move on impact fees and a plan to address the construction costs issue. Anyone think they will?
Being a school board member is a tough job. I have no issues with the job being done with one exception. How did Ron Crawford ever get elected to the school board? He is not what we need.
I believe the results speak for themselves. Almost every highschool was graded a "D". Yeah, I am sure there are a lot of excuses, but a lot of other counties did a better. Most did a lot better.
When our kids do poor an standardized tests, I am sure the school turns a deaf ear to the usual "..It ain't fair", " I don't take tests well" and the like. Personally, I don't accept the school board's reasons.
I have lived in five states and this is the first place that school board members receive pay. The non-paid school boards were also much better than ours here in Marion. Probably, because the people serving really wanted to be there.
I also agree with Charles, our high schools need much improvement. Maybe the board needs to spend as much time on education quality as it does on the budget and minor operational issues. My observations of the meetings tells me this is not the case.
I wish we had five Sue Moseleys on the school board. Sue has really surprised me as a board member. I was not sold on her at first but she has won me over. She is about the only one who “understands” the problems parents have in raising and educating our children.
I have also changed my opinion of Ms. Moseley toward the more postive. However, not sure that we want five just like her. A bit of diversity in personalities and view points is frequently helpful.
The county commissioners have opened the door for the school board to step up to the plate on the issue of raising impact fees. Now let's see who has the guts to do this.
Our education problems are about 25% school board and 75% bad parenting. I can’t put too much blame on the board for poor academic performance. Problems with financing and operations are the school boards challenge. However, the major problems today are lack of discipline at home and a non-caring attitude of parents. Talk with any teachers-I have-and they will give you some horror stories. A section of this blog should be devoted to giving teachers a chance to post their experiences with bad parenting.
Poor parenting is a problem. However, I'm not sure I would give it as much weight as 75% of our problems. The problem teachers have is a School Board that doesn't have a clue about classroom challenges in educating children in Marion County.
Not only are the school board members paid, they receive as much as a starting teacher. Also they get health care coverage and retirement plan. Not bad for a part-time job! Probably more than most of them could make full time in the private sector.
Absolutely, poor parenting is a problem. However, this exists state wide. Duval County, Orange county, and Volusia County all face a similar mix of parents, yet their high schools graded better than ours graded. Logically, I remove this constant from the equation, and look to the variables unique to our failure.
One factor may be in the socio-economic mix of new residents. We have low impact fees, thus attracting people to whom cost is more important than other quality of life issues. This may sound bad, but maybe we don't need to attract people with 4 kids and zero skills. This is gonna sound event worse, but retired snow birds, who return north in the season, are a hellofa deal. They pay property taxes have health insurance, and don't have any kids in the system. They seldom use the roads, police and fire services, usually don't have 3 junk cars in the backyard, next to a bulldozer, or whatnot.
Just a thought...
Great thoughts, Charles. Reality is reality. We do have the wrong mix of residents. However, until someone does something about getting us the right kind of jobs-to attract the right kind of people, we will continue to have problems.
So we have 5 republican county commissioners, and 5 school board members who are also republican. Does that have any correlation with our screwed up roads, growing infrastructure problems, poor performance of our schools, and overall financial problems? Just wondering.
One of the best school boards I have ever seen was in Montgomeryville, PA. It was composed of five parents and they were not paid. It was a board in touch with parents, teachers, the community and the problems of running a school system.
Frank,
I doubt there is any correlation between the many problems of our county, education and otherwise, and political affiliation of those in office. The real problem is the lack of joint county commission/school board long-range planning that goes back many years, and includes politicians of both parties. It’s the people in the political positions, not their party, that’s caused the financial and operational problems we have today.
I agree with Stan. It’s not the party it’s the person. Give me 5 republican, 5 democrats, 5 independents, or any combination of parties. What I’m looking for is a politician who understands the details of financial management, can solve problems, looks at situations from a long-range perspective, willing to represent all the people and not just a small group of special-interest party folks, and is an independent-minded leader and not just a follower of party gospel. Have you seen many local politicians like this? I haven’t.
It looks like the school board is now trying to get the Ocala City Council to share in its "pain" of being poor financial planners. Let the school board handle its own problems. The City Council did not create the mess the school system now has. What the school board members are looking for is "political cover" to protect themselves in the next election.
I don't agree that the school board created it's own mess. The free wheeling approval of all the new homes by the city and county is the problem. The school board must live with the mistakes of these two political bodies. To blame the school board is a cop out!
Perhaps our school board should be pushing the state legislature and U.S. Congress to allow local public schools to charge tuition. When I had to pay for my children’s college education, I took much more interest in their education. There would have to be some provisions for poor families. However, that could be done.
Continuing to pay for schools indirectly through property taxes and an occasional (sunset) sales tax increase is not going to get us out of the mess we are in. Is public school tuition a crazy idea? I know many taxpayers who don’t think it is.
Just so everyone knows, not only are school board members paid almost as much as starting teachers, but they get TWICE the retirement as the people who do the work. 'Tis true, school board members are vested in the retirement system in five years and it is based on multiplying their last five years salary by the years of service times three percent. Teachers and janitors get years of service times salary times 1.68 percent. Teachers have to recertify every five years. School board members do not have to have ANY educational requirement, just get elected. I spent three years trying to get the legislature to remove the retirement benefit from school board members and they squeeled like a stuck pig.
--pwf
Jim, you are correct that all the blame does not go to school board members, and much of it does go straight to the parents. But in my 47 years in Marion County, few school board members have been a shining example of leadership.
The strongest board was back in the late 60's when Les Turner, Ed Anderson, John Lane and Co. voted to integrate our schools.
Actually, a portion of the blame has to go to the superintendents. Florida law does give the power to run the school system to the school board. Their duties and power are strictly limited and generally, they have no power over the superintendent, although many board members think they can run it. --pwf
Question for PWF:
Do you remeber the political parties of the school board you liked so much? I know the board is non-partisan but they all lean one way or the other. Just wondering.
Back in those days -- the 50's, 60's, 70's and 80's, if you were going to vote in Marion County, you were a Democrat. When I registered to vote in 1959, I signed up as a Republican -- the 497th Republican in Marion County! (Now there are About 90,000 Republicans in the county.) The next year, I was smarting off about who I was going to vote for and the Supervisor of Elections, the late Fan Pasteur, said "you aren't voting for anybody, you are a Republican!" She then explained that unless there was a candidate to vote for, Republicans did not vote except for President and occasionally, US Senator. So I solved my problem, and I became a Democrat, to which Fan said, "I thought you would see it our way!"
While everyone was registered a Democrat, there were strong fiscal conservatives and certainly strong social conservatives. In fact, most of the conservative DEemocrats of that era were the base of what today is the Marion County Republican Party -- they switched. I doubt, however, that anyone called Ed Anderson or John Lane a "conservative" after they led the fight to save hundreds of thousands in legal fees and voluntarily integrate the schools, but they were one term board members too! The then Superintendent, Mack Dunwoody, was voted out of office, and the underlying issue was integration of schools, in spite of the fact that federal law required integration.
On bopard partisanship, it was a state law in the early 90's or perhaps late 80's that converted the school board to non-partisan, but they are actually MORE partisan today than they were before -- current board members worry constantly about what the "base" will say, and are frequently reminded what the GOP stands for; that is why they have been gutless and we have no impact fees.
Contrary to what Kelly, Crawford and Co. say, impact fees would have generated nearly $100,000,000 had they been imposed in 1990 when they should have by any reasonable person who understands growth, birth patterns, and school finances. The money would have been spent building schools when they were needed. Now we are faced with sky high land and construction costs and are short of money. Crawford has been there seven years and the financial plight has gotten worse, even with the half cent sales tax. Kelly wants to be a career politician and refuses to lead. Mosley has tried several times to get impact fees on the table, and she has finally succeeded. Hopefully, we will get a $5,000 or so fee on the next 5,000 homes someone like the Villages will build in marion County. It will be too little too late, but would be a start.
--pwf
PWF: Thanks for the history. My how times change!!
If I read the paper correctly, the Board is listening to someone who advocated impact fees for mobile homes at areound $2200 against around $5000 for conventional houses If impact fees are to make growth pay for itself, what possible justification is there for a difference in impact fees for mobile homes vs. stick built houses?
I have a hard time believing that mobs have less impact on our schools than block houses have.
Charles, I agree with you on mobile homes. However, having the fee the same as for conventional houses would likely put the local mobile home industry out of business. Perhaps there is some reasonable alternative to the fee for mobile homes.
Here we go again! The school system is going to hire a consultant to tell them what to do on impact fees. That way if the public (developers) cry foul, the school board can blame it on the consultant. What a cop out. Where is the leadership?
Clay County, a fast growing area just bit the bullet on impact fees. Here is what a press release says they did:
"A 250-percent boost in Clay County Impact fees for construction of single-family homes was approved yesterday. It will raise the fee from 2-thousand-dollars to more than 7-thousand dollars. Commissioners voted four-to-one for the increase. Authorities say the school district should receive 392-point-5-million-dollars over the next 20 years from the impact fees to build 27 new schools in the fast-growing county. Twenty citizens, builders, and developers voiced opinions during the county commission meeting. Only three say they support the ordinance. The higher fees will go into effect October 12th."
Will something similar happen in Marion County?
People, including Sue Mosley, in today's paper comment that impact fees in mobile homes will put the industry outta business. Assuming that to have some validity, I question how much we need to spend to support the industry. Yep, the industry provides jobs, but if it folded, I suspect that the electrictians, carpenters, and other workers would simply go to work in the site build field.
IMO, impact fees are to pay for new school construction brought on by new residents to the area. If the proposed new residents can't afford to pay for their dinner tab, perhaps they should go to a more affordable restaurant, like Alabama. Marion County does not need to ATTRACT people who have nothing. Lets raise our vision, our sights, if you will, and look for people who bring health insurance, retirement income, and a bit of a nest egg.
If mobile homes are where the school impact is most coming from, then let's put the fees on that segment. Not sure the $7000 figure is correct. Guess that's what we are going to pay big bucks to the consultants to confirm.
It appears that another consequence of reducing the impact on MHs is that reduction will have to appear back via an increased impact fee to conventional homes. Is this true?
If you want to put the impact fees where the actual impact (kids) come from, the first place is apartments, many of them govt subsidized, so the impact fees would be paid in the govt subsidies by the feds. The second largest impact comes from mobile homes. The big, big homes, create little impact on schools. The $500,000 and up homes are built by retirees or working people who put their kids in private schools. But at $7,000 to 8,000 impact fee on a half million dollar home is not a deal breaker.
--pwf
Charles,
You wrote:
"It appears that another consequence of reducing the impact on MHs is that reduction will have to appear back via an increased impact fee to conventional homes. Is this true?"
Impact fees are difficult to understand and to implement, hence counties always hire consultants to set them up, so they have an "expert" to defend them when they get sued, as they usually are.
Different from other parts of government finance, impact fees are not designed to raise, for example, $25 million to build a new elementary school. Rather than are imposed to collect the actual impact (usually set so they raise less than the actual impact, for political purposes) caused on the school system by the single house that is being built.
If they charge $5,000 per unit, and need $25,000,000 for a school, you gotta have 5,000 dwelling units constructed.
City and County government finance establishs a needs budget (spending) and then determines how much in millage rates it will take to raise that specific amount of money. i.e., you need to raise $100 million, there is $1 billion in taxable property, and you charge the apopropriate millage rate.
I know it is complicated but only because govt and lawyers make it complicated.
--pwf
Pwf, so I think we agree.
If a house brings in 3 kids, and a MH brings in 3 kids, and a school for 6 kids cost $90, then both the box and the house should pay $45. If the MH only pays 50% of the impact fee as the house, then the house has to pay $60 and the wobble box, $30.
Assuming the same kid impact, any reduction for the MH has to be made up by the other. (Or is this fuzzy math?)
No Charles, the way it would work is we would just wait longer to get the money to build the new school, either until there was another mobile home or another stick built house. I think it would be hard for the consultants to defend your system in court.
--pwf
PWF I think it would be easier to defend. How do you explain that 3 MH kids have less impact than 3 stick built kids?
The only explaination is if there was evidence that a average MH brought say, 2 kids and the stick house brought 3 children (or more than 2) into the system. (My prejudice is that a MH brings more than a stick)
Hmmmm....maybe I will call the school system for a copy of the report. That would be a novel idea, for us to actually know what we are talking about.
PWF,... [next page]... Board sez will take 60 to 90 days for study to be done.
I’m convinced that several foreign countries are doing a much better job educating their children than is the U.S., especially Asia. Perhaps “outsourcing” our children’s education would not be such a bad idea. Here is a piece from an October 10 article in “The Federalist Patriot”:
“A recent trend in tutoring children is outsourcing. The students work at their computers in America, and their online tutors work with them from their computers in...India. Shocking? No. If you believe that the prime responsibility for educating children should rest on the parents, then ALL teaching outside the home is outsourcing. In America, of course, most people are used to outsourcing the job to the public schools. But our governments' schools haven't been doing so well. So there is growing competition. Now even from India."
Charles,
Why should it take 60-90 days to complete a report that will be cut and paste from another county, just changing the number of structures, information provided by another government agency.
And if it is true, as was reported above, they hired the same consultant as the county, why, why, why? Sumter County is getting rid of them, Marion County found their report to be useless.
Further, I don't think the school board has the gumption to do what they should have done ten years ago and impose impact fees.
Iy will bve intersting to see what kind of figure the consultant comes up with and then compare it to other counties.
--pwf
the current school board is better at whining & complaining than stepping up to the plate & solving problems. they'd rather whine than figure out a way to fix the problem. i've had enough!
One of the big problems is that Kurt Kelly things he has a career in politics and is trying to bob and weave around issues, supporting those the far right likes, and ignoring what needs to be done to solve problens. Kurt things he is "due" a seat in the legislature, or perhaps to replace Cliff Stearns.
I am so excited to have top notch business people planning to run for the School Board. I believe Dave Alvarez and Kurt Kelly are the future for our kids!!
It is amazing to me how dirty politics can become. Where is the integrity? Family values of words and actions equating??
look up the meaning. In my Websters, it has a picture of townley and mosley to define integrity. you can only imagine where kurt and david are. Ask former Microdyne stockholders what they think of david's business expertise. and Kelly's businesses have been closed by the state for inactivity.
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