VoteNoBonds.com

Due to a mistake the press conference will not be Wednesday, October 5.
The press wasn’t notified.

I will forward another email as soon as we straighten this out.

Lewis Guignard

Capacity Contortions Yield Contradictions

By BRIAN GOTT - STAFF WRITER

Is Board of Education Vice Chairperson Kit Cramer a conniving con artist who twists and distorts facts to support a mammoth $427 million schools bonds package? Or is Cramer a shining knight out to expose myths and distortions that opponents of the schools bonds are passing off as facts to blur the truths about the pressing needs that face Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools?

Voters will get a chance to make that decision for themselves between now and November’s bond referendum, but the battle to win the hearts and minds of those voters has already been launched, and Cramer is on the firing line’s frontline.

Bond opponents think Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, and taxpayers, would be better served if money was used to build new schools where they are most needed to alleviate severe overcrowding, typically in the suburbs. They contend the proposed schools bonds contain millions of dollars to pay for renovations to schools that are woefully under-capacity and under-utilized. Bond proponents, like Cramer, say those renovations are critical and that the schools, typically in the inner city or mid-ring, aren’t as empty as critics contend.
…
For example, if a Marie G. Davis classroom was scheduled to have 20 students and the classroom only had 16, it was still listed at 80-percent capacity, even if it actually could have held 30 students. Bond opponents contend that Cramer and others use similar mathematical rationalizations to debunk the “myth” that several schools, which bond opponents contend are under-capacity and under-utilized, are, in reality, near or above capacity.

For example, Cramer and other so-called myth busters contend that Druid Hills Elementary has an 89-percent occupancy. On the other hand, bond opponents claim the school has a capacity of 800 students, but only an enrollment of 428, according to CMS’ 20-day, student enrollment numbers from the 2004-2005 school year. Those numbers would give the same school only a 54-percent occupancy.

Likewise, Cramer and others contend that Pinewood Elementary has a 115-percent occupancy, while Bishop, Puckett and others point to enrollment numbers that show the school has only 417 students versus a 800-student capacity – or only a 49-percent occupancy.

The dueling numbers go on and on: Where Cramer and others think a school like Thomasboro Elementary has a 92-percent occupancy; Puckett, Bishop and company point to enrollment numbers that show the school with only a 53-percent enrollment, or 420 students in a school built for 800.

Cramer contends Walter G. Byers has a 91-percent occupancy; her critics point to enrollment numbers that show only a 54-percent occupancy – or 430 students in a school built for 800.
….
Similarly, Marie G. Davis has 466 students with an average of 240.5 squarefeet per student, while Quail Hollow Middle’s 1,237 students have an average of less than half that at only 100.5 square feet each.

E.E. Waddell High has 1,190 students with a square foot average of 197.3 per student, while North Mecklenburg High, which has 2,799 students, has an average of only 86.2 square feet per student.

Thomasboro Elementary, which Cramer and company contend has a 92-percent occupancy, dedicates 245.6 square feet per pupil, compared to Huntersville Elementary in the crowded suburbs, where bond opponents say money should be used to build new schools to relieve overcrowding. Huntersville has only 90.3 square feet per pupil.

“As for Ms. Cramer’s myth-busting, we hope she will explain how Lincoln Heights Elementary, for example, is at 100-percent of capacity with 471 students in a spanking new building built for 800,” the Republicans’ statement read. “We suspect she would have to reveal that her utilization statistics for replaced urban core schools are built on changed ‘capacity.’”

They say that type of fuzzy math is just another example of why the public mistrusts CMS.

“Is it any wonder that there is a crisis of confidence in the stewardship of our tax dollars and public schools?” their schools bond statement read.
….
It’s not only a handful of Republicans on the school board and the board of commissioners, though, who are opposing the schools bonds, and Cramer’s arguments do not seem to be swaying some Democrat challengers running for the board of education

“We have Walter G. Byers in our district and I know it’s under-capacity,” said Sheila Ann Johnson, who is running against District 2 board member Vilma Leake in November.

According to Cramer’s occupancy claim, Byers is 91-percent occupied, even though it could hold up to 800 students and currently houses 430. According to the bond opposition, the elementary school has 210 square-feet per student – far higher than many other schools.

Those numbers leave candidates like Johnson puzzled.

“I am concerned about the numbers they (the pro-bonds committee) are using. Are they true numbers?” Johnson asked. “I am not supporting this bond package. CMS is very top heavy. We do have a lot of empty seats, and CMS has not demonstrated fiscal responsibility.”

Alexander said the bonds are excessive.

“We have all these under-utilized schools, good Lord,” Alexander said. “I don’t think the citizens of Mecklenburg County need to be fleeced any more under the guise of ‘This is for the children.’”

Rhino Times Article

Dear Editor,
Please consider this an open letter to the school board: I am so not into politics. I am just a regular mom who wanted to make a difference, not only for my kids; for all the kids. And, believe it or not, it’s the truth. The bonds on the November ballot are a key issue. I asked myself many times why I would want to subject myself to this hardship and sacrifice for my family to help and be a part of this board just for the interim position for District 6. The answer is: It was the opportunity to make a difference.

Thank you to (school board members) Kaye (McGarry) and Larry (Gauvreau) for casting votes for me. Let me remind the board of the article from the Aug. 11 Charlotte Observer, which said that it was unlikely the board would choose any of the three candidates running in November to keep the seat. Board Chairman Joe White said it would be unfair to give one the edge of incumbency. The public needs to trust that the board will do what it says it’s going to do, whether it is appointing an interim board member or spending bond money.

The residents of Charlotte-Mecklenburg are clearly frustrated, based on the last nine months of activities that have gone on. Catchy slogans alone won’t pass the bonds. With more than $400 million to be spent, who will take on the task of understanding where, how and when this November bond money is going to be used, and then let the public understand the importance of it? The facts need to be presented without any spin and the people will decide.

For me to vote for the bonds, I need to know the following information for each and every one of the CMS schools: year of construction, total cost of the school at construction time, square feet of the building, number of students capacity (using the same formula for every school), the number of students for the 2005-06 school year, which district the school is in, renovations completed, year of renovations, cost of the renovations, and, most importantly, where the money came from for the initial construction and the renovation work that was done (bond year or certificates of participation). The schools that would be receiving money from the November bonds should be highlighted. That would be a good start.

Ask the public what they need to know to make their decision based on the facts. Make the information public in a timely manner so the voters have all the facts before Election Day rolls around. Certainly, the voters deserve these facts that you should have been working with to determine how much bond money to ask for. Every taxpayer deserves information to make an educated decision. I would be happy to endorse the bonds when CMS can show me the facts that support it.

A concerned taxpayer and parent,
Teresa Hermanson

Rhino Times Letters Sept.

While having served on the Mecklenburg County Board of Commission for three years, I have gotten a better scope or understanding as to how government or tax revenues are spent, and the consequences of the spending.

While my colleague, Commissioner Rembert, and the Chamber of Charlotte will argue that the bonds are about building schools only, I contend that bonds are about how children are educated… Since the reorganization of the student assignment about four year ago, this community has been in an uproar surrounding education, especially where children are educated.

Because of how this community is divided, schools are affected. This process has caused new “state of the art” schools in the center city to become underutilized, while suburban schools are overcrowded. While Commissioner Rembert and the Chamber of Charlotte would state there aren’t any underutilized schools in CMS, I would beg to differ. There are at least 20 schools that fit in this category. While Commissioner Rembert and the Chamber would argue that center city children need smaller class space in an effort to adequately learn, I contend that CMS has put a cap on the intercity, state of the art schools, to allow what is before us today, and that is, overcrowded schools in the northern areas. As we all know, there has been a faction of people who are excited to segregate the CMS system. I am not. I think that if all children, were for the most part, together, not only will our children have the exposure of diversity, but each school will have the resources that this community require of CMS to educate all children.

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg NAACP voted not to support the bonds, People United for Education are not supporting the bonds, the head of the teachers association is not supporting the bonds, members of the Black Political Caucus are not supporting the bonds, simply because, all children are not receiving an adequate, basic and sound education in CMS We in this community feel that if we are to support raising our taxes for the purpose of paying the bond debt, then, we should see the benefit of doing so, knowing that our children are receiving upscale resources in every school and every child would receive a sound and basic education.

Valerie C. Woodard

Summit Turns Into CMS Cheerleading Camp

By BRIAN GOTT - STAFF WRITER

What happens if you throw an Education Summit and nobody comes? That was almost the case last Friday, when nearly half of the board of commissioners, along with several school board members, never made it to a joint meeting between the two boards to discuss issues of school funding and board relations.
Turns out the folks who missed the event didn’t miss much. The so-called summit never reached its peak and quickly devolved into little more than an extra opportunity for Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools administrators to showcase their lobbying efforts for more and more funding, without addressing any substantive detail.

Excerpt…
School Board Vice Chairperson Kit Cramer said, “Because it’s a good example of an older school that’s also way overcrowded and in need of some help. We chose this location specifically so that people can see it.”

What people should be seeing is another prime example of CMS logic gone awry, Gauvreau said in an interview this week. Long Creek is but one example of a suburban school suffering the consequences of CMS failing time and again to build schools where they were needed the most, Gauvreau said

“It’s sad that all these politicians who have purposely misprioritized spending money and building schools in the suburbs now want to hold press conferences like this summit under the guise of education to improve their image,” Gauvreau said.

Excerpt…
Rembert also asked Chamberlain to assuage any concerns that schools in the past had only been built in the inner city and not in the suburbs.
Chamberlain responded that school construction and additions have been “fairly uniform” in the suburbs versus the inner city. Amazingly, he was able to say it with a straight face while sitting in Long Creek Elementary School, which was built in the early 1900s and is among only a handful of elementary schools serving overcrowded north Mecklenburg.
That pretty much summed up the tone and tenor of the Education Summit: style over substance in search of more cash.
http://charlotte.rhinotimes.com/sto…d=674#continued

More info on the Education Summit

I want more facts about school bonds

In response to “Beware of baloney” (Sept. 18 editorial):

Taxpayers are entitled to detailed information about the school bonds on the Nov. 8 ballot.

The $427 million price tag should be broken down. For instance, where will the 10 new schools be built? What will they cost? How many students will they accommodate?

The need for new schools is great, but without better information to justify this expenditure, I will vote no.

Mary E. Squires

Matthews

Letters to the Observer

In July, five Republican officials urged the Board of Education to propose an affordable school bond referendum focused on the most critical construction need—new schools and new seat additions. In our recommendation, we mentioned that, because of poor prioritization in the recent past, suburban overcrowding has been insufficiently addressed while “serviceable schools [in the urban core] were razed and replaced only to be half-filled.” We cited eight examples and observed that reconstructed First Ward Elementary “has 49 classrooms for 639 students—13 students per room.”

The School Board ignored our recommendation and sent a whopping $510 million request to the Board of County Commissioners. There, the Democrat majority whittled it—by cutting funds for new school sites! We have urged voters to defeat this still-bloated, misprioritized school bond and then ride herd on the Commissioners to accelerate construction of new seats with COP’s, STARTING THIS FALL.

Two weeks ago, on behalf of a well-financed pro-bond campaign, school board member and Chamber of Commerce official Kit Cramer labeled a “myth” our report of half-full, newly rebuilt schools. She claimed utilization rates of 89% or more for the eight schools we cited, except for two in the mid-60s and one that is a foreign language immersion program in transition. A number of recently replaced schools, Ms. Cramer claimed, are at more than 100% capacity

Well, Ms. Cramer, you didn’t say where you got your numbers, but we’ll tell you where we get ours. From CMS and your bond campaign web site.

The table below sets forth 2004-05 utilization rates of every one of the replaced schools cited in your memo. (The schools in bold are the ones we mentioned in our paper.) The figures are calculated from the CMS 2004-05 20th-day enrollment list and school capacities of reconstructed schools published by the bond campaign: See “ Bond Projects 1996-2005,” www.voteyesforbonds.com/SummaryBondFundYears.pdf .

Now, compare these new elementary schools, eight of which are approximately half-full, with 29 others, mostly suburban, where permanent space per student is as little as one-fourth that in schools CMS has replaced. For example, Steele Creek has 60 square feet of permanent space per student, compared with 270 square feet per student at Ashley Park—almost five time less:

So, as we stated, eight elementary schools replaced at a cost of over $90 million are approximately half-full, not one replaced school is full, and 29 schools that have not been augmented are from one-and-a-half to four-and-a-half times as crowded as those schools CMS decided to replace.

As for Ms. Cramer’s myth-busting, we hope she will explain how Lincoln Heights Elementary, for example, is at 100% of capacity with 471 students in a spanking new building built for 800. We suspect that she would have to reveal that her utilization statistics for replaced urban core schools are built on changed “capacity.” Not that any of the school buildings constructed in the urban core are any smaller or different than set forth in the “Project Scope” column of that table on voteyesforbonds.com. Rather, CMS and the Chamber simply told us one thing when they asked approval to spend the money; they now tell us another to hide that the money was spent foolishly.

Is it any wonder that there is a crisis of confidence in the stewardship of our tax dollars and public schools? It’s time for a new direction. No more poorly prioritized, wasteful spending. Vote NO on the school bond issue, and the County Commission can begin focused funding of the real school construction priorities THIS FALL.

Dan Bishop, BOCC District 5

Larry Gauvreau, BOE District 1

Bill James, BOCC District 6

Kaye McGarry, BOE At-Large

Jim Puckett, BOCC District 1

Ellen Loflin, BOE Candidate District 5

Bond Brouhaha Begins

By BRIAN GOTT - STAFF WRITER

With strong opposition from some leaders of the black community, voter approval of the $427 million schools bonds appears to face an uphill battle.
….

By far, though, the schools bonds issue has proved the most controversial, even for politicians and community activists that typically have never met a schools bond they didn’t like.

Some black candidates for district school board seats – races that will be decided the same day as the bonds – aren’t voicing a tremendous amount of support for the bonds this time around.

“It’s evident we need new schools, but I’m also aware that we need to maintain some of the older schools,” said Donna Jenkins-Dawson, a black Democrat who is running against District 2 board member Vilma Leake.

“That bond is faulty,” Jenkins-Dawson said. “We go from one extreme to the other. We need some balance.”

Dwayne Collins, who is seeking the seat District 3 school board member George Dunlap currently holds, said he’s not sure yet if he’ll vote for the bonds.

“At this point, I’m kind of in between,” said Collins, who is black. “The question in my mind is how is this money going to affect the high poverty, low performing schools.”
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James said those sentiments are indicative of a rift growing in the black community when it comes to getting behind the schools bonds.

“There’s a big family feud,” James said. “The only thing missing is (former Family Feud game show host) Richard Dawson.”

“The NAACP and the Black Political Caucus are opposed to the bonds because they don’t want to build schools in the suburbs and they don’t like the student assignment plan,” James said.

But that might just be James’ own interpretation from what he says he has been hearing at the grassroots level. Neither group is officially opposed to the bonds at this point. The Black Political Caucus held a community forum to discuss the matter Sunday night.

Rembert said she’s heard from some in the black community who are opposed to the bonds and she’s heard complaints that too much of the bond money is scheduled to be spent in the suburbs. However, she thinks when all communities are educated about the bonds and how past bonds have been spent, people will realize these bonds are necessary.

“I recognize that there is extraordinary growth in the suburbs and the schools are overcrowded,” Rembert said. “But we also need to renovate schools in the middle ring.”
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Proponents of COPs, though, point out that they demand more accountability than wide-sweeping bonds. Board of Education member Kaye McGarry, a white Republican, said bond money could be shifted and changed for different projects than those for which voters approved the bonds, which has happened in the past, while COPs fund specific projects.

However, Democrats who control the board of county commissioners all said they would oppose using COPs to fund school construction if the bonds are defeated.

Puckett called that “blackmail.”

School Board member Larry Gauvreau, a white Republican, said some leaders in the black community are feigning opposition to the bonds in the hopes that more bond money would be spent on inner city schools, instead of suburban schools, to gain the black community’s support.

“I think it’s an act that certain politicians put people through every year,” Gauvreau said.

“It’s a negotiating tactic to scare people into building more schools in the inner city,” he said. “But how can anyone disagree with the fact that over a billion dollars has been put into the center city and middle ring schools since 1998? They are over-built.”

Bond supporters are turning to technology in their effort to get the bonds passed come November. Board of Education Vice Chairwoman Kit Cramer, who is white and registered as Unaffiliated, announced recently the voteyesforbonds.com website promoting the bonds will have a “myth-busters” section to counter what she claims are misconceptions some people have about the bonds.

Some of those myths are that schools in the inner city are at half of capacity, Cramer said.

James contested that notion and said one thing is not a myth: The public is not satisfied with CMS and the way it is spending the taxpayers’ money.

“If you really want to send a message to CMS that they are incompetent boobs, vote ‘no’ on the bonds,” James said.

Rhino Times Article

Hi, this is George Young from Matthews. I had applied for the interim school board position. I didn’t expect they would take me because I pushed the idea of deconsolidating CMS. But, I was surprised to hear Joe White say that they weren’t going to choose someone that was going to be running in the District 6 race, and then see them turn around and choose the deputy of Kindberg. And for Ms. Downing to get that, prior to the election and after Joe White’s remarks, I think once again it drops the trust level of what a member of the school board, particularly the chair, says compared to what he does. So, I doubt the bonds are going to be approved. I know I won’t be voting for them, because I can’t trust these people with money. Regardless of what they say, that’s not what they do. Once again, George Young, Matthews, North Carolina. Thank you very much.

Sound of the Beep - Rhino TimesSeptember 15, 2005

Archive - News | Citizen Servatius 05.05.04
BY TARA SERVATIUS

If you brought in a cartographer from Alaska who knew nothing about local politics and showed him last year’s maps of where Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools planned to build and renovate schools in the next decade, he’d be baffled.

The colorful dots representing the new schools CMS has now built, or planned to build or renovate at the time, are mostly in the center, where the bulk of the county’s population doesn’t live. A few stray dots are scattered in the suburbs, where most people in this county do.

The date of these maps, which were part of the Long-Range School Facilities Master Plan, is September 2003, just before a suburban majority took over the school board. This was far more than a building plan; it was a desperate blueprint for one last stab at integration by the same school board that fought in court to keep the system integrated. It was a plan not just to renovate schools, but to cluster the bulk of the newest seats in and around its center, which over time would force white kids to be bused in, reintegrating the system. That’s why many schools already built and renovated under this plan now sit half empty. They were overbuilt, and that was no accident.

To understand how we got here, you’ve got to understand the thinking of the last school board. They knew that without busing, suburban schools would get even whiter, the best teachers would follow, and the disparities would snowball in an endless Catch-22. So the way they saw it, they had three choices: Shut down dilapidated schools in the county’s center, forcing minority kids into suburban schools; build new seats in the center of the county, which would eventually force suburban kids into those schools; or dictate to teachers where they would teach and let the kids follow them, a game teachers wouldn’t be eager to play and that low-income children would never win.

The last school board was midway through option number two when the unforeseen disaster occurred. They lost control of the school board after suburbanites finally noticed that all the school construction they kept voting for didn’t include much for them. The new board has, of course, no intention of filling the extra seats planned and built in the center of the county with suburban kids. Instead, it has completely reversed direction, leaving some of the center county schools that still need work in limbo. Before they’re done, the new board will likely blow hundreds of millions more on suburban schools we should have built five years ago.

Read more…
Creative Loafing Article