It’s still business-as-usual down at the Board of Education and District offices. It’s like one big game of Hide and Seek. They hide what people seek, the truth. For years, the budget process began with the release of the Preliminary Budget, which included a wealth of information on enrollment, employee numbers, and expenditure data for every site and department delineated in the attached Proposed Budget Summaries. But over the last two budget cycles that coincided with the worst financial crisis in history, none of these support documents were ever released to the public. Yet year after year, like clockwork, the Financial Oversight Committee keeps submitting the same request-word for word-asking the Board for more timely and complete financials. Since they are the only advisory committee empowered by voter approval, why don’t they stop acting like drones and just demand the information on behalf of the people they are supposed to represent?
A review of these site budgets (obtained after submitting a Request For Public Information) clearly demonstrates the growing disparity of per pupil overhead costs from school to school. Still, the Board continues to dodge the subject of possible school consolidation or closure, thus avoiding any political fallout. Recently, the Board received an update on Measure BB projects. After invoking eminent domain two years ago in order to buy out two longtime families, the Board will spend $35 million to rebuild and expand the Edison Language Academy despite the continuing trends for declining enrollment and vanishing revenues. The decision to build a new school in one of the most isolated areas of the city where one-third of the students must travel from outside the district, had to be political, certainly not practical.
According to the minutes of a special workshop meeting in September, the Board heard Educational Services staff describe what they do, using a PowerPoint presentation with 45 slides, not one of which showed a breakdown of the budgeted expenditures for these services. When it was the Board’s turn, nobody asked the obvious questions: What is this costing us and how do these expenditures compare to like-size districts?
At its Oct. 7 meeting, the Board began its search for a new superintendent with the usual promise that “there would be an opportunity for the public to weigh in during the superintendent search process.” Let’s have a public discussion whether or not the Board should be offering a housing allowance to the superintendent. In 2001, John Deasy was the first, receiving $18,000 per year along with a $75,000 relocation bonus if he lived in the district. But when Dianne Talarico took over in 2006, she got nothing for renting in Malibu. I guess women don’t qualify for housing, because when Tim Cuneo was hired to replace her, the Board brought back the perk to the tune of a whopping $38,400 per year! SMMUSD is one of only three unified school districts in Los Angeles County that agreed to a housing allowance at a rate more than three times the $12,000 offered by the other two districts. Shouldn’t the Board discuss at a public meeting the need for adopting a housing policy before they hire the next superintendent?
As long as the two-dozen or so politicos that make up the private government in our city are calling the shots about who gets endorsements and eventually elected, the upcoming elections probably won’t bring much change. But we have all seen what a group of fed-up, regular citizens can do to turn a national spotlight on their city of Bell, California. When they broke through the chains of apathy and spoke up, people started to pay very close attention. Even the tactics of retribution and shooting the messenger couldn’t stop them. What will it take to get the truth to be told here?
Jim Jaffe