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Monday, June 30, 2014
OUSD votes for Bond election
SPECIAL REPORT
OU$D Bond WATCH 2014
a news service of
Orange
Net News
/O/N/N/
As ghosts from Elections Past
appear at the meeting...
OUSD Board
votes 6-1 to send H.S. Facilities Bond to voters
The
Orange Unified School Board meeting in a Special Session voted 6-1 to send a
$296 million High School Facilities Bond Measure to Greater Orange voters this
November. The only item for the June
30th Open Session Agenda on the unusual Monday Special Session meeting brought
a sizable crowd including opponents to the Bond measure being placed on the
ballot.
Among
the numerous community leaders attending were Villa Park Councilwomen Deborah
Pauley; former Orange Mayor Carolyn
Cavecche and former OUSD Trustee Melissa Smith.
The return of Kathy Moran and Michael Fisher
Also
in the audience and addressing the Trustees were two very familiar supporters
of the 2001 recalled Reactionary Jacobson Majority - Kathy Moran and Michael
Fisher. Moran and Fisher were long time fixtures in the OUSD Board room in the 1990's
and early 2000's as they supported the reactionary agenda of the Jacobson
Majority. Moran was often referred to as
the unelected eighth Trustee.
Both
Moran and Fisher had come to oppose the placement of the Bond on the ballot. Moran by her own account told the Trustees
that she had not been back to the OUSD Board room since the defeat of the 2004
OUSD Bond. Moran and Fisher both had
talking points about deferred maintenance monies for the schools. Moran stated that before the Recall that
Board was putting aside 4% for maintenance -double the 2% required by the
state. Moran's point? If the trustees
can't keep 40 schools running with a 2% maintenance budget- they should not of
cut the budget-therefore they are not good money managers. Yes this is the logic of the mind that guided
the Jacobson Majority to their eventual recall in 2001- Moran's Mind.
What
Moran failed to mention was the doubled deferred maintenance fund was just one
place the Reactionary Board was hiding educational
tax money-racking up hundreds of millions in
reserves while strangling the OUSD public schools. All this as Moran's Trustees
were spending millions upon millions of educational taxes meant for schools on
political lawyers, lawsuits and litigation against everything in public
education. Basically Moran's friends were using educational tax dollars to wage
a reactionary war against the Greater Orange public schools. Moran
was their closest community ally- appointed to numerous high level OUSD administrative committees and even
sitting in on Trustee Closed Sessions.
Later in the meeting it was Trustee Rick Ledesma who took on Moran's fantasy
anti-Bond deferred maintenance. Ledesma-methodically offered a "realistic
picture" of what had happened to
school finances. Ledesma outlined the $50 million yearly budget cuts during the
Great Recession that started in 2008.
Reminding the audience of the choices between programs and maintenance
resulting from up to 25% budget cuts he also outlined budget restraints caused
by mediations, legal rulings, categorical funding reductions- as well as
changes in the make-up of the Board with different philosophies. Ledesma
emphasized that since 2008 the focus of the OUSD Board has primarily been the
budget.
Remarks from all sides
President
John Ortega chastised those who opposed a Bond vote saying he had yet to hear
anyone offer any other solution to upgrading local schools.
Trustee
Mark Wayland also defended the Board's handling of the budget. Wayland pointed to the OUSD Board selecting
Superintendent Michael Christensen - with a financial background as opposed to
a superintendent with an educational doctorate.
Wayland's remark about having " the best financial manager sitting
to my left" [Christensen] brought applause from the audience.
Trustee
Kathy Moffat highlighted the Bond's financial manager remarks about OUSD's high
credit ratings as proof of fiscal responsibility. The financial advisor confirmed the strong high
double "A" financial ratings OUSD has that will help with lower
interest rates- Moody's "Aa2" rating
and Standard and Poor's "AA-" rating.
Former
Orange Mayor Carolyn Cavecche now President and CEO of the OC Tax Association also
spoke. Cavecche reporting that while the OCTA takes no positions on Bonds, the
OUSD Bond and Policies meet all 13 criteria requirements of the OC Tax
Association.
The
highlight of the night had to be the public opposition to the Bond from Villa
Park Councilwomen Deborah Pauley. Pauley went into a soliloquy of indebtedness-referring
to the bond as "worst than a tax-its a debt".
However
it was not Pauley's " indebtedness" nor
Moran's "deferred maintenance"
logic that resulted in the lone vote against the Bond election from Trustee Dr.
Alexia Deligianni. For her the reason to vote against an election was
because the designs of the four architectural firms were "gorgeous" and this Bond would not pay for all the design
features-so an election for a Bond would be "setting up the community for
disappointment".
With
President John Ortega moving the item and Trustee Diane Singer seconding it,
after the discussion Ortega called for a roll-call vote.
Trustee Timothy Surridge had no comment through out the entire meeting- in the
end he voted Yes. The finale vote was
6-1 ( Deligianni the only no).
The
audience erupted into applause as Ortega closed the meeting.
Comments heard during the meeting
"Local problems solved with local
solutions."
- C.A.R.E. co-founder Kris
Erickson
"Will it be enough when we are all bonded
servants?"
-Villa Park Councilwomen Debora Pauley
"Were you good fiscal stewards or
were there re-allotments to other needs?"
- Kathy Moran
"El Modena looks the same way it
did in the 80's!"
-OUSD President John Ortega
"If you lived in a house for 50,
60, 70 years, when do you do a major re-model?"
-OUSD Trustee Mark Wayland
"What we do today is for the future."
-OUSD Trustee Kathy Moffat
" I see a mess."
-OUSD Trustee Dr. Alexia Deligianni
"I'm opposed to raising taxes, but
I vote yes to increase property values!"
-OUSD Trustee Rick Ledesma
"My vote is to give you the opportunity to vote."
-OUSD President John Ortega
"Yes."
-OUSD Trustee Timothy Surridge
Comments:
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Honestly, have any of you been to the local high schools to see for yourselves the crumbling infrastructure? Have you seen the remodeling and refurbishing that took place at Foothill HS? Parents with any kind of means available to them will be running like mad to enroll their kids at schools other than Orange schools unless the community takes action now!
# posted by 
: 7/01/2014 9:40 PM
: 7/01/2014 9:40 PM
OUSD always cuts from the bottom, the "kids". They never mention that they get more money per student than any private school or that there is always plenty of money for bloated salaries and pensions, Ortega himself could not defend the FACT that they pay the OUSD Superintendent more that the Vice President of the United States of America - at 278,000.00 - OUSD needs to CUT from the top, not the bottom.
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# posted by : 7/15/2014 2:29 PM
: 7/15/2014 2:29 PM << Home
