Another Bailout

Greed

Big salaries and golden parachutes

Mismanagement, incompetence. and lack of accountability

Finger pointing

Scare tactics

Bailouts

And the taxpayers are left paying for it all!

Am I talking about the 700 billion dollar Wall Street bailout plan that was passed this week and signed by the president?NO. I'm referring to the 13.5 million dollar bailout of the Marshfield School District passed earlier this year. The similarities between these two bailouts are amazing and deserve a closer look. After all, we learn by our mistakes.


GREED

The Wall Street tycoons are greedy bastards, there's no denying that. And the mortgage lenders preyed upon people chasing the American Dream and the chance to own a nice home. But a lot of these dreamers also reached beyond their means and purchased homes they could never afford.

Our schools also reach beyond their means. They want it all and they want the best. When they found out they couldn't pay for it all, the logical thing to do was look for what could be cut from the budget. But nobody wanted to give up anything. A good example is the AP courses. We live in a community that has a university and a technical college. Yet the school district decided to, in effect, build a small university within the high school so that students can take AP courses and earn college credit and in fact compete with MSTC and the UW. And the taxpayers pay for all three. Before this, high school students were able to take AP courses through the UW and their parents paid for it. It's an example of greed. Our school district, our students and parents want it all, and they want the taxpayer to pay for it.

Watch what happens with the Middle School. Do you think the district is really going to do something sensible and find a way to utilize what we already have by making room for the middle school at the high school? Or are they going to pitch a plan to build a brand new $25 million complex, complete with a new football stadium? Greed is alive and well within our school district, and there's going to be a lot of pork added to the middle school project.


BIG SALARIES AND GOLDEN PARACHUTES

Who isn't pissed off that some of these Wall Street CEOs make millions? And then when the bank goes belly up, they leave with a huge golden parachute worth even more millions! And now we have to bail them out?

The Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance released a report comparing the salaries and benefit packages for school districts. When the Marshfield News-Herald reported this, they compared the Marshfield School District to other area school districts and, not surprisingly, Marshfield not only has some of the highest salaries for our district's "CEOs" but we have the best benefit package. Marshfield pays 95% of the health insurance premium for all school district employees and their families. We're also the only school district that also pays as much as 50% of the deductible. While other school districts are negotiating contracts and asking their employees to take a bigger share of their health insurance, Marshfield continues to bow to the unions and refuses to engage in negotiations. A small shift from a 95/5% split to a 90/10% would save millions! Other districts are doing this successfully.


MISMANAGEMENT, INCOMPETENCE AND LACK OF ACCOUNTABILITY

There were plenty of warning signs that our economy was in trouble. As far back as 3 years ago, economists were raising red flags. Some in the government were listening and a few spoke up about Freddie and Fanny, but nothing was done to intervene until it was too late. And now we're paying the price for bad management, bad decisions, and incompetence on Wall Street and in Washington.

While Marshfield has pretty good schools, we have a track record of some pretty bad management within the school district administration and on the Board of Education. The board always rubber stamps everything that comes from the central office and goes along with whatever King and Saucerman lay on the table, and there have been plenty of mistakes and blunders in this administration! The biggest problem, however, is the lack of accountability. No one is ever held responsible. No one questioned how and why our school district budget has a 2 or 3 million dollar shortfall each year. Oh, a lot of excuses were given, but it came down to the taxpayers as it always does. The mindset of the administration and board seems to be "Spend , spend, spend...and when the money is gone, we'll go to the taxpayers for more." When are the taxpayers going to say enough is enough?

This summer our school board discussed the food budget. Higher food and transportation costs were not covered by the federal and state funds that are used to provide hot lunches at our schools. The finance director predicted the district will lose 25 cents on each meal each day during this school year. The board's brilliant idea was to raise the lunch prices by a dime, and take a 15 cent hit on each lunch. That will leave the district with a six-figure deficit in the food budget. And how will they make up that deficit? The board suggested selling snacks after school and at sporting events. Sounds like another bad idea that will only lead to a big budget deficit and another bailout by the taxpayers!


FINGER POINTING

The democrats blame the republicans and Bush, the republicans blame the democrats, and fingers were pointed at Wall Street, at the banks, and even at the people who took out loans they knew they couldn't pay for.

When the school district found itself in a financial bind, they were quick to point their fingers at Madison and say that is where the problem is. The school funding system is broken, they said. They blamed it on revenue caps and the QEO. They also blamed it on high health care costs.Marshfield School Watch and the NO Committee not only points a finger at Madison, but also one at Marshfield. The funding system is broken on both ends. Mismanagement, incompetence, lack of accountability are alive and well in our district. Are we going to sit back and watch the finger pointing and wait until the next financial crisis before we do anything about it? The next referendum is already being drafted and can appear on the Spring ballot!


SCARE TACTICS

Doom and gloom. Recession. Another "Great Depression." The collapse of Wall Street. A run on the banks. Losing your 401k. These scare tactics were used to change the tide of public opinion. Many of us were mad. Why should we bailout Wall Street? The House of Representatives voted down the first proposal. The stock market tanked (thanks to speculators) and low and behold the tide of public opinion began to change. Now the bailout bill is a done deal, but the economy is not out of the woods yet.

Crime will skyrocket. Gangs will form on our streets. Students will leave the district in droves if we cut any student clubs or organizations. No new businesses will come to Marshfield. If we cut overtime from the custodial budget, our schools will become so dirty that students won't be able to learn. If we cut the buildings and grounds budget, our new schools would collapse into a pile of rubble. These were some of the actual arguments offered by the school district, by teachers, and the Yes Committee. And who can forget the pity parade before the school board? The tears and the fears and the board pretending like they have no other choice.

The entire threat to cut sports and music and AP classes was all a scare tactic. How do we know this? What was the first thing the school district did within weeks of the 13.5 million dollar bailout? They added sports! Weeks before they didn't have the money to sustain what they had, and then miraculously after the bailout, not only can we afford all the sports, we can add more! One of the proposed cuts was to eliminate one administrator. After the bailout, they added two! There was a proposal to freeze administrator salaries. After the bailout, everyone got a raise!

The sports, music programs, student clubs and activities were never really in jeopardy. Our school district has money to pay for all of this. What they don't have money for is continuing to pay high salaries and Cadilac benefits. These had to come first. So that put the student programs on the cutting board. They knew there would be an emotional response, and there was. This shifted the focus. The bailout, then, was "for the kids," and anyone who didn't support it was against the students and teachers. The district knew they couldn't say they needed money to fund their retirement plans. Some area school districts actually had referendums on this and they were defeated soundly. But by making sure their salaries and benefits were covered first, our district put the student programs on the chopping block knowing that we'd fight for them. It was a scare tactic. And people fell for it.


THE BAILOUT

Whether baling out Wall Street or our school district, the taxpayers get screwed. But hopefully we learn from this. Governor Sarah Palin, in the Vice Presidential debate, raised a good point. In referring to the Wall Street bailout she said we all need to take personal responsibility and to stand up and say never again will we let them take advantage of us. And she's right. There is plenty of blame to go around and in the end we are responsible for what we do. That includes how we manage our money and personal finances and how we vote and who we vote for. It also includes standing up and demanding accountability, oversight, and better leadership.

What applies to Wall Street and the federal government also applies to our school district and our local government. We have plenty of property taxes in Marshfield. What's lacking is oversight, sound management, and accountability. This is true for City Hall and it's certainly true for our school district.

Our school district administration and Board of Education took advantage of us and used scare tactics to switch the focus of the bailout referendum so that it was "for the kids." After what we now know, the reports from the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance about salaries and benefits, and the actions of the school district to add sports and give administrators raises weeks after the bailout, it's very clear that the 13.5 million bailout was not really about the kids.


SO NOW WHAT?

It's a done deal. The Yes'ers keep telling us to move on. But if we do that, we risk falling into the same trap again. Our school district is losing money on lunches. They're adding sports. They're raising salaries and continuing to offer those Cadilac benefits. They're going to build a new middle school and football stadium. They're going to need more money.

Instead of waiting for that next bailout referendum, we need to demand more transparency, accountability and oversight when it comes to the school district budget. We need to elect new people to the school board. We need to keep our eyes and ears open. And we need to speak up.

Real reform and change are coming!