LBUSD Needs To Delay Vacancy

On Tuesday September 1st the Long Beach Unified School District Board of Education will convene in a regularly scheduled meeting. The agenda packet for the board meetings is rather lengthy, in this case fifty-four pages.

Typical of these meetings is a closed session to deal with discipline issues for students and personnel in a closed meeting, and a rather large consent calendar. For those unfamiliar with committee meetings, commissions and boards, consent calendars are used to save time and allow for quickly passing measures and items that are routine and typically are not subject to any controversy. Items such as disbursements, credentions, procedures, approving contracts, are placed on the consent calendar and in that way the board can vote to approve many items at once instead of having ten, twenty, fifty...separate items read and voted upon.

Following the closed session and the consent calendar on Tuesday the LBUSD Board of Education will get to item 24. New Business. There are three very interesting items under new business, first is whether the Board will approve the renewal of the charter for Constellation Community Charter School which has had its difficulties abiding by its charter in the view of the Board. After the Constellation renewal vote the Board will have this item:

Resolution No. 090109-B, Declaring A Vacancy in the Office of Board of Education Member, District 3.

The entire resolution can be found on page 51 of the agenda. To recap for those not in the Long Beach area, or those who are but have been on a desert island, District 3 of the LBUSD has had as its elected representative one Michael Shane Ellis. His election was very controversial due to his lack of residency, though approved by City Attorney for the ballot despite not have established 30 day residence in the district, his only being on the ballot because of his relationship with now fired Executive Director of the Teachers' Association of Long Beach, Scott McVarish, and his complete lack of relationship with our community. Ellis' tenure on the school board brought more publicity to the board than ever before due not only to his election showing the attempt by TALB to take control of the school board, but subsequent reports of his being fired from a prior teaching job due to drinking in front of students, his multiple arrests for alcohol related incidents, the District's inability to prove his residency and finally his failure to show at scheduled school board meetings. In the middle of all this members of the community, led by the Greater Long Beach Chamber of Commerce, attempted to recall Ellis but the effort failed due to lack of the required number of signatures to put the recall on the ballot.

In August Ellis taped to the office doors of the other elected members of the Board of Education a letter of resignation effective September 1, 2009. While the members of the board have been doing research to determine how to vacate Ellis' 3rd District seat, the letter of resignation appears to have solved their problem, and that of the community--he finally is giving up a seat he had no interest in retaining once his mentor and puppet master McVarish was forced out at TALB.

Now the District has a big problem. Like many municipal bodies it is suffering from severe financial difficulties, overwhelmingly because of the State of California and its inability to properly budget the past decade. Because of the pending vacancy of the 3rd District Seat it must declare a special election to fill the seat. What makes this pill particularly hard to swallow is that the 3rd District seat comes up for regular election on April 13, 2010. Because of the City Charter if the Board of Education declares the seat vacant on Tuesday it must call a special election to fill the seat within 120 days of the seat being declared vacant--provided the regularly scheduled election is not within 120 days of the seat being vacant.

The special election will cost the District approximately $200,000. That pays for a couple of teachers plus benefits, or a lot of dry erase markers. That is too much money for a broke district to spend to fill a seat for four or five months.

It is my opinion that the current members of the Board of Education should look to use procedural rules to not accept Ellis' resignation; vote to postpone the vote on Resolution No. 090109-B or vote to reject it. What happens if the vote to declare the seat vacant fails? What happens if the board votes to hold over the declaration? The City Charter says the election must be within 120 days of the seat being declared vacant but what if such a declaration is never made?

The current members of the Board of Education, District 1 Member and President of the Board Mary Stanton, District 2 Member Felton Williams, District 4 Member Jon Meyer and District 5 Member David Barton, are smart and responsible officials. They work with an excellent staff at LBUSD led by Superintendent Chris Steinhauser. On this matter they have received briefings and advice from the district legal department on interpretations of the various rules regarding Ellis. At this point the board needs to take what may be a risk, but for $200,000 seems to have a pretty good return--postpone the vacancy of Ellis' seat until December. At that time the seat can be declared vacant and be filled during the regularly scheduled elections which will also see Stanton and Barton up for re-election.

But what of the people of Ellis' District 3? Do they not deserve representation? Sure they do, and they elected a representative who abandoned them. They failed to sign petitions to recall the representative they had despite the numerous reports on his short-comings as their representative. Because of their poor decisions regarding Ellis it is expected that the entire District suffer a loss of $200,000? Much of the money in the LBUSD goes into the 3rd District as it encompasses some of the poorest areas of the City. The schools within the 3rd District have more special needs programs and assistance than the other LBUSD schools and because of this the $200,000 cost of the special election might disproportionally affect the 3rd District--in essence it is in their best interest as well to keep the seat vacant until the regularly scheduled election on April 13, 2010.

School board members are often great community members who feel the need to help their communities and serve on the board. It is a mostly thankless task, it does not have any of the publicity of a City Council or other elected body. Go to any campus and ask parents dropping off kids who their School Board representative is and almost all of them will not be able to answer. Ask most of the teachers who represents their school and most will be unable to answer. Generally the members do not think in political terms or find ways to skirt the laws while not breaking the laws--something more polished politicians become rather adept at doing. They read the law and follow it.

In this case it is my hope that for the greater good of the students, teacher and administrators of the entire Long Beach Unified School District that the Board of Education reads the law from a different perspective, with the perspective of what if we do not make any declaration of vacancy?

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Just Some Questions

Below are questions I have asked myself throughout the past week. Instead of writing what my answers to them would be I am interested in any answers you may have, or additional questions you have asked yourself.

For the week starting Monday August 24, 2009 here are some questions I have had:

Why can you buy Coors Light in bars and restaurants locally by not Coors?

If every “competitor” surrounding your business is able to more than adequately accomplish the core aspect of the business with 25% less personnel why don’t you reduce your personnel as well?

If more power were pushed from the Federal government to the states would they be able to compete like the private sector for residents, businesses, jobs, etc?

If you can fly from Southern California to Northern California for about $50-75 how much would you pay to take a three hour train ride from SoCal to NoCal?

Has your business or industry been impacted by new Federal regulations in the past six to twelve months?

College football or NFL?

What is your smartest purchase in the past twelve months?

President Obama has said, and Sen. Landrieu (LA-D) has reiterated that illegal aliens will not/should not receive health benefits—then who pays the hospitals that have to treat them in their ERs when they show up for care?

What was right about your week?

How many drops in the bucket does it take to fill the bucket?

Which President saved passenger train service in the United States?

A question I asked the Leadership Long Beach class on Monday: It seems groups, organizations and committees are usually formed to fix problems someone sees, can you think of any that have been formed to keep something that is right and not a problem?

Kid #1 Question: Do you have kids?

If Congress is spending $2.4 billion per year on Amtrak to keep it running, how much government funding will be needed to keep a high speed rail between LA and San Francisco operating when customers can fly in half the time for less money than taking a train that costs of $3 billion to build?

Does Ted Kennedy become greater in death than he was while alive?

What is the longest you have stayed on hold? Was it worth it?

Can you imagine how crazy the anti-Bush crowd, led by the New York Times, would have been if his Administration took over control of interrogations of captured terrorists with a specially appointed group?

Is $246 million in tax breaks for movie producers to purchase film really stimulus or is it political payback for donations?

From friend Greg: How high would the pile be if you stacked up all the pages of laws and legislation that affect you and govern you?

Should the passage of the health care reform really be based upon the death of a Senator and not the facts in the bill?

Do you own a gun?

Instead of trying to squeeze more out of doctors and hospitals with their health care reform proposals why don’t Democrats go after tort reform to reduce costs?

Kid #2 Question: What was your favorite age when you were a kid?

How hot is too hot for you? How cold is too cold?

For those living in the Greater Long Beach area, are you aware that Orange and Los Angeles Counties are in discussions to move the border in the Long Beach region?

Cookies or Pie?

So those are the questions, what are your answers? Click on the comments button below and let us know what you think.

Home Health Care System to the Rescue!!

Who needs ObamaCare?

Who needs the provisions of HR3200?

Who needs Blue Cross or HealthNet?

When you are a minor, you and your dependents first come under the care of the Home Health Care System!

As Leslie describes in her great post "Long Live Dotty!" the HHCS handles surgeries and trauma right in the home!

Read the post and leave Leslie comments your HHCS stories!

Take The Stimulus Money Back

The news this summer has been very focussed on American citizens at townhall meetings. Some of the news diverts into showing just the screamers, while other reports show the questions being asked and statements being made. Almost all of the reports have been centered on health care reform and the people's objections to legislation currently working through the various committees of the House and Senate. Lost in the reporting is a very common message being given to members of Congress: stop spending money and creating massive debt for our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

On Friday afternoon, with the President and the White House press corps A-Team out of town on holiday, the Administration issued an "oops" press release. It seems that its estimates of the budget deficits in the coming years was slightly off, only about 29%. Instead of the federal deficit reaching $7 trillion in ten years the White House acknowledged the numbers that have been put out by the Congressional Budget Office and said the number is more like $9 trillion--in the hole, negative, red ink.

A LOOK AT OUR DEBT

So far this year the Treasury has been engaged in auctions of all of its bills and notes, 6 month, 1 year, 3 year, 7 year, 10 year. The auctions have actually gone quite well with significant bidders keeping the prices high and the yields low. Low yields when selling debt are important because when you start talking about hundreds of billions the smallest tick in rate costs hundreds of millions. When you are talking about a trillion a small tick is a billion. As of this writing the U.S. debt totals $11,719,060,925,865.86

One reason the Treasury debt auctions have gone well is because there have been plenty of foreign investors. As of June 2009 $3.4 trillion of U.S. Treasury Securities are held by foreign nations and investors. The interest payments on this $3.4 trillion approximates $25 billion per year, being paid to foreign investors, so far. Foreign investment accounts for approximately 30% of our national debt. While much is made of China's holding of U.S. treasury securities, and they own a lot at $776 billion through June, not too far behind China is Japan at $711 billion. What this means of course is that hundreds of millions of dollars per week are paid to both nations in interest payments.

Looking forward from the present there is great concern about the rapidly rising debt and treasury auctions since many of the auctions are used to refinance debt that is coming due. In six months the Treasury will have to pay off the 6 month bills issued this month, how? By auctioning on more bills and bonds. With our economy looking to be coming out of recession in the next six months we will see upward pressures on interest rates. Every one-quarter of one percent in interest rate (00.25%) the interest paid on $11.7 trillion goes up approximately $30 billion--that is the increase in payments.

WHAT CAN WE DO TODAY?

Obviously the primary way to stop debt rising in the future is to stop borrowing today. Since we are talking about the U.S. government that is pretty much impossible, there will always be debt--the U.S. house will never be free from a mortgage. However what can be done is to control spending and reduce hindering future economies and generations with massive debt payments by limiting spending today.

As the current bills have piled up President Obama and the Democrats in Congress have touted that the payments of the bills will come from "the wealthiest among us." Specifically those making more than $250,000 as a family have been targeted as evidently not paying "enough" and will be called upon to pay higher taxes, and or have many tax deductions such as mortgage interest and charitable contributions taken away from them. But how much of a dent can Americans making $250,000 or more put into a $9 trillion deficit? How many Americans will suddenly make $249,000 because they net more after taxes than if they make that extra $1000? Is it realistic to believe that our current spending will be paid by future Americans making above that magic threshold?

It is just as realistic as my proposal to help lower the future deficit and send a message to Americans that they have been heard this summer.

TAKE BACK THE STIMULUS MONEY

Upon returning from summer recess (aside: when you hear Congress is on recess do you picture them on slides and swings, they often act like children I picture them on recess like children), when they return Congress makes huge in-roads with Americans and perhaps gains back a little trust if their first order of business is to repeal the Stimulus Package passed in February for any funds that have not yet been sent out. It is not needed to stimulate the economy as evidence that only 10-15% of the funds have been spent or credited through tax cuts and the economy by almost all reports is on the road to recovery. If the purpose of the $787 billion was to boost and support the economy, and the economy is boosting and supporting without the money then do not spend it. Take it back.

Yes there will be communities through the country upset because their pork projects of renovation of dilapidated and unused rail stations will stay dilapidated, skate parks expansions will stay the same size, walkways will not be built around lakes and some will be stuck with the millions and millions of dollars of signs printed touting a project is being paid for by Federal Stimulus Funding. So what, let them be upset in the end pulling almost $700 billion in spending back into the budget will help reduce the current deficit and the future deficit.

Americans across the country are telling their Congressional representatives to please listen to their constituents, look at how much money has been flowing out of Washington and how much more is on the table--over $1 trillion for HR 3200 the health care reform bill that is the center of most of the debates. Now is a chance for Congress to tell the American people, "we hear you, we understand, we will not spend money that is not needed to be spent by the Federal government."

Were Congress to rescind the unspent stimulus funds and pass a motion to suspend HR 3200 until Congress and the White House are able to reform and make efficient the waste in Medicare and Medicaid, I think they would have a much better chance of passing step-by-step and methodical health care reform.

If I were a "Blue Dog Democrat" on the hot seat in November 2010 for the deficits being rung up I would certainly be touting saving $700 billion and be part of the first Congress to ever un-ring a spending bill.

Think it will happen?

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Expanding The Size Of Government

In the past two decades Americans have seen all levels of their government expand rapidly. City, county, state and federal government budgets and powers have not just crept higher and stronger but have leaped. As I read, listen and watch the health care debate across the country one of the factors of the current proposal that concerns, in many cases frightens, many people is the huge leap it makes in expanding government.

Presidents Clinton and Bush both contributed to the expansion of the federal government, but their contributions to such expansion combined pale in comparison to what has happened--or is proposed--since January when President Obama took office. Of even greater concern is not just the expansion of the federal government but specifically the expansion of power of the Executive Branch.

With a $787 billion spending package passed in just a few weeks that was to stimulate the economy, and we were told create or save 3 million jobs, Obama quickly showed his power over members of Congress that created the Democratic majority. With over 90% of the stimulus money still not spent the impact of the stimulus package is non-existent as our economy still struggles, but the timing of the money hitting the economy will coincide with the 2010 mid-term Congressional elections . With that money hitting local economies while candidates will be stumping for votes, President Obama will be able to use his charisma and oratory skills to help re-elect any Democrats that may find themselves in trouble following whatever results from the health care reform debates and proposals.

That is normal political power that all past Presidents have typically been able to wield, or try to wield, in their terms of office. Generating even more power for his Administration and the Executive Branch is the ownership of three companies, GM, AIG and Chrylser. Two of the companies, GM and AIG, are the biggest in their industry in the United States. With major ownership stakes in these companies policies and regulations from a multitude of federal departments from the Department of Transportation, to Treasury to the Federal Reserve are all now impacted on how it affects U.S. investment in these companies. Rather than establish independent trustees to run the companies and act as stockholders by voting and controlling the stock as to how it might best benefit the companies and their profitability, the ownership interests are controlled by various "Czars" and members of the Obama Administration. The President of the United States has control of three major U.S. corporations, unprecedented in the history of our country.

Speaking of Czars, the current count in the Obama White House is 32 (list here). The benefit of creating a "Czar" is there is no confirmation from the Senate. The position is filled by appointment from the President and the duties are rather fungible, basically whatever the Administration feels the position needs to be. Advise, policy creation, enforcement, the powers vary from Czar to Czar, but in the end who says "no" when being called by an individual appointed by the President? And should not these positions be under one of the Cabinet positions, whose leaders are confirmed by the Senate?

Now the Obama Administration is proposing to Congress an Independent Medical Advisory Committee that would have very broad powers to set rates and reimbursements for Medicare and Medicaid; basically by-passing the current Medicare Payment Advisory Commission who reports to Congress. The new IMAC would be appointed by the President and once it passes regulations and prices the Congress would have 30 days to pass a joint resolution, currently on the table is with a two-thirds majority according to the California Hospital Association, over turning any IMAC recommendations. If Congress is unable to provide a joint resolution in 30 days the decisions are binding.

One of the pillars of Obama's arguments for paying for the one trillion plus cost of the health care reform is "fixing" Medicare and Medicaid, goodness knows they need some fixing but so far from what I have read and heard his idea of fixing is to reduce reimbursements to providers. Recently doctors across the country received notices their Medicare reimbursements are dropping, over 12% across the board from what I have read and heard from doctors, and up to 40% for cardiologists. This is to "fix" the costs in Medicare. If the purpose of IMAC is to control expenses and there is a take-it-or-leave-it relationship with a divided Congress, the Executive Branch is now in the roll of fixing health care reimbursements for hospitals and doctors across the country.

A $787 billion stimulus package with 90% of the funds not spent and therefore not stimulating, take over of private corporations, cash for clunkers that has proven to bill ill conceived and ill managed, and over 30 top level administrators in office with no Congressional oversight. Now we are being shown a grab for even more power for the Executive Branch to control the payment of those who take care of our nation's health.

Checks and balances? Advise and Consent? Is anyone concerned about the disintegration of the enumeration of powers as defined in our Constitution?

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