RW Weighs In Again

RW has a couple of comments on the school situation. First, he gives his two cents on the Shimmin recall effort. He sees the logic in CARES' choice but fears that if, the recall fails, then the Trio will feel empowered to much bolder than they currently are. Maybe that should be part of the argument in favor of signing/vote for the recall.

The second point is the You're-a-puppet-of-Robinson argument. RW finds that argument to be unpersuasive. We do, too. When we argue that it is wrong for a board member to vote for a contract amendment without having it reviewed by an attorney, to have someone respond, "You're wrong because you just agree with everything Robinson says," doesn't move the discussion forward.

Rob Allen

The Democrat Herald has a brief article about Rob Allen continuing in the Athletic Director position at the high school.

Ken Ray took over the A.D. duties after Bo Yates was booted out for financial wrongdoing (which we acknowledge was not done for Bo's personal benefit, but was still wrong). Allen took over the position in the spring for the remainder of the school year. Allen's short tenure was marked by . . . no controversy!

While it would be preferable in our eyes for someone with an administrative license to serve in this position, we think that keeping Allen in the position for another year makes sense, given the lack of controversy and the budget situation in the district.

The Tricycle Theory

The posting about the high school raised a number of comments. Obviously this is a matter of concern within our community.

Here's a couple of thoughts:

Commenter 1:

"I really believe in the tricyle theory in schools. We need all three wheels to work together, parents, teacher and administrators in order for there to be easy wheeling for our students."

LT doesn't think that three is enough wheels, particularly in the teenage years. Teenagers need everyone to work together to help them succeed. It is not simply the parents, teachers, and administrators. It is also the extended family, employers, mentors, friends, and the community at large. Having said that, we hope that we are really agreeing with Commenter 1.

The reality of the matter is that most difficult problem is how to support the parents who are absent or otherwise ineffective (and some of those "ineffective" parents are good people with kids who have big problems). Those of you who are able to direct your kids through high school successfully either because you are super parents or have super kids are going to do pretty well in a high school, regardless of the quality of the high school.

Sherrie Sprenger has spoken effectively on this subject on a number of occasions. She says that she joined the school board because she wanted to help her son to get a good education. Over time, she came to realize that she wasn't on the school board to help her son, but she was there for other students who don't have the parental involvement that her son has.

Of course, LT is not saying that we should not be concerned about providing the highest possible education for our best and brightest students. Rather, it is easy to come up with the ways to improve the education of the smart and/or privileged kids. The challenge is to find ways to help the students with a weak parent wheel to find success. And, by doing this, we improve the climate of the entire system, benefitting the top kids as well.

Commenter 2:

"'the tricyle theory'

Hmmmm....

In what ways would you like to see parents involved? The high school does not seem to want them THERE unless selling concessions at a sporting event. Only so much can be done at home and you don't get to see/feel for yourself what the environment is like when you are checking homework and helping study for tests."

We don't know all of the reasons that vocal parents feel so disenfranchised by the high school. We don't even know if the reasons are important. The question becomes how do we work together to trust each other and collaborate? How does the high school become a welcoming place for adults?

Here's a first step: if you are an adult who is willing to volunteer at the high school, send an email to Mark Finch (Mark.Finch@lebanon.k12.or.us). If you do not hear back within a reasonable amount of time, let us know. Finch needs to help build community and that means he needs to reach out to potential volunteers, either directly or by having someone on the staff contact them. If that is not happening, then we need to make voice about it.

LT is willing to listen to ideas that will help make the high school work better. So let's hear what you think would help.

Correction: Larry Was First

Here's Larry Coonrod's article.

Press on Debi

Here's the first press report on the Shimmin recall effort. We must say that Jennifer Moody is on top of her game to get a comprehensive article out so quickly.

Moody covers a little bit of ground that is not available in the CARES press release.

First, Moody shows a more complete picture of Shimmin's voting record: there are times when Shimmin has voted with Fisher and Sprenger. For example, Josh and Rick wanted to prevent the district from demolishing Crowfoot, an accident waiting to happen. As one of our commenters noted Crowfoot was old when he went there decades ago.

Her most significant vote against Rick and Josh was her motion to rescind the Robinson administrative leave. This was, in fact, the right thing to do because the board did not have grounds for taking the action it did. And her vote in this case did save the district money and all the misery of a lawsuit. However, her original vote is the one that placed the district in jeopardy in the first place.

Moody also explains the mechanics of recall. In order for an effort to be successful, the petitioners must collect signatures equal to 15 percent of the votes cast for governor in the last gubernatorial election. Here's Moody's summary:

"Once the clerk approves the paperwork, petitioners have 90 days to collect signatures from registered voters in the school district.

If enough valid signatures are gathered, the recall target has five days to resign or submit a statement responding to the charges. If the board member does not step down, the clerk schedules a special election.

The number of valid signatures required to force a recall election is 15 percent of the total number of votes cast in the school district for all candidates for governor in the last election, 2006 in this case."

When contacted by Moody, Shimmin had no comment. It was probably the first she had heard of the recall. So it is not surprising that she would have no comment.

It's time to think.

RECALL DEBI

C.A.R.E.S.' press release:


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
5/30/2008
Lebanon CARES (Citizens Alliance for a Responsible Education System)
announced today that it will initiate an immediate recall of School Board Member Debi
Shimmin. “The members of CARES and this community feel betrayed by Ms. Shimmin.
She has broken almost every promise she made during her campaign. Her votes have
been consistently irresponsible and potentially unlawful and will ultimately lead to more
litigation against the Lebanon School District” explained CARES President John
Kennedy. “We feel we have no choice – Ms. Shimmin must go before more damage is
done.”

“Almost every member of CARES supported Ms. Shimmin in her campaign"
said Kennedy. "In fact, the co-chairs of this recall effort, Joyce Weatherly and Connie
Schmidt, were both strong advocates of Ms. Shimmin when she ran for election." Ms.
Weatherly explained. "We believed we were getting an independent, fair-mined board
member. What we got, however, was the exact opposite.”

CARES cites the following votes as examples of Ms. Shimmin’s irresponsible or
potentially unlawful actions: voting to increase funding to Sand Ridge while facing
significant cuts in our public schools; refusing to hire two quality administrators without
explaining her inaction or even showing up to reconsider their hiring; voting in favor of a
contract with PIE drafted and negotiated by fellow board member Josh Wineteer without
even requesting the advice of the School District’s attorney; refusing to support board
policy that would end last minute additions to the agenda without the public being aware
of the changes; and, by her own admission, failing to follow appropriate procedures when
she voted to place the School Superintendent on administrative leave.

CARES decided against seeking a recall of Board Members Josh Wineteer and
Rick Alexander because their terms expire next year. “Ms. Shimmin has three years left
on her term, but both Josh Wineteer and Rick Alexander are up for re-election next year.
We intend to recall Ms. Shimmin immediately and wait for next year’s election for
Lebanon voters to remove Mr. Wineteer and Mr. Alexander.” CARES’ President John
Kennedy announced. “We believe that with Ms. Shimmin removed from the Board, Mr.
Wineteer and Mr. Alexander will have a difficult time pursuing their personal agendas
and damaging actions through the next election.” Kennedy stressed, however, that
recruiting and electing competent, rational and ethical board members remains CARES’
primary objective.

Kennedy urges anyone that wants to help collect signatures or simply sign a recall
petition to contact Lebanon CARES. Lebanon CARES’ recall effort can be reached at
recalldebishimmin@yahoo.com.

Monday Night's Meeting

The agenda for the Monday night meeting has been posted.

There are a number of involuntary transfers on the consent agenda. But what you keep in mind is the use of the term "involuntary" doesn't necessarily mean that the employee is unhappy with the move. Steve Kelley defines the term to include any transfer where the district took the first step. Some of these transfers may be a result of the downsizing required by next year's budget.

There are a couple of items about which we don't have any insights.

The first major item is the Ed Sansom hearing. You will recall that Sansom's contract was not renewed this spring. However, he has a year left on his contract and thus his contract could be renewed next year.

LT obtained a copy of the tort claim notice that Sansom's attorney filed with the district. (Please not that his attorney is the same one that Bo Yates is using, which raises an interesting question: isn't there a conflict there? Sansom was/is Yates supervisor. In addition, we note that this attorney has been disciplined twice by the Oregon State Bar).

Okay, Dennis, LT obtained the notice a while ago and we don't know where it is right now. We will try to post a more detailed report on the tort claim notice this weekend. There's no intention of denying you access to the name of the attorney or quotes from the notice itself.

LT doesn't know much about Seven Oak. However, we wondered about the embezzlement question. A school secretary embezzled funds from accounts to which parents and students contributed. Sansom's tort claim notice indicates that he was given a letter of reprimand for his failure to properly supervise the embezzler.

One question is what should be the standard for the board to overrule the district administration. If you buy into the notion that the superintendent and his staff are supposed to handle the day to day operations and employment decisions, then the board should not overrule the administrative decision unless there is a major flaw in the process.

We doubt that is the standard that the Terrible Trio will use. Some may think that a vote for Samsom is a vote for Bo. Josh has announced that the vote to nonrenew Robinson was a statement that the board intended to send the district in a different direction. And Rick plain doesn't like Robinson.

LT doesn't have any ideas about the rest of the agenda. We shall see.

Mark Finch, New Scapegoat?

We received a comment blasting Mark Finch, the new head principal at the high school. We've spent several days contemplating what to do with it, because we think that author has some things wrong and also is assigning too much blame to Finch.

There is an accusation that Finch is "micromanaging" the high school and that this is a bad thing.

Teaching Assignments

The first charge is that Finch is responsible for the demise of the welding program because the position is being cut back to half time. The welding program was the poster child for the cuts in the vocational program. Jim Robinson must be breathing a sigh of relief because up until this week, HE was the one who was charged with that crime.

But let's look at the facts: if the welding program is being reduced, that is occurring because students did not sign up for the classes for next year. There are hard choices being made due to budget cuts. This may be one of them.

Now, you may say that the welding program has fallen apart because the district didn't hire a decent teacher immediately upon the retirement of Steve Steele. However, it simply is not easy to find a qualified welding teacher. We know that Ken Ray put in a big effort to find someone and people in the district office did so, too. We are not convinced that this was a master plan to tank the program.

It would be nice to have beginning welding classes at the high school. This allows students to try welding out to see if they want to go earn a certificate at LBCC and it also allows other students, including pre-engineering students to get hands-on experience with metals.

But it is a program that has had quite a few problems since Steele's departure. Moreover, it is expensive and it is available at LBCC.

The writer then goes on to make a couple of blanket allegations: "Other teachers are being moved for who knows what reason. Academy secretaries are being shuffled through the building, again without any logical reasoning."

We don't think movement of teachers is occurring for no reason. We don't even know that people have been told their assignments for next year. There are 4 or 5 positions being cut at the high school. A couple of teachers are retiring which can cause some adjustments and people are having to move as a result of balancing out of the tightening. There is some reduction in social studies positions, which means that some people with dual endorsements are being moved in order to keep as many current staff employed as possible. A couple of academies have 3 language arts slots. That could account for some movement. Until a master schedule is shown to the staff, we aren't sure how you know this is so.

There were some involuntary transfers that happened a couple of years ago that were handled in a way that was less than ideal. The transferred teachers felt like they were not given straight answers for the cause of the moves. We hope that any people who are transferred will receive enough information to feel respected this time around. However, teachers should understand that the district administration has the right to move people if they believe it will be best for students.

Yes, academy secretaries are being shuffled. However, there is some logic to the shuffle: the high school is losing an administrator and some support staff. So Finch and his crew have to decide how to cover the administrative needs of four academies with a smaller number of people. Again, we don't think that decisions have been made about new support assignments. While we understand that the lack of information doesn't feel good, we don't think that it is time to get upset.

Both teachers and support staff have to sit back and be patient. Certainly, it seems premature to write Finch off as a failure.

Teacher Shopping

Another complaint of this writer is that Finch is stopping students from crossing academy lines to take courses. This is simply false. And we worry about this gossip being used as a means to rile up the Terrible Trio. The school board approved crossing over to obtain courses that were not offered in a student's home academy. They did not approve crossing over because Ms. Smith is easier than Mr. Jones.

Finch did make clear at the public interview session that his intention was to reduce teacher shopping. Allowing students to cross academy lines to take courses offered in their academies is a whole different animal than allowing a student to cross over to take a course that is not offered in his own academy. In the former case, you have students who are losing the benefits of an academy -- being well known by a group of teachers and taking courses that have been aligned within the academy. And students who choose this route grow up to believe that if you don't like your boss, you just walk out the door instead of finding ways to make things work.

Accessibility

The author then complains that Finch is building a powerbase and cutting himself off from teachers. This is based on an email that his secretary sent out indicating that teachers should try to make appointments rather than expecting to just pop in whenever they feel like it. This is a change, but it is not one with an evil purpose. Administrators and their secretaries were trained in executive management. This increases the responsibility of the secretary for scheduling the administrator's time and keeping him accountable to his calendar. The purpose: to become more efficient and increase the amount of time the administrator spends out in the building with students and staff. LT's experience with scheduling an appointment with Finch was that we had to come back about an hour later. And we aren't on Finch's A list so it was not preferential treatment.

Becoming more efficient and more professional strikes us as a good thing. For those who want to avoid change and for those who have accumulated a little power niche, it is not a very comfortable time. However, don't we need to model dealing with change for our students.

Many times change turns out to be exactly what each of us needs. People who lose their jobs often find a better one. People who are transferred often find that the new position is much better than the old one.

Let's not get in a twist yet and let's not start accusing people of things before the decisions are even made.

Ethics Complaint Against Jay?

Rhetorical Wasteland has an interesting post regarding whether Jay Jackson committed an ethical violation by discussing the PIE amendment with Josh Wineteer when he knew that the school district was represented by an attorney.

We are not an expert on the issue. However, it is clear that Jay Jackson knew that the district had legal counsel for the PIE negotiations. And it is clear that Jay Jackson admitted at a school board meeting that he had communicated with Josh about Josh's proposal. This, on its face, appears to be an ethics violation. There was knowledge of representation and communication despite that knowledge. Jay may attempt to argue that he was not acting as an attorney in the discussions, but the ethics rule seems to say that it applies whether Jay was acting as an attorney or otherwise.

RW raises the question of whether other communications between Jay and school board members were also ethical violations. We think that it might be difficult to prove other violations. There is the question of whether the subject matter was one in which the district had representation. More important, there is the question of proof. In the above case, there are multiple witnesses who can testify they they heard both Josh and Jay admit in a public meeting that they had communicated on the matter. Maybe there is even a tape recording of the meeting. Finally, the discussions on the PIE amendment were not casual, as evidenced by the fact that the board approved the amendment without the benefit of review by the district's attorney.

Perhaps someone may want to contact the state bar association. Jay has already been disciplined by the bar three times. These previous cases of misconduct would be considered by the bar in deciding what discipline should be delivered upon a finding of an ethics violation.

And, it may be appropriate to notify TSPC of the matter. The state still has not approved the registration for him as an administrator. The TSPC website shows that additional registration materials were filed on May 15, 2008. Of course, because the application is not available for public review, we can not find out if Jackson is trying to make the argument that he is not an administrator of a charter school because his title was changed to administrator of PIE rather than Sand Ridge, a change in name only, as admitted by Mary Northern to the press.

If Jay Jackson is not deemed competent by the state, why in the world would Sand Ridge parents want him in charge of their school? If Jay Jackson can not keep up on the paper work, why in the world would Sand Ridge parents want him to be responsible for these important tasks?

It is a mystery to us.

The Problem With Gossip As News Source

LT is opposed to the use of gossip as a definitive news source. We don't mind the use of talk about town as a provocation to investigation. But let's take a look at what happens when a person takes gossip as news.

This week's Lebanon Express includes a letter from Pat McConnel of Brownsville. Ms. McConnel's thesis is that the district administration's budget is flawed because it has failed to make administrative cuts at the high school.

"If the Lebanon School District needs to cut 71K from their budget maybe they should rethink the high school personnel. "

Okay, not a bad opening. But check out the second sentence:

"Do we really need four principals and four principals' secretaries? Is the majority of parents really supportive of the academy system? " (emphasis added).

Nothing personal, Ms. McConnel, but you lost credibility with us at this point. The administration's budget called for three principals and secretaries.

Ms. McConnel claims that she has grandchildren at the high school. Apparently, her family was the source of her information.

"Is [sic] the majority of parents really supportive of the academy system? "

We don't think that you know the answer to that question. It can not be disputed that there was a great deal of negative reaction to the academies when they were first introduced. And, we think that assignment of some blame to the district administration is fair for not finding better ways to inform the public and ease concerns. However, the current views among teachers, parents, and students are different now. While your family may not like the academies, that doesn't mean that all families or even the majority of families are opposed to the academy system.

Plus, we don't think that is the right question. The right question is what do experts, high school staff, the district administration, parents, and students think about the academy system. Yes, parents should have a voice in the education system: they are the experts in their own children. But the others also have expertise to offer.

"Three of your school board members having been trying to help improve the system (Alexander, Wineteer, and Shimmin) but they only get flack. Even when they want the opinion and input of the appointed Budget Committee, they get shot down."

Again, we have factual errors. For example, "they only get flack." No, there are people, we think ill-informed people, who regularly voice their support for the tactics of the Terrible Trio. So they get something more than flack.

"Even when they want the opinion . . . of the Budget Committee." Debi wasn't there. And, we presume that you are referring to LT's comments on Josh's proposal to force all the budget cuts onto the support staff. At the last budget committee meeting all, or nearly all of the principals in the district spoke about the importance of classified staff in running schools. This is not something that we regularly see. Principals generally do not get up to speak their minds in this district, but this was so important that they lined up for the mike.

"We don't have a lot of the vocational classes that are important to life skills. Why? Because we are heavy on administration!"

Ms. McConnel, LHS has more electives available to students under the academies than were available under the old system. In addition, students have the option of taking on-line classes, often at the district's expense. Most important, your grandchildren have the option of taking a multitude of vocational classes at LBCC on the district's dime. There are LHS students right now finishing up the welding program. For example, students can receive training as a CNA, dental assistant, civil engineering assistant, office assistant, heating repairman.

Sorry, Ms. McConnel, we're sure that you are well-meaning and have the best interests of your grandchildren at heart, but you simply lack the information to seek to inform the public through a letter to the editor. What you have done instead is exemplify one of the most significant problems in Lebanon: not the district administration, not even the school board, but a misinformed public.

What's Wrong in Lebanon?

A commenter got quite emotional this morning:

"What a board member stabbing another board member in the back?"

It seems that Sherrie's action was appropriate on two grounds. First, as an employer, it is only fair that Sherrie give Steve Kelley the opportunity to respond to a complaint. Second, as a human being and as a practicing Christian, Sherrie was avoiding the middle role. Christianity teaches that if you have a problem with a person, then you should first go directly to that person. That is also the teachings of ethics and playing fair. Sherrie's forwarding note ("I'm forwarding this email to you so that you may be made aware of opinions on the board that affect you.") is quite direct about her intention and the stated intention is NOT to stab Debi in the back. For these reasons, we disagree with your conclusion.

"This blog site is laughable. As a very proud graduate of LUHS you people make me sick. LT you need to quit being a puppet for Robinson and the DO."

If you find this blog upsetting and offensive, then don't read it. LT is not a puppet, never has been, never will be. But LT does agree with Jim Robinson on many policy matters and, most important, LT does believe that the district should follow the law. LT is not alone in this position. Note the recent Lebanon Express editorial as well as the creation of CARES. That would be an unmanageable number of puppets to manipulate, wouldn't it? LT believes that communication in our community has degenerated to the point that gossip has become the only acceptable news source to a portion of us. We assign some blame to Jim Robinson for this situation. As a philosophical matter, Robinson does not believe in responding to gossip so he has not set the record straight on numerous occasions.

LT believes that arming people with the facts is important and therefore we are doing so.
Part of our reason for feeling so strongly about this is that we were initially fooled by the gossip. We bought all the rumors about Robinson. Over time, we found that some of the information we were receiving didn't quite add up. Then we started investigating on our own and even asking Robinson himself. What we found caused us to do a 180.

"Lebanon is a laughinstock because of people like you that do nothing except divide the people of Lebanon. You come on here and attack people that have different opinions then you.It's embarrassing for this crap to continue."

We think that laughingstock is an overused word in Lebanon. We admit it; we think that unity for the sake of unity is a bad thing. We think that being divided on issues is healthy so long as people are willing to consider all the facts and reconsider their positions in light of the facts (so long as we agree to stay true to certain ethical and legal obligations).

We come on here and attack the opinions and actions of people we think have done something wrong. That is part of considering the facts and reconsidering our positions. We have been angry at times, but our goal is not to attack people but to work for change.

We think it is more embarrassing for the Terrible Trio to continue doing terrible things than it is for us to discuss the embarrassing things that are happening. We can't get better if we hide the truth.

"You can't get teachers worth a crap to apply. You can't get administrators worth a crap to apply. You have an administration that nobody in the state respects, yet you want to continue to support this group. You need to look outside your little box and figure out that what is best for Lebanon is not the current DO but somebody that actually has a clue as to how to run a school district."

How do you think that the current teachers and administrators are going to feel about your statement? It appears that you have just said that all the teachers and administrators in the district aren't worth crap. We hope that you just engaged in hyperbole, which unfortunately is offensive to many of the current employees of the district.

We also wonder the basis of your conclusion that our administration is one that "nobody in the state respects". Here's one fact that suggests your conclusion is not true: Jim Robinson is on the board of directors for the Oregon Association of School Executives. That suggests his peers hold him in some esteem. We are not going to sit down and compose a treatise responding to your accusation because you have not given any facts whatsoever to support the conclusion that our administration is bad. There are some facts to indicate that our administration is not perfect. However, our contacts and observations are that the people in the district office are honest, ethical, and committed to increasing the achievement of Lebanon's students. They are willing to do the hard work necessary to stay true to their objectives. We admire them for that. However, we do not admire them to the point that we blindly follow them.

"As an outsider who just read Deb's e-mail it would seem to me that she did the right thing and that your Queen Sherrie went right to the DO and told them what was said. Great leadership, I can only hope that someone like that never steps foot in our legislature.I am sad to say that I am embarrassed to be a Lebanon native and graduate. "

Sorry, Sherrie is currently in office and set foot in the legislature last February. We think that she did the right thing. If you are embarrassed to be a Lebanon native and graduate, then we suggest that you take some time to become informed on the issue. Come to some school board meetings and observe carefully. Go talk to Robinson yourself.

Debi's Email

There's been a long discussion over on Rhetorical Wasteland about Debi's most recent public email. And there was a comment on this blog accusing Larry Coonrod of lying about how he got the email.

Here's the deal: Larry Coonrod filed a public information request with the district to obtain a copy of the email. The email was forwarded to Steve Kelley at his district email and therefore became available to the public. We don't know who Coonrod learned of the email, but we presume that is was asking a fair amount of questions about events at the May board meeting.

Debi (debi.shimmin@gmail.com) sent the following to Sherrie Sprenger (ssprenger@centurytel.com) sent May 8 at 10:31 a.m.

"Dear Sherrie,

When I was first elected, you told me if I ever needed help, to go to you first and so with that said, I have some serious concerns about the professional conduct and decorum that is taking place at our board meetings. I am contacting you first and I am hoping you will be able to put a stop to this.

Whether or not we as board members agree or disagree on issues before the board, we must show respect for each other. Questioning our motives is not appropriate. Questioning our judgement is not okay. Trying to understand each other's perspective through a respectful line of dialog [sic] should be how we conduct business. It should not be through smirks, or flippant comments or any kind of negative remarks.

I and the board was berated and bullied by the Assistant Superintendent and to a certain degree the Superintendent last Monday night. Their job is to provide information, answer questions and allow the board to deliberate. They should not be allowed to berate us for a half hour on any issue before the board. Steve Kelley's speech at the end was insubordinate. he has no authority to make a speech to the board and not allow a member to respond. He has no right to tell me that I am supposed to tell him how I'm going to vote before a board meeting. There is a complete lake [sic] of respect for the board majority and I feel to a certain degree Sherrie that you exacerbate the situation because you often agree with them, and you allow them to argue with us. You don't protect me when you allow them to bully me. I need you to support me in my right to vote any way I choose to without fear of public rebuke. This would never be tolerated by any City employee at city council meetings and we should follow their lead in this respect.

Again, I hope you are able to help provide a more positive environment to function in and I appreciate your help very much.

Kindest Regards,

Debi Shimmin."


At 1:32 p.m. that same day, Sherrie forwarded Debi's email to Steve Kelley with the following cover note:

"Steve:

I'm forwarding this email to you so that you may be made aware of opinions on the board that affect you."

Steve Kelley sent a response to Sherrie on May 14th:

Sherrie,

Thank you for the feedback. I have delayed my response to you as I take this (and any) feedback very seriously. I have consulted others on this issue. I have sought people that would be truthful with me. I have also received several unsolicited responses to my interactions with the Board on Monday, May 5th. Without exception, these people have not shared the same view as Ms. Shimmin. With this feedback as well as my own reflections, I must respectfully and strongly disagree with Ms. Shimmin's point of view.

I do agree with Ms. Shimmin that we should try "to understand each other's perspective through a respectful line of dialog". I am concerned that she seems to suggest that my interaction with the Board should be limited to "provid (ing) information, answer (ing) questions and allow (ing) the board to deliberate." I was under the assumption that we were attempting to build a strong collaborative community that would include a genuine partnership between the Board and the executive administrative team. I wish to seek ways to strengthen that relationship rather than limit my role. As I stated at the end of the meeting, if Board members would communicate their concerns/questions (not their voting preference) prior to the meeting than I might be able to avoid the embarrassment of prospective employees and their hiring committees.

Our reputation proceeds itself in the State of Oregon. I am committed to changing that negative image. I am also willing to assist you with Ms. Shimmin and her perceptions as you see fit. Thank you again for passing on this feedback."

PIE's False Blues

PIE's claim that the freeze on the enrollment cap is creating problems for next year seems inconsistent with with the facts. The argument that the charter school must cut back is valid only if Sand Ridge is currently at the cap. But the reality of the matter is that Sand Ridge is under the cap right now, by around 16 students.

Jay Jackson is claiming that the enrollment cap is doing all kinds of damage. But how can that be true if Sand Ridge is not at maximum enrollment right now? And what does that say about the alleged waiting list to enroll in the charter school? If there are so many people on the list, why doesn't Sand Ridge have 280 students on its roll?

PIE's Next Plan

Jay Jackson was singing the blues last week to Jennifer Moody. In this article, Jackson claims that Sand Ridge will have to cut enrollment next year because of the frozen cap imposed by the new charter. He says that this year's kindergarten students, who are counted as 1/2 student each (the state funds half-day kindergarten (something that LT would like the legislature to change)), will be counted as full time students next year. He says that means the school can take in fewer new students next year.

LT doesn't think that is true. Sand Ridge has a history of a plunge in enrollment in the upper grades, starting in the fourth or fifth grade. Sand Ridge had a kindergarten class of 36. It needs to lose 18 students at higher grades in order to be able to enroll 36 kindergarten students next fall. Last year, Sand Ridge had no students in the 12th grade, and only 8 in the 11th. The eighth grade had a mere 18. So we think Jay's blues shouldn't be the cap-ain't-fair blues, but my-students-don't-love-me-they-use-me-to-learn-their-reading-and-arithmetic-and-dump-me-like-day-old-bread-in-the-for-sale-cheap-aisle-in-the-grocery-store blues. Jay, figure out why your older students don't stick with you.

FIRST TAXPAYER ALERT:

Is Josh going to come back to the June school board meeting with a surprise attack -- one of those late night commando attacks -- to add an agenda item: increase poor PIE's enrollment cap?

We hope that somebody tells Debi IN ADVANCE OF THE MEETING that would be a really bad idea.

And if the Trio decides to do this, we hope that Chris at least tries to include an amendment that would make PIE accountable to bear any funding cuts that it causes the district. Think about it: why would PIE refuse to this condition? This isn't Lebanon trying to punish PIE. This is just Lebanon trying to protect our students from having to pay for PIE's mistakes. It is an insult to the community for PIE to refuse this clause. What the district should have included was this clause as well as an additional 5% of the state withhold to pay the district administration for the costs of PIE's violations of state laws and regulations -- because that is what it is going to take for the state to withhold funds.

SECOND TAXPAYER ALERT:

The second portion of the article is where the interesting stuff occurs:

PIE may eliminate the high school at Sand Ridge to stay under the cap.

What is interesting is this was part of the district proposal and in fact it the district's proposal was the reason Josh gave for his coup of the charter negotiations.

Something is not working at the Sand Ridge high school. It's time that the Sand Ridge community addressed it. When things were not working well at LHS, the district started making changes. We can debate how successful they are, but the district did not ignore the problem and is not ignoring the problems now. There are continuing efforts to improve student achievement.

What did PIE consider about its high school problem:

"PIE officials toyed with this possibility last year as part of an idea to apply for a new startup grant for a separate high school charter."

Wouldn't that be fraud? Let's close our school so we can start a new school so we are eligible to get more start-up money from the state.

Just another example of why people are fed up with PIE. It's time for the good people in the Sand Ridge community to stage their own coup -- you have a cancer in your school. You need to stop ignoring it. Don't wait until it destroys your entire school. That is not intended to be a threat; that is a prediction. You have people in your organization who are not acting right. They are violating government mandates; they are lying about the intentions and actions of the school district; they are serving as poor role models for your children. Your school is important to our community. Make those people behave or cut their malignancy out of your group.

Josh Is Not Just a Self-Made Lawyer!

The Democrat-Herald reported on Thursday's budget committee meeting. District officials offered the committee two recommendations for making up the additional cuts required for the additional $71,000 Josh got diverted to his daughter's school.

Option One: cut 1.3 more teachers.

Option Two: cut 20 hours of classified time.

But Josh is not satisfied with the options that have been presented by administrators. Does this sound familiar? Josh has no college degree, no experience working in an educational system, has never indicated that he has had any training in educational management, yet he is going to come up with his own proposal for how to make budget cuts.

What is his proposal? To make whatever cuts to the classified staff that are necessary to reduce the 8.5-9.8 teachers that the administration recommends to 2-6 teachers. He is requesting that the administration return next week with a budget based on his proposal.

Now why would he come up with those particular numbers? One interesting clue: Kim Fandino, the president of the teacher's union, offered comments earlier in the evening, requesting that the board find a way to minimize the number of teaching positions that would be cut. Is this another example of Fandino bypassing district administration? (Just because you have "First Amendment Rights" to speak doesn't mean that you should go around the boss' back).

Another clue: the classified employee's union is currently bargaining with the district. According to one member of the bargaining team, the school board members of the district's team have never even bothered to show up! In fact, this person didn't even know the names of the two school board members assigned to this task. One might think that this was an attempt to intimidate the classified employees into submission but for the fact that the board doesn't seem very interested in the classified negotiations.

If this were an isolated event, LT would not be concerned. However, this is a pattern with Josh. He did it with the PIE contract for Sand Ridge. He did it for the hiring of the two administrators for the high school. And that is just what he has done this month.

More important, he announced his intention at the May 5th meeting: He wants to run the district himself. From the Democrat Herald:

"Robinson reminded board members that, by contract, personnel decisions are his responsibility and called the lack of action "micromanagement." Wineteer countered that the board's majority vote in March to not renew Robinson's contract indicates the board wishes to guide the district itself. "

Here's another example of Wineteer speaking not merely for himself; he is speaking on behalf of the Trio. He has announced that the district is going to be run by three individuals, none of whom have any professional training in education, one of whom has two criminal convictions and apparently no high school diploma, and two who never finished college. Running a multi-million dollar operation, one that requires strict compliance with laws and regulations should not be left up to a crew like this, PARTICULARLY WHEN THEY HAVE AN ESTABLISHED PATTERN OF DISDAIN FOR THE LAW, PROFESSIONALS, AND HONEST, FAIR DEALING.

Is this okay with you?

Special Board Meeting Report

Last night's special board meeting resulted in the hiring of two administrators for the high school. Jennifer Moody got her report in and posted online promptly.

What if they had a meeting and no one showed up? Sherrie Sprenger arrived about 6:20 for the 6:30 meeting. Josh Winteer rolled in about two minutes late and Chris Fisher came in about 10 minutes late. Then everyone waited for another five minutes. Apparently, Rick Alexander had said that he would not be at the meeting, but Debi Shimmin was a no-show.

Where was she? Why didn't she call to let folks know that she wouldn't be there (seems like common courtesy)? And why didn't she answer her cell phone when a school official tried to contact her?

The agenda for the meeting was short -- the reconsideration of the hiring of the two administrators. As you will recall, the board refused to hire the administrators at the regular May meeting, for reasons that were and remain unclear.

High school principal Mark Finch noted that the uncertainty about the administrative team had reduced the office staff to tears this week. Interim social systems principal Dick Behn, who noted that he had no personal interest in the outcome, made a well-reasoned case for the hires. Parent Edda King noted that both she and her daughter were impressed with these two candidates at the public presentations. No one spoke against the hires, although Kim Fandino made an abstract case for keeping as many teachers as possible.

A number of critics of the Trio were in the audience, including a few who had published letters taking the Trio to task for their performance at the last board meeting. However, they remained silent last night.

Josh took the opportunity to lash out, claiming that he had been intentionally misrepresented by the press and CARES (which he pronounced "carries" -- it took LT hours to figure out who he was talking about).

"We, or at least, I, wanted the budget committee to exercise their diligence," he said.

Notice the pronoun choice: WE [oops, I need to back up because I just made a statement that indicates I colluded with Rick and Deb] wanted to look at the budget. Just doesn't sound sincere, Josh.

The good news is, whatever the underlying motives and whatever the true intentions of the Trio, they were stopped in the tracks by the public outcry.

However, they didn't do anything to correct the Sand Ridge mess they created. We learned last night the initial cost of the increased funding to the charter school -- 1.3 teachers or 20 hours per week of classified staff.

Great.

Rick's Criminal Record

A couple of commenters, who must be new to our place, want to know about Rick's criminal records. We discussed this back in January. Here's the post.

"Morons Like You"

We have been taken to task for using the moniker "Terrible Trio". We think that the actions of Debi, Rick, and Josh have been terrible and we think based on what we have seen of their actions at board meetings that they regularly collude outside public meetings.

But we have not called them moron, idiots, or the like. We have questioned their ethics, but we haven't called them criminals -- except Rick, who is a convicted criminal.

So Anonymous 2 Cents blasts off with "throw all the bums out and, by the way, you're a moron." Way to improve the level of discourse! What exactly has LT done to deserve being called that? We might be irritating. We might be inconvenient. We might be stirring up the pot. But we don't think that we have exhibited stupidity.

2 Cents, we sense that conflict makes you uncomfortable. But just getting rid of everybody is not going to stop conflict from happening. What would be nice is if we could learn to fight fairly. Fighting fairly means that we state our cases without calling each other names. We act rationally and legally. We seek what is best for the children.

If that is moronic, call us a moron.

Are Our Schools Terrible?

Part of the complaint in Lebanon is that our schools are terrible. But is the gossip and bad-mouthing of our schools justified?

Let's take a look at the press.

Green Acres kids build a mural for their school.

Cascades kids raise money for a classmate.

Friday is the the annual day of community service at Pioneer.

A LHS tennis player is headed to the state tournament.

Maybe there are some good things happening.

Betrayed

From Joyce Weatherly, former board member.

More Public Dissatisfaction

Again, LE news:

Comment on Special Board Meeting

Also from the Lebanon Express

Ethics Complaint Against Josh?

From the Lebanon Express.

Recall the Terrible Trio?

From the Lebanon Express.

Note that the Express particularly takes issue with Debi Shimmin because she campaigned on a policy of fairness and logic.

Special Board Meeting

Thursday night is a special board meeting to reconsider the administrative hires for the high school.

Josh's Legal Skills, Part 2

Here's part of the problem with Josh's practicing law without a license: the clause he wrote giving PIE an increase from 80% to 85% of state funding for each K-8 student.

First, his rationale at the meeting: rather than penalizing PIE for not complying with state law (see Josh's Legal Skills, Part 1 posting), he wants to reward PIE for complying with state law.

Hello, let's pay everybody that way. Heh, you didn't kill anybody today - thanks, here's $5. Heh, you paid your taxes. Thanks, we are going to refund 10% even though you paid three years too late.

Second, the great avoid-the-problem with Jay's registration clause -- PIE does not have to make sure that all teachers and administrators are properly registered with the state, it merely has to get Sand Ridge to promise that it will do so.

The language:

"Sand Ridge Charter School shall agree that Sand Ridge Charter School shall not employ a teacher or administrator who is not registered or licensed through TSPC."

Let's count the ways that this is nefarious:

1. The entity that has to provide the statement is Sand Ridge, not PIE. It is absolutely unenforceable. That promise is not worth a warm bucket of spit. The district does not have any agreement with Sand Ridge Charter School so there is absolutely no way to enforce this clause except to terminate the charter. We're getting a feeling, didn't we dream about being stuck in this particular little bind before. No, that was life last summer. That was even before the Jay Jackson non-registration. PIE couldn't even get teachers properly registered. Why are we going to put everyone through that again? And don't tell us that it's not going to happen again. If that was true, PIE would be willing to agree to the pass-through of penalties from the state.

2. This might as well be called the save-the-Jay clause. The agreement is that Sand Ridge has to promise to register its teachers and administrators. Do you remember that clever move a few months ago when PIE changed Jay's title so that he is no longer the administrator of Sand Ridge, he is now the insert-title-that-is intended-to-avoid-the-obligation-to-register-Jay-so-we-can-insult-state-officials-with-the-same-an-instructor-isn't-a-teacher-argument job? Yeah, that's helpful. Let's start the new charter with litigation. Normally, when parties have a history of problems, they use the negotiation of a new deal to fix the problems. Here, Josh is using the negotiations to continue all of the problems.

3. Even if this was a promise from PIE to register/license all teachers and administrators, it would be a warm bucket of spit. It's just a piece of paper that says "I promise". If PIE fails to live up to its promise, there is no recourse. They can use the childish, we just agreed to promise; we didn't agree to actually do it defense. And PIE would win because there is nothing in the charter that allows the district to do anything about it short of termination.

Third problem with Josh's proposal: there is this list of conditions that PIE must satisfy before the bump to 85%, but there is no procedure for determining when the list is satisfied or who determines that it is satisfied. What Josh did was take the list from the district's counterproposal and eliminate all of the things that protect the district.

LT is too disgusted to provide a list of all of the flaws in Josh's list. Today's overview will merely mention one. The District's counterproposal included the separation of PIE and the private school, while allowing PIE to run its two charter schools in one entity. But Josh isn't going to limit PIE's operation of other private schools. But he wrote the conditions so that Sand Ridge funds can't be transferred to other "charter" schools, meaning that funds can still be transferred to the private preschool. This appears to be an intentional word choice. The other clauses have been written to apply to "other schools PIE operates."

If you had a lawyer write this agreement, there would be a procedure for PIE proving to the district's satisfaction that the conditions have been met, or to the satisfaction of a neutral party agreed to by both the District and PIE (at the expense of PIE). PIE and the district have not agreed about much of anything. So this means that PIE will do whatever it wants, the District will complain, and PIE will give propaganda to its supporters that the District is trying to kill Sand Ridge, again.

And, drum roll, please, the big problem with Josh's conditions: PIE ONLY HAS TO COME IN TO COMPLIANCE FOR ONE SECOND, and then the district has to pay 85% for the life of the charter, no matter how much mischief PIE brews subsequent to that one second.

Josh included a phrase, "Items listed in 10(b) through 10(i) above shall be ongoing obligations on the Charter School."

What is particularly nice about Josh's phrasing is that people who don't take the time to think it through (Debi and Rick, unless they lied to Sherrie Sprenger at the meeting) could be confused and think that the district has the right to take the funding back to 80% if PIE fails to live up to the conditions. No, the only thing that the District can do is terminate the charter. WAIT! Josh so cleverly made this a "Charter School" obligation, not a PIE obligation. The Charter School is not a party to the charter, so arguably violation of these conditions do not even give the district the right to terminate.

This entire clause is meaningless. The board just gave PIE the 85%. Why even go through the charade of this clause?

To those Sand Ridge supporters who are going to argue that these were inadvertent drafting mistakes, LT might have bought that argument. But Josh, Debi, and Rick refused to have an attorney review the document, even though Josh, a non-lawyer, was negotiating with a lawyer. We don't think any person in attendance at the meeting was under the impression that this was just sprung on Debi -- she may not have seen the actual document, but she knew it was coming. Shy didn't she ask for the district's lawyer to take a look at it before he left? That is what a responsible board member would have done.

This is not a warm bucket of spit. This is something much more disgusting than a warm bucket of spit. A warm bucket of ________________.

Josh's Legal Skills, Part 1

LT has had a chance to review the contract amendment approved by the school board on Monday, as well as the initial PIE offer and the counter offer prepared by the district administration.

Josh, stop practicing law without a license.

Here's the most egregious example.

The district has been threatened repeatedly with the loss of state funds due to PIE failures. Okay, so under the current charter there is a disconnect between the sinner and the penalty. PIE sins and everybody in the district except PIE pays for it.

The district's proposal included a clause allowing the district to pass on any loss of funds that are caused by PIE.

Fair play requires that PIE should be the school to lose the funds if PIE causes the loss. More important, this clause should ensure that PIE stops screwing around, wasting everyone's time because they can do so without penalty. If PIE was at risk to lose funding because the state finally lost its patience with the Jay Jackson non-registration, don't you think that the PIE board would step in and take care of things? Why should Steve Kelley have to stress about PIE not turning in their reports on time. Shouldn't Mary Northern and Jay be the main worriers?

Josh, Debi, and Rick did not perform their fiduciary duty to the district on this one.

Sand Ridge -- the High School Question

At Monday night's meeting, it was mentioned that the District counter-proposal included termination of the high school portion of the charter. It is unfortunate that district officials did not go public with a justification for this important point.

However, there are some clues available. First, let's look at the numbers:

The district budget proposal show enrollment for each district school by grade. This is the state-mandated October enrollments. The high school enrollment as of October was 25; it is now 23.

Sand Ridge enrollment October 2007

K 36
1 36
2 37
3 31
4 28
5 29
6 18
7 15
8 18
9 11
10 7
11 8
12 0

Sand Ridge is not able to maintain enrollment in the high school grades. Why?

Counselors at the high school are well aware of the flood of students that are leaving Sand Ridge during their high school years. We're happy to report that we do not know most of the details behind the wave of transfers. Why? Because counselors are required to keep a great deal of what they learn confidential.

We understand that PIE blames the whole problem on the lack of access to L-B classes. When posed the question, LHS counselors deny that access to L-B is the main reason; their eyebrows suggest that there is a whole lot of bad they might say about Sand Ridge's high school if they could.

Sand Ridge students leave for a variety of reasons, as counselors at the high school will tell you. The reasons we hear from a variety of sources, including individual students who have left Sand Ridge, relate to the lack of options for students at the charter school. In other words, students do not have enough variety in classes and activities. The appalling example is the student who got As three years in a row in Algebra I before transferring to the high school. Why didn't he move on to new math subjects? There was no one qualified to teach math beyond Algebra I. That example alone means that Sand Ridge parents and supporters should be asking questions, not of Jim Robinson, but Jay Jackson.

Teenagers want choice in their classes and they want to make personal choices as well. Teenagers don't want authorities who mandate rules without explanations, which is something one who subbed at Sand Ridge said is a big complaint among the upper grades. At LHS students complain about the rules, but the rules allow a great deal more freedom than that afforded at Sand Ridge.

Of course, if it was just about the dress code, we would not be concerned about the education that Sand Ridge high schoolers are receiving. Wanting your child to maintain a certain dress code is a parental choice (although we think that the embarrassment of over-application of make-up and terrible clothing choices is less severe in high school when everybody is doing it than when you are 18).

There are a wide variety of courses available at the high school, which allow students to find their individual passions. With an enrollment of 25 -- which translates into less than two teachers, it is pretty difficult to build variety into the schedule. Sand Ridge has to find creative options to maintain enrollment. The numbers suggest that they have not been successful.

Reaction at the High School

Some in the community may be wondering about reaction around the district to the board's actions Monday night.

High school staff were greeted with the following message from Principal Mark Finch:

"Staff,

I had expected to announce to you today our new academy administrative team. However, due to actions of the school board, actually inactions, I am not able to do that. The committee had unanimously selected two wonderful candidates that very much balanced each other and me. Each offered something missing from the administrative team and each offered many strengths that overlapped. Members of the board, however, must have disagreed (not even knowing one of the candidates). I was embarrased by the behavior of some members of the board and I know the candidates were as well. They left confused and disheartened. This is a sad day for the students in our district because their needs were not well addressed by the decision (actually lack there of). When each candidate was presented, one member of the board moved to hire. Because the remaining members of the board failed to second that motion, the motion died meaning we could not hire these fine folk.

My concern, in discussing this with both members is that of 61 candidates only a few rose to the top of the list. Following a challenging interview process, two continued to impress the selection team. They were brought before the board tonight only to face humiliating conversations. Both candidates indicated they would continue searching for positions elsewhere while the drama in Lebanon plays out. I only hope they are available and willing to accept the positions next time the board decides to weigh in on the recommendations we might make but I truly believe we will not be that lucky as these are very fine candidates and certainly other district will see more value in them than ours did.

I am truly sorry that many of the decisions we could have made progress on this spring have necessarily been delayed until I know the make up of the administrative team. Our students will continue to be underserved by this board inaction.

The word that comes up most often in discussions with district employees at all levels regarding this matter is embarrassed -- that staff is embarrassed that the board would treat these two candidates in this manner.

While people might not expect better from Rick and Josh, people had reason to expect something different from Debi Shimmin.

From the May 4, 2007 Lebanon Express:

Bettering the often acrimonious relationship between board members is “the whole reason I'm running,” Shimmin said. “I want respect not just between the board but for all teachers, students and employees,” she said.

People in the board room during the meeting felt disrespected. That includes administrators, both those in the district office and those heading schools. Teachers and classified employees there felt disrespected, particularly those who served on selection committees. And community members felt disrespected. So Debi, you failed to live up to your campaign commitment Monday night.

Now, you Shimmin fans hold on a minute before you start up on the hate mail. DEBI COULD HAVE BEHAVED IN A PROFESSIONAL, RESPECTFUL MANNER AND STILL NOT VOTED FOR THE HIRES. OR SHE MIGHT HAVE BEEN OPEN ABOUT HER CONCERNS AND BEEN CONVINCED TO APPROVE THE HIRES.

Dead silence in response to a request for action is not open, professional, or respectful. And that's what the Trio did Monday night. They did not deliberate. They did not ask questions. They did not actively listen to what district officials had to say. They just sat there.

Here's what a open, professional, respectful board member would have done in your shoes:

"I appreciate the efforts that you [Mr. Kelley] and your committee have undertaken to bring us good candidates. However, I have some concerns about the state of our budget for next year and therefore I am reluctant to approve hires of people we may not be able to afford. "

This would have been respectful to the two candidates SITTING IN THE AUDIENCE as well as everyone else. More important, it wold have given Kelley an opportunity to clarify the projected budget impacts and he could have explained that approving the hires Monday night would not impinge on the budgeting process. Employee contracts contain a clause that permits the district to terminate employment if there isn't money available. It also would have permitted Kelley, the selection committee and Mark Finch to explain why it was important to move forward with the hires immediately.

But we suspect that there was more at play than merely approving hires for the high school. It was the Terrible Trio wanting to mandating who would be hired. When Jim Robinson reminded the board that his contract called for him to make hiring decisions, Josh Wineteer made an incredible and totally irresponsible statement.

From Jennifer Moody's Monday article:

"Wineteer countered that the board's majority vote in March to not renew Robinson's contract indicates the board wishes to guide the district itself. "

Why do we go so far as to call Wineteer's comments irresponsible? RW has a rather good explanation. Josh is already testifying in Robinson's favor in Robinson's lawsuit against the school board, which, of course, will be paid for by the district.

Josh, and presumably Rick and Debi as well want to run the school district themselves. They have zero expertise in education. Okay, let's move on to analogies: You have the choice between Bill Barrish and Rick Alexander selecting a heart surgeon for you. Whose advice will you follow? While Josh has the experience of practicing law without a license (his contract amendment Monday night which was too good to need to be reviewed by a real lawyer), would you have him decide on your representation in a lawsuit or would you ask Tom McHill, Tre Kennedy or another local attorney in Lebanon? You have an upcoming IRS audit; the IRS says that you owe them $20,000. Are you going to take Debi or Dave Benneth?

There's a role for community members to play in the oversight of the district, and the district has created a role for any member of the public, including school board members to participate in administrative hires (none of the Trio bothered to show up for that process). The role the Trio has selected for themselves is not consistent with their office, good management practices, the board role as set forth in district policies, nor the contract to which they committed themselves to Robinson.

Debi, your actions are as unprofessional as they come.

What a Commenter Said

One of our readers:

May 2007 Voters Pamphlet:

Debi Shimmin:

If elected, I will use my work ethic, experience and professionalism to foster a positive environment with board members, teachers and parents. I will be fair, listen to all sides, promote good communication, and conduct myself in a respectful manner.Together we can build a better and stronger school system, which in turn will create a strong and vibrant community. It’s time tomove forward!

So? What about it, was that a lie? and in print no less. It is time to move forward, too bad Debi didn't mean it.

RW again

More from RW

The First Thing We Do, Let's Kill All the Lawyers. . .

Yes, that was the sentiment of Monday night's meeting.

Many people know that the line was penned by the Bard, but few know the context of the remark. The character who utters this is a VILLAIN, not a hero, and a BUFFOON at that.

So, at the expense of being redundant, let's take a minute to recap the Sand Ridge mutiny successfully pulled off by Josh et al. to the benefit of his daughter's school (7% of the students in the school district) at the expense of the other 93%.

Josh "wrote" this document while consulting with Jay Jackson, an attorney (although he has been disciplined by the Oregon State Bar on three separate occasions), who is the chair of PIE, the other party to the charter.

Josh did not show it to any official at the district: Jim Robinson, Steve Kelley, Sherrie Sprenger, and Chris Fisher did not see a copy of the document until Josh moved its adoption at the public meeting. Nor did any of those individuals receive notice that there would be a proposal on the PIE charter before the item came up during the public meeting.

This is dirty, dirty dealing. A complete breach of all rules of fair play and common decency. Josh was unwilling to take the time to have the district's attorney review the document before calling for a vote. Now you PIE people may say that it really wouldn't be fair to PIE to wait another month to approve the amendment.

THE ATTORNEYS WERE ON THE PREMISES. JOSH REFUSED TO REVEAL THE DOCUMENT UNTIL AFTER THE ATTORNEYS HAD LEFT THE BUILDING!

Hello, how many red flags does it take for the Lebanon school board to suspect something naughty is happening?

We know that Rick has no respect for the law. He has two criminal convictions, has threatened people both on and off the board and even IN the board room. He even asked a citizen to step outside from a board meeting so that they could fight.

One of his clever quips that he pulls out from time to time is about how lawyers will take two sides of any issue so long as they get paid.

Now what about Debi? Why would she go along with this? LT's discussions the last few days have been rather interesting. Debi, people were willing to cut you some slack when you were new to the job, but now people are questioning whether you have the ability to LEARN. You ended up with egg all over your face less than a year ago because you didn't consult with an attorney before voting. Why would you do it, again? Why don't you make your boys play fair? They can't do anything without your vote so you can make them behave.

We have reached the conclusion that Josh and Rick believe that they can not win a fair argument on the merits, so they have to play dirty, sand-bag, hide documents from lawyers.

Is it better for them to win in this manner? Certainly there is personal satisfaction in winning and certainly there is personal satisfaction in getting the best deal for your daughter's school. But aren't there other things that are more important.

Are the students of Lebanon served better be Josh and Rick sneaking around in the dark to get their agenda in place or is it better for Lebanon kids for board members to have the opportunity to be fully informed before taking a vote.

Yes, Definitely, Let's Kill All the Lawyers.

Sand Ridge Snow Job

There are a couple of comments alleging that the Sand Ridge increase in funding is contingent on the school district budget. Nice try, Josh (the guy who took a few college classes, but never received any kind of degree, who never attended law school and who has no law license) "wrote" a "contingency" that is a non-contingency. It merely says that the increased funding to Sand Ridge does not take effect until the Lebanon school board passes a budget.

Hello! The increase payment to Sand Ridge is not contingent on the school board passing a budget with the 85% funding to PIE. The way Josh wrote it, if the district budget includes a 0% funding obligation for PIE, the district still has to pay PIE at 85% under the terms of Josh's most excellent contract amendment.

Nice job, Josh. Way to take care of your daughter's school at the expense of every other student in the district.

Jay Jackson Still Not In Compliance with State Law!

A recent commenter wants to know whether Jay Jackson has successfully completed the registration process with the state, as required by state law. You can look at the status of his registration application here.

TSPC says about Jay:

"Most recent application materials pertaining to this file were received on 3/6/2008. We are currently processing application materials that were received by TSPC on 5/5/2008."

So the short answer is that Jay has still not been registered with the state. Remember that he was supposed to be registered before the beginning of the 2007-08 school year. He didn't even file an initial application until December, when Larry Coonrod called him regarding a story for the Lebanon Express on the matter.

Shameless copying

Here's a report on the rejection of the high school administrator by someone else who was at the meeting:

The administration recommended the hiring of Kim Masog and Tami Volz as academy administrators. The selections were the recommendation of a hiring committee that include members of the community, teachers and staff. Steve Kelly described the exhaustive work the committees did and highly recommended both be hired. Chris Fisher moved that both Kim and Tami be hired. The motion died for lack of a second (Sherrie Sprenger has a long standing practice of not seconding motions because she is the chair – she certainly would have otherwise). It was 100 percent apparent to everyone at the meeting that this was an orchestrated plan by Rick, Debi and Josh. Rick said that he wanted to see the budget first and complained that he didn’t see all of the applications for the job. Since when is it the job of the Board to review applications for a school position? This was a tremendous slap in the face to Kim Masog and Tami Volz. It was also a slap in the face to the volunteers from the district and the community that served on the hiring committee. In a time when we have such trouble recruiting candidates to come to this dysfunctional school district, the School Board
rejects two highly qualified candidates. This is embarrassing as a community and we should not tolerate it.

We received some information this afternoon that might explain some of the Troublesome Trio's analysis:

A friend of Rick was talking with a member of the selection committee before the school board meeting. This FOR insisted that the district was planning to hire five administrators for the high school next year. Our friend tried to explain that the plan was for three administrators and two instructional coaches (who will be transferred from the district office to the high school). Instruction coaches are teachers on special assignment and in our case their salaries are paid almost exclusively from grant money, not from tax dollars. But the FOR didn't understand that nor did she understand that teachers on special assignment don't make a higher salary than other teachers. So, apparently Rick, who by the way has never demonstrated that he received any additional education beyond the 10th grade and certainly doesn't act like he learned anything through informal education, has made some huge error in understanding the plans for next year. Given that Rick and Josh assume Robinson lies, they don't bother to ask for any clarification. If they had just explained last night that they thought the budget was going to have the equivalent of 5 administrators at the high school, then Steve Kelley and Jim Robinson could have set the record straight. But, on the other hand, Rick just gets a confused expression on his face and struggles to try to figure out what they tell him.

LT wants board members who are able to understand elementary explanations, something that is lacking in a number of the current cadre.

At the end of the meeting, Steve Kelley made an impassioned plea that board members contact him in the future if they plan to oppose hires because Kelley can't stand to put candidates through this type of humiliation. School boards are supposed to approve the hires of the district administration unless there are some terrible problems with the hiring process. In this case, the hiring process maximized input from the stakeholders and the idea that we would reduce the administrative staff at the high school by more than 25% is imprudent when we have a projected shortfall of only 10%.

There are mixed reactions to which candidate is entitled to more sympathy: Kim, the local teacher who is well-loved and respected or Tami, the highly-qualified stranger. LT votes for the stranger. Kim knows we are dysfunctional in an intimate way. Tami was an outsider. It was like showing off our dirty little secrets in the town square for the tourists to go home and wonder about.

Parlimentary Procedure 101, Josh

During the Sand Ridge hijacking of fair play and common decency, Josh invoked the universal jock gesture for let's get on with it: the circular motion of the finger while Sherrie was trying to run the meeting in good order.

It appears that while senior in tenure to Debi, Josh still has a lot to learn about parliamentary procedure. Uh, Josh, do it like Debi. When you are bored or impatient, you're supposed to wait for an opportunity to say, "I call the question."

LT wants to use a word that means a crude, boorish, or low-witted person, but we get in trouble when we use that word.

We've Missed You, RW

Nice, headline.

Call Them Irresponsible

There's no other way to describe the actions of the Lebanon Community School Board last night.
As noted by the article penned by Jennifer Moody today, Josh, Rick and Debi teamed together to approve a contract "written" by Josh after he negotiated directly with Jay Jackson.

It's hard to find enough words to describe the betrayal of the community, the students of Lebanon, and basic standards of ethical behavior.

Let's start to count the sins:

1. The superintendent is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the district. The board is responsible for determining policy for the district. Josh's actions violated this basic principle. Debi and Rick are accessories to this crime.

2. The board had an established team, including board members to negotiate with PIE. Josh interfered with the negotiating team. Debi and Rick are accessories to this crime.

3. Josh "wrote" a contract amendment, presented to the board, and did not provide copies of the underlying contract that was being amended so that board members would know what they were voting for. Debi and Rick are accessories to this crime.

4. Even though he has a fiduciary duty to the citizens of the entire school district, Josh acted for the benefit of a tiny portion of the district, at the expense of all of the other students. Debi and Rick are accessories to this crime.

5. Josh asked for board approval of the contract amendment without having counsel for the district review the draft. What makes this particularly egregious is that Josh could have made the draft available to counsel before the meeting (legal counsel was in the building before the public meeting). Rick and Debi were accessories to this crime.

6. Josh, Rick and Debi approved a contract amendment, increasing the per student amount of funding for Sand Ridge students, even though the district is going to have to cut funding to all other programs in the district.

7. Josh, Rick, and Debi approved a contract amendment without finding out from the district's business manager the dollar amount of the increased funding for Sand Ridge.

8. Josh failed to provide notice to the district that he was conducting negotiations on behalf of the district and he failed to provide board members or the district's administrative team with a copy of the proposal before the meeting.

LT is too disgusted to list more of these sins. This is simply unacceptable business practices. Josh is not a lawyer; he should not be writing contract amendments for the district. And no board member should vote to approve a contract amendment until the proposed amendment has been reviewed by an attorney.

Tonight's Board Meeting

A brief recap of the evening events:

Josh proposed a new contract for PIE and it was approved by the board without running the language by an attorney or finding out the budget ramifications from the business manager.

Linda Darling was approved as the new business manager.

The two academy administrators for the high school were not approved.

During the open meeting, Debi Shimmin accused Jim Robinson of lying to her at a meeting earlier that day.

It was a crazy meeting.

More later.

Hiring

Jennifer Moody has an article about the hires on the agenda for tomorrow's meeting.

Dawn Baker has been selected as the next principal for Hamilton Creek, replacing the retiring Tom Yates. Haven't heard of her? Not surprising. She's an outsider. After the hiring of Mark Finch as the high school principal, there was murmuring about it being an inside job. People complained that we would be better served by bringing in an outsider for new thoughts. LT thinks that we should just hire the best person that we can find. And we think that a mix of people who have a background in our school system and others who bring ideas from their experiences elsewhere is ideal.

Speaking of someone who knows the community, the district office has finally found someone willing to take on the business manager position after Donna Chasten resigned last fall. Linda Darling is someone who has been in Lebanon . . . forever. She has been active as a parent in the schools, having three children go through our system, including a special needs child. She received a college degree last spring, graduating with her daughter. While the degree is new, she nevertheless has relevant life experience.

There's something for everyone on the hiring list, whether you advocate for insiders or outsiders.

Monday Night's Meeting

It looks like we can expect some interesting discussions Monday night at the school board meeting, even though the agenda looks benign.

The board will be meeting first in executive session to discuss two items, one of which we presume is Ed Sansom's appeal of his non-renewal, approved by the board at the March meeting.

We are not aware of all of the grounds for the non-renewal, but the community has seen some red flags waving over at the middle school. First, Sansom came with some baggage: he was hired at Central Linn as a principal, but went to work before he had an Oregon license. The superintendent who hired him was suspended for two years as a result. We wonder why Sansom was not disciplined.

There was also the issue of Sansom's oversight of an employee who embezzled thousands of dollars. And there was his supervision of Bo Yates as well. One could argue that Sansom was in a difficult position on that one. While Yates was under Sansom's direction in his capacity as an administrator, someone else was supervising his work as A.D.

More on the meeting later today.