School Board to tackle travel

Concerned about the jet-setting ways of the Hillsborough School Board? Mark your calendar.

The Board is going to discuss travel guidelines -- and maybe, gasp, a budget -- at a workshop on Thursday, July 31. Over the past four years, elected officials have spent $150,000 of public money on education-related trips in Hillsborough and beyond.

The Board has imposed a temporary halt on travel, until it can self-impose some standards. They will discuss matters further at the upcoming workshop, scheduled for second floor conference room at the downtown district offices.

-- Letitia Stein, Times staff writer

Comments

[Chris W]

You know, this is just the sort of stunt that a politician in trouble might dream up to distract the public from noticing what a jackass she is.

$150,000 in four years? Yeesh! The school district spends about $3 billion _per year_ (IIRC), so my back-of-the-envelope calculation is that the entire school board travel "budget" amounts to around .001% of the amount of taxpayer money spent by the district. I bet the district administration staff spends a bunch more than that on travel, memberships, conferences, and the like.

You have to wonder who benefits from turmoil like this over (basically) nothing, don't you?

[terminator]

Chris W:
you're totally off base. It's a matter of maintaining public trust.
when you can't give teachers raises board members shouldn't be traveling, it's that simple.
good for the Hillsborough folks.
Hope this woman Valdez get's her *ss handed to her in the election!

[Chris W]

Termie, sometimes I agree with you but not this time. If you want to see where your raise money went, look at the Superintendent's bonus and all the land she helped the district overpay for. Members Griffin and Valdes were the only two to rake Elia over the coals in her evaluations; the others just rolled over and let her scratch their tummies.

Chris, I sometimes agree with you (never with termie). You are partly right in your evaluation. This is a meaningless issue, but the problem is that Susan likes to play these same meaningless games over other minor non-issues. It is her turn in the barrel. I didn't put her there, but she has little to complain about when she does the same thing all the time.

In addition, the money used for the land purchases could not have been used for teacher's pay. The superintendent's bonus could have been. The "funny" thing about overpaying for land is that the only way that you can "force" a landowner to sell the land you need at any price is to use eminent domain laws which conservatives blast governments for using. It is natural to overpay when there is a small market (only a few extremely large tracts of land owned by a handful of people) and the sellers know exactly where the buyer needs them because of the 5, 10 and 20 year district workplans.

As to termie's position that board members should never travel if the money isn't there for pay raises, he is an idiot, as per usual. Some of the travel included on this list was to go to Washington and to Tallahassee to advocate for more funding for public schools. This is where the money for teacher salaries comes from. There is a whole lot of travel that is critically important to the district including to the success of teachers that is needed whether there are raises or not. It was termie's best buddy that cut the schools and then went to work for FIU.

[terminator]

4:44
I've never known of any local school board member who had much (if any) influence on the legislative process in Tally or in DC (which has little to no influence on school funding shy of grants and title one) so that whole argument is a bunch of hooey.
Yes, by all means clamp down on the administrators as well. I think you 've seen me rail on here many times about rogue districts with their overpriced and underworked bureaucracy. It's what's choking our school districts to death and what's put us in our current position since most have no credibility in the Capitol thereby resulting in less funding or increases to the RLE.
Fifty grand for a few years of travel is a lot. Let's face it, most of these trips are free vacations for elected officials with a little work included.
I did plenty of them myself but fortunately for Florida taxpayers, it was gratis courtesy of grants from the USDOE.
Been there done that!
My protaganist has a huge problem with Marco. I think Marco stood him up one night and he (or she) has never gotten over it poor thing!

[Mencken Jr]

4:44 - The way to get less expensive land is to buy it when it's cheap and hold onto it until you need it. That, of course, takes competent demographic projection plus some higher-than-rudimentary fiscal management skills.

[Mike]

The only reason this came up is because Valdez is not liked by the rest of the board (sans Griffin) and Elia. They figured this will hurt her chances for re election. Griffin and Valdez are the only two to be honest and not 'go with the status quo. I watch the school board meetings at times, and when valdez was first elected she was told she needed to be trained to so the school board can get the title of 'master board'. Its funny how this is happening now and its also funny how Valdes is the only one not to get campaign money or an endorsement from Elia and her staff! Things that make you go hmmmmmm

Don't be fooled by the fat cats attacking a dissenting board member. This is a classic trick played by veteran board members trained and brainwashed by FSBA and its clueless leader Wayne Blanton.

The best thing Jeb Bush did while in office was the line item veto of funding for the FL School Boards Association! Bush was a smart governor. He didn't use it to work in my best interest all the time, but he was smart.

Jeb knew that elected members of school boards should be able to rise above the riff raff of the good ol boy network and make decisions for themselves.

Quiz any member of the FL School Boards Association AND its staff about the Constitution, the balance of power or individual rights and I'll bet the FCAT they don't pass.

Lets grade the "training" provided by this "organization."

It looks like Valdez must be a threat to the status quo.

Check Jack Lamb's travel. Do not stop at the school board's budget. Check out the budget from FSBA where he used to be President.

Check out the price of his suites and private piano bar parties. Add in the cost of the expensive steak dinners in DC where bottle after bottle of expensive wine is guzzled as Wayne Blanton sits at the head of the table.

Just because some board members know how to hide their travel deep down in others' budgets, does not mean they are not spending your tax dollars. Find out if some of them travel with the reading department's money or the math department's money.

Are they riding the Reading First grants all the way to the roller coasters at Disney World?

The Times should be ashamed of printing this and offering it as investigative journalism. When another member of the school board calls the newspaper with the story it is just dirty politics.

The children in the school district suffer when the adults charged with the responsibility of looking out for them choose to work in this manner.

Why not work cooperatively in the best interest of students instead of working together to condemn a real adult trying to do real work that benefits children?

Susan Valdes: $50,300
Candy Olson: $23,900
Doretha Edgecomb: $23,400
April Griffin (elected 2006): $14,800
Jennifer Faliero: $12,800
Jack Lamb: $11,400
Carol Kurdell: $7,600

Since the mission of the Times is to "tell the truth" I'm sure this is just the beginning of the reporting, right?

Now see if Kurdell, Lamb, Faliero, Olson or Edgecomb hold positions in FSBA-the organization that "trains" school board members. The same organization the board urged her to go to and be trained in being a school board member.

If the other board members hold elected positions or board of director positions with that organization then FSBA pays for their travel. How does FSBA get paid? By school districts of course. The district pays FSBA and the board members being jetted all over the state and country keep the school district paying for FSBA dues.

In turn FSBA "trains" new board members not to cause a stir. FSBA will "help" veteran board members "contain" problem board members by acting as the "expert" in board membership and training.

Ironically, FSBA often fails to inform board members of their individual rights. They fail to help all board members in favor of helping the ones who best serve FSBA's interests rather than the interest of the students in the districts they represent.

Enough already.

Tell the WHOLE truth and quit picking and choosing what facts you want to print.

There are a literally MILLIONS of school children counting on you to tell the whole truth and expose the system that allows corruption, greed and ego to get in the way of helping children.

Be part of the solution, not part of the problem.

[terminator]

2:07
so basically you're saying the FSBA and individual school boards are inherently corrupt orgainzations.
something I already knew thank you!

[Chris W]

terminator - Not "corrupt" so much as a "hive mind" with the FSBA as the Borg Queen trying to assimilate everyone.

[terminator]

Chris W:

I knew Blanton quite well from my days in Tally.

Everyone said he was a real piece of garbage.

The FSBA is much like a giant elephant that wants to keep sucking at the government trough.

They care nothing about students, teachers and school employees.

They and the district administrations have a symbiotic relationship, they're both parasites who feed off each other while delivering nothing to the betterment of the districts themselves.

It's all about lining their pockets at taxpayer expense.

It is time to take out the trash. When Blanton lost state funding, he wanted to crawl in bed with developers to eliminate impact fees. You know, the development fees used to build local schools for new housing developments? Tried to present it to board members as a great move for school boards. Thankfully someone spoke up. Blanton was surprised that someone actually knew what an impact fee was.

Edgecomb & Kurdell are on the FSBA board of directors. Jack Lamb is a past president and he sits on the Learning 1st Task Force.

Who is the voting block on the Hillsborough School Board? I really don't know, but I could guess.

The real problem is that some of the board members drank the kool-aide at FSBA. They understand that it's easier to rubber stamp then it is to actually do the work required to take the district to the next level.

Don't let these people push out a good woman with a kind heart and an educated mind. It would be a shame to put another lame duck in her place.

Valdes actually feels compelled to work for her paycheck and put the students before herself.

Why the newspaper chooses to frame the discussion in terms of bickering about travel dollars, I'll never understand. I know the news hounds can see through this crap. Now why not put forth a little extra effort and expose the real wasteful spending? Let's start with FSBA dues. How much are they?

For a union guy to talk about sucking on the teat while doing nothing is beyond hillarious.

Teminator doesn't know anyone who wants to do right by public education except for himself. He is more than wrong. He wouldn't know leadership if it was sitting on his face. Actually, he would have to get his head out of Marco's rear first.

termie better look at the history of the labor movement before calling anything or anyone corrupt.

[Captain Obvious]

6:58 - They focus on things like this because (a) it's easy to explain to your average reader and (b) it makes a juicy article. It doesn't really matter whether it's *actually* important or not (and it isn't).

There are valid philosophical differences among board members, which is to be expected - they were elected to represent their constituents' educational interest. If you wanted a picturesque capsule description of the current board...

Lamb: the old guy in a nearly empty bar complaining that he can't hear the TV

Edgecomb: doesn't understand what all the fuss is about but wants to be on the safe side (whichever that turns out to be)

Olson: Queen of passive-aggressive condescension; has Republican Entitlement Syndrome

Kurdell: Psycho-granny; believes people who tell her she's smarter than she really is.

Faliero: going for Guiness record for most acts of political suicide on an elected body; tells *herself* she's smarter than she really is, and believes it.

Griffin: *is* as smart as she thinks she is, and knows that she needs to know more; doesn't really care whether other board members like her or not as long as students benefit.

Valdes: good hearted, wants to ask questions; needs to cowboy up and stop being too nice, and learn how to make a point and then stop talking.

[What Happened To Lamb's Notes]

Didn't Lamb publicly state that he used to "write notes" to Faliero to train her in the ways of the Board and how to be a team player?

Didn't this bit of information come out when Griffin and Valdes questioned the status quo?

Look at the tapes.

Griffin attempted to question the process of how "Principal Promotions" were handled, and was publicly ridiculed by other members of the Board.

Think about it.

The Superintendent makes the recommendation to the Board for a new Principal. This happens while the new "potential" Principal sits in the audience with all of their invited guests.

What real choice does the Board have at this point?

Publicly embarrass the Superintendent, the recommended Principal-to-be and their family and close friends, and everyone involved in this pomp and circumstance?

Instead, Griffin tried to raise the point of procedure and process. She waited until after a vote was completed, and noted that her concern about the procedure and process was not about tha specific vote, but that she wanted to address the issue.

But that higher thinking mind set was lost on the "rubber stampers" and all hell broke loose.

Along with that, Griffin publicly stated that it was difficult to get information after a "recommended decision" had been made prior to the "board approval vote".

Why vote at all about the Superintendent's recommendation if you can't vote no?

[Pasco?]

Jeff,

Do you know what Pasco's plan is regarding travel this upcoming year?

[Jeff Solochek]

The Pasco School Board has budgeted $10,500 for member travel, the same amount as last year.

I don't know about the specific case that the "notes" refer to above. What is important for each school board member to know is the law about what authority/responsibility given to them under the law/Constitution versus what authority/responsibility given to the superintendent. I am confident that Lamb knew/knows both while the other board member based purely on the questions listed above did not know the difference.

These issues are clear in the law and have been litigated many times when school boards have tried to single out administrators that they did not want hired or tried to hire administrators that the superintendent did not want. The superintendent's authority/responsibility to make staff recommendations has been upheld every single time.

If Mr. Lamb gave her notes about this issue, it was to try to avoid publically showing her lack of knowledge.

Personally, I hope that the notes are found and that they are appropriately revealing.

Seriously??? "Valdes actually feels compelled to work for her paycheck and put the students before herself."

Why then did she visit my daughter's second grade class last year and pass out her School Board business cards to all the students and tell them to take thim home to their parents? Sounds like early campaigning tome.

[So Why Vote?]

4:46- So why a Board vote on the Superintendent's recommendation?