From the Arizona Capitol Times…
Court teaches school district a lesson — do what you promised
But both the Arizona and U.S. constitutions prohibit governments from impairing contracts. Legislative favoritism cannot circumvent those protections. Simply put, the state cannot make a rule that authorizes a school district to break another rule.
This suit was a farse to begin with. A successful salvo from disgruntled libertarian, permanent NO voters that would prefer to tear down public schools rather than support them. The only lesson to be learned here is that folks who write ballot language and bill language need to be more careful, more simple and more broad in order to obtain funding with flexibility required for future needs. The will of the majority who voted YES in 2000 in support of proper school facilities is being usurped by this litigation. I hope the ruling is overturned on appeal and I support the board's decision to appeal. Any argument against this bond money being used to maintain existing schools is one of the anti-tax, anti-public school movement being pushed by the unscrupulous few in this district.
ReplyDeleteWell...I would argue that you are correct most likely in that the majority of people would have supported the current plans for the funding.
ReplyDeleteSo..there is no reason why the district should have worked with the legislature on this questionable law.
Three or four years ago when they realized the money needed to be used for something other than what the specific language dictated, they could have put it back out for a vote. That is allowed. They could have stated that current fiscal and capital needs made the original request no longer valid and that, as good stewards of district funds, they felt a new use of funds would be in the best interest of the parents/students and community members and would result in overall cost savings (i.e. expanding CSHS instead of building a SECOND high school).
But that was too difficult. There was no trust that the community would act in a logical manner and support the vote. There was only fear that if they put it out for vote again the restructure suggestions would fail.
So, they kept having lawyer after lawyer look at the language, trying to see how it could be manipulated. When they kept being told there was little room for manipulation, they decided to try the back-door approach.
Were they nefarious and evil? No...they wanted a good use of the money for the students. But...they chose a manipulative way to bring about the desired outcome rather than the one that is allowed already in current process.
It is human nature to become defensive about those groups, organizations and schools with which one is involved rather than be able to sit back and really evaluate fully what is going on. After all, no one wants to admit they made a mistake and that they might not have their students in the school/district with the strongest leadership and focus. It's easier to blame everyone who disagrees with what happened and label them.
This community support/lack of support is a two way street. While the district continues to castigate, throw stones at, use as excuses and criticise those in the community who see things the district is doing in a different light than the administrators do; the community continues to do the same to the district in return. Until there is some real listening and some honest self evaluation and acknowledgement of mistakes and errors (the district is not perfect), then nothing will ever move forward.
In the recent board self-evaluation on the CCUSD website, they note that the board has to do a better job of "educating" the community about their stances and how wonderful CCUSD/the board/administration is. OR, perhaps they should actually LISTEN to some of the concerns and respond to them. Active listening and response will bring better results than "educating" which indicates a lack of interest in real, detailed self evaulation.