Full Disclosure

The following letter was sent to the School Board by resident, Steve Diaz. His letters continue to be ignored.

Members of the School Board:  As you revisit your options and plans for the future of the school district, there is one important matter as to which your silence is not helpful:  the pension funding obligation.  While you rearrange the drawings for an aspirational $113 million face-lift for the high school campus, while you spend thousands on glossy brochures extolling the wisdom and benefits of bonding us up as much as you think the law will tolerate without giving the people a chance to vote on incurring such debt, you plan in a vacuum, as if there were no other pressing financial obligation constraining your work.  The game plan is transparent:  you will bond us up as much as you can without a vote, then come back saying there is no legal choice and force us to vote for yet more debt to fund the pension obligation.  A nice trick, but one that will earn you the scorn of the community and a place in history as the most conniving, profligate and foolish school board in our history.

It has been quite a while now since the obligation to fund the pension plan shortfall has been known.  It is quite likely that while the precise number on the cost may not yet be established, the scope may even exceed the amount you want to spend on grand bricks-and-mortar projects even while our academic reputation continues to decline seriously.  Yet, you plan your vanity spending as if it were the only major expense we have to accommodate.  It is neither responsible nor practical to continue to ignore the pension funding matter, either alone for its own merit or in the context of your larger bonding and spending plans (including the "renovation" project).  It is your obligation, morally, politically and legally to provide us all of the information, and your best estimates, as to the size and nature of the looming pension debt and how you plan to pay for it.  This is especially important given the $113 million in debt you want to lay down before turning to the pensions.  It is time to stop ignoring the looming fiscal crisis---it is your public duty to tell us what you know, completely and candidly (just pretend that you trust us, your neighbors and constituents).

The people have a right to know the entire picture, not just the piece on which you want us to focus until you have your way.  I call upon you to tell us, if not in the same glossy brochure format by which you sell your pet project, at least in some reasonable, widely and easily accessible format, exactly what you do know about the pension funding matter and how you plan to pay for it---if you have any such plans yet.  If you don't have such a plan you may wish to consider what impact such fact might have on the thinking of any prudent person vis-a-vis the "remodeling".  What impact will the pension funding obligation -- on top of the "renovation"-- have on the school budget, the bonding capacity and needs of the district, as well as on the taxes you impose on this community?  How will all this affect the "livability" of Mt. Lebanon?  In the end, how does any of this fit with a desperately needed academic reform of our failing schools (yes, we are not as good today as yesterday, and we are getting worse not just in the absolute but certainly relative to our "competitor" districts).

I cannot say what motivated any of you to undertake the difficult task of getting elected to public office or the rigors of service that accompany being selected.  I can say, however, that the standard by which you will be judged is quite objective:  did you achieve our goal of the best education for our children or did you get lost in the glamor and power of office?  What are you achieving and what will you leave behind?  If the community has a lower standard of living because of unduly burdensome taxes and uselessly extravagant facilities that produce less well educated students (have you seen "Waiting for Superman" yet?), you will have failed not only in the eyes of your neighbors and constituents, but also, one should imagine, in your own private self-evaluation.

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz

Update June30, 2011 10:15 AM

Mr. Ostergaard:  Thank you for your reply, copy below, as I have grown accustomed to receiving either no reply from the school board, or merely a perfunctory one.  Unfortunately, the information to which you refer me only underscores your failure to answer the questions I have posed.  The projected budget numbers you offer are as dense as a tax return, and, like most tax returns, are designed to conceal more than they reveal.  The gross numbers and broad categories stated on the board's website offer little useful detail and provide no insight into the coordination of major expenses such as the pension and renovation budgets.  I know you did not assume I would not actually read the budget document to which you have referred me, but you also cannot believe I would find answers to my questions there.  Your reply demonstrates the bureaucratic and condescending approach taken by the board to solving problems that require in-depth analysis, creativity and true responsibility---not to mention the candor essential to secure public trust.

I have asked the board several direct questions to which your reply does not respond:  (1) what are your best estimates as to the likely cost for the pension underfunding? (2) on what information are such estimates based? (3) what are your plans as to funding the pension shortfall relative to borrowing or taxation?  (4) how has the board put the "renovation" cost in the context of the pension costs?  None of these questions (all direct summaries of the substance of my last email) finds an answer in the information you provided to me yesterday.  Moreover, inasmuch as many of the "essential" elements of the board's "renovation" plan, items which the board previously held unalterable, are now proclaimed by the school board as dispensable, the board's current policy seems confused, even disoriented.  I seem to recall Mr. Remely screaming at me in Town Commission chambers that the community demanded a third gym and that we could not live without the proposed pool enlargement, just as I recall the overwhelming rhetoric at various public meetings and hearings that you also incorporated into your glossy sales brochure advocating the "new building" on the subjects of LEEDS standards, new traffic patterns, gleaming towers and bridges, new everything, including an anachronistically "21st century" hard-wired computer network (why not wireless requiring no construction cost or architectural reconfiguration?), etc, etc.  Surely you must see what damage such posturing does to the credibility of a board that brooked no possibility of such views during the entire Act 34 process and beyond.

The board seems intent on not telling the public about the scale of the coming tsunami in pension costs.  I can understand why you do this as it reveals the over-grand "renovation" plans you have as unrealistic and unaffordable.  I cannot understand why you refuse to disclose the full picture as to the impact of BOTH major spending "needs" together, so the public can be advised of the complete scope of the "grim" money picture, as you yourself put it. People want to know, before they go and buy over a hundred million dollars of new bricks and mortar, what other major expenditures are before us:  not information on one or the other at a time, not the obligatory one only after the discretionary one is approved.  The school board is playing a very ugly game of information keep away.  By keeping the public in the dark on the "grim" figures you will not reveal, you are misleading us in an effort to get us to spend money we would not consider prudently laid out for new school amenities if all of the "grim" facts were on the table.  How very cynical and how very irresponsible.  

I, as a lowly voter and taxpayer, would like to make a suggestion.  Stop trying to build a new school until our finances are in order.  Deal first with the immovable object of the pension obligation, perhaps even using the roughly $70 million you have already borrowed (ironically to fund a building you cannot seem to find a way to actually build), and use that money on which we are already paying interest (for no apparent reason--and at rates we could have bested in the time since you prematurely borrowed it) as a source of liquid funds to address the decades of deferred maintenance for which the school board is responsible and to meet the pension burden?  That way, first things first, we take care of the property that has been entrusted to the to-date negligent care of the school board, and we take care of our binding legal obligation for teacher pension benefits, before we decide what else we can afford by way of amenities.  Why don't we try addressing the truly "necessary" (as in mandatory) fiscal obligations of the district first, then seeing what we can actually afford in aspirational - but discretionary - spending.  Why is it to you somehow not "21st century" thoughtfulness to be prudent and responsible in spending other people's money?

I am glad to have your reply, but I yet await an answer to the questions I have posed to the board.

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz.

--- DOstergaard@mtlsd.net wrote:

From: Dale Ostergaard <DOstergaard@mtlsd.net>
To: Steve Diaz, School Board Email list <SchoolBoardEmaillist@mtlsd.net>, Lawrence Lebowitz <LLebowitz@mtlsd.net>
Subject: RE: Full Disclosure
Date: Wed, 29 Jun 2011 21:34:21 +0000

Mr. Diaz.
Thank-you for your inquiry.

I can assure you Mr. Diaz that the Board is very cognizant of the pension funding issue and the impact it may have on our community and every community in the state. We are tracking very closely every communique from the state legistlature on the pension funding and actively communicating with our state representatives on this issue. The pension fund rate is set yearly, and the future projections look quite grim. We are not assured of what direction the state will take. Lately they have backed off from implementing the recommend funding levels and pushed out the larger anticipated rate increases needed to fund the pension at the appropriate level. Nevertheless, we know the rate will not go down and will only increase.  We have to be prepared for that.

In preparation for future pension increases, reduction in block grants from the state, and other budget obligations, the Board has been actively engaged for almost a year now in systematically reviewing our operations to find cost savings and revenue generating opportunities.  This process has been very visible to the community and will continue to do so for the next several years.  We are looking at every opportunity to find efficiencies that we can safely make without affecting the quality of education in our classrooms. We are being very proactive here in anticipation of require future cuts to stave off tax increases to meet state funding obligations. We have already made good on a key reduction through the elimination of the curriculum supervisors positions after much research and deliberation.  I am sure you will see future deliberation on other items that come up from the review teams recommendations. The Board is committed to a systematic process of review, study, deliberation, and action to ensure the best decisions are made for our children and our taxpayers. (We too are taxpayers Steve!).

The current forecast has been made public since January and you can find it at the location below.  We will update this over the summer as we prepare other budget documents. But I caution you that these are only estimates, and based on data that is subject to significant fluctuation (pension funding costs to be specific). I can say unequivocally that this Board is cognizant of the funding issues that lie before us, is considering every possible option to counter the looming increases, and is diligently researching viable options to enact if and when necessary.

http://www.mtlsd.org/district/budget/stuff/1.4.11forecastestimatedpdf.pdf

You ask about what motivates us as Board members. What motivates us as Board members is a desire to serve this community and in particular the children and their education. There is no glamor in our work, there is no political motivation, there are no rewards other than the satisfaction of seeing the children of this community receiving and appreciating the education they obtain. We can only do our best and hope the community feels that we are giving our best.
These are very difficult times; unparalleled in recent history. School districts are making massive cuts, some may fold. We are doing our best to preserve this District that has been entrusted to us as Board members. I am pleased to serve with each and every board member currently serving. They all bring unique skills and backgrounds that collectively will allow us to make the best informed decisions possible.

Regards,
Dale Ostergaard