District/Municipal Collaboration

Wow! I can't believe it.  Both the President's November Report and the Superintendent's November Report have been posted on the School District website. I didn't have to remind them.  Just a little background, both reports were about six months behind on the website. While Dr. Steinhauer was blogging about fortune cookies and construction, his monthly board reports were MIA. Mrs. Posti decided to reprint her board reports on her unofficial blog instead of keeping them official on the website.  Nice to see some improvement.

By reading Posti's report from last night's meeting, I see that she is taking a more cooperative stand with the municipality.

Later this month, the Commission will be taking action on developing a new ad hoc committee designed to review Mt. Lebanon’s available fields as well as the needs that the various local athletic organizations have for field space. This committee will be made up of representatives from the Municipality, each of the field sport organizations as well as representatives from the District. Should this committee’s development be approved by the Commission, I’ve asked Mr. Grogan, Mr. Marciniak and Mr. Kubit to serve on the committee.

This is just one of the many ways the two local taxing bodies work together on a regular basis to realize cost efficiencies, share resources and provide support to each other. In addition to this committee, representatives from both taxing bodies serve on our Strategic Planning Committee, the Municipality’s Comprehensive Planning Committee, the Environmental Sustainability Board, our Safety and Security Committee and the Municipality’s Economic Development Council. Our staff work together to coordinate field maintenance, fuel purchase, winter maintenance, photocopying and printing, interoffice mail delivery, fire safety, police and fire training, pedestrian safety, drivers training, contracted services, recreation, parking and communication. We also work together on programs like School in the Park and Arts in the Park regularly and have realized cost efficiencies for things like joint elevator maintenance in the past when it was cost-efficient to do so.

Additional areas of potential cooperation might include contracting District employees for things like HVAC and Building Automation controls, janitorial services, shared purchasing and fleet management. As contracts are renegotiated in future years, these opportunities and others might be explored. We’ve worked with the Municipality over the years to realize cost and service efficiencies that benefit our residents and are grateful for such a collaborative relationship with their employees and elected officials.

Josephine Posti forgot to mention how she had cheerfully invited the commissioners to the school board community coffees rather than having a Joint Discussion Session.  She is much too busy and requires an agenda to determine if it is worth her time.  Josephine also failed to bring up how difficult it has been for the commissioners to discuss the Joint Maintenance Agreement with the board members.

Posti too busy for Commission

At last week's Commission discussion meeting, Joint Discussion Meetings was an agenda item. Evidently, the Commission has been trying to set up another meeting between the School Board and the Commission to discuss, among other things, the Joint Maintenance Agreement. Remember that fateful night when Josephine Posti said that I have hate in my heart, so she was praying for me? Apology to Josephine Posti That meeting included Dave Brumfield, Kristen Linfante, Steve Feller, Elaine Cappucci, and Josephine Posti.  There has not been another meeting since February 28.

In Citizens' Comments, I expressed my feelings and thanked Dave and Kristen for all the abuse they were getting from Josephine Posti. It was revealed during the Discussion Session that Josephine wanted to see an agenda before she would commit to another meeting. I had said that if the Commission felt that they should have another meeting, then they should have a meeting. This time, the Commission wanted to have a public meeting with as many Commissioners and School Board Directors present, as possible.

In so many words, Josephine blew off the Commission. So I filed a Right To Know on September 13, 2012, asking for all communication between the Commission and School Board Directors concerning joint meetings between Municipal and School Board representatives. 

Here it is. Not only is she much too busy for any meetings, but Josephine also encouraged the Commissioners to attend the School Board coffees along with the rest of us.
Joint Discussion Communication

A closer look at the JMA, YSA, MTL, MTLSD, MTLH, MLAC, TBDC,and any other letters of the alphabet

Fascinating information is pouring in about these groups. I received this link from the July/August 2002 issue of mtl Magazine.  See pages 30 and 31 about fields and YSA. http://ebooks.mtlebanon.org/mtl/mtl-072002/files/31.html  There was talk about turfing Jefferson from the time Smartchan was superintendent ten years ago.  The JMA earned the PASBO (PA Association of School Board Officials) award of achievement, but it doesn't look like PASBO ever reviewed the 990 forms.  According to the article, drainage was already rectified. Lots of interesting information, including The Blue Devil Club and Marcia Taylor's involvement.

I also received more 990's. The Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club does a fiscal year, only their fiscal year is from 1 September to 31 August of the following year. Here are their 990's.
Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club 2008 990
Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club 2009 990
Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club 2010 990

The Mt. Lebanon Hockey Association also reports on a fiscal year basis starting 1 May and ending 30 April the following year. Here are their 990's.
Mt. Lebanon Hockey Association 2009 990
Mt. Lebanon Hockey Association 2010 990
Mt. Lebanon Hockey Association 2011 990

I'm intrigued with all these non-profit groups in Mt. Lebanon - especially the field sports groups.  No one group has $200,000 to contribute towards this scheme to carpet and light Wildcat/Middle fields.  The Soccer Association comes close, with net assets of $179,687 - and MLAC has $131,592.  YSA certainly can't come up with the $200K by themselves - they only have a net worth of $31,918!  They must be counting on contributions from other field sports groups to bring $200,000 to the table.