Just write the check, Kristen UPDATED

Resident Steve Diaz offered a challenge to Commission President Kristen Linfante. In the name of fairness, Mr. Diaz asked Kristen to pay her fair share and to write a check for $8,000 for her underassessed home, which is on the market for $495,900.






The "intro" where Madam President says his name was struck from the sign up sheet, and Mr. Diaz says he did not do it, was included in the sound clip.

Update May 15, 2014 10:58 PM Mt. Lebanon residents criticize 'newcomers tax,' turf project for fields

Assessments and Regressive Property Taxes - Open Letter

The following is an open letter to Dave Brumfield from Lebo Citizens reader and Mt. Lebanon resident, Steve Diaz.

Dave: I write this open letter to you this morning after reading about the hearing on Tuesday about property tax assessment appeals taken against residents by the municipality. This is a matter of justice, fairness, and just doing the right thing.

First, I notice that you are quoted in the paper as saying that the more recent the sale of a home, the closer to sales price the assessment should be. This is an opaque comment, but reveals a serious flaw. If, as you are reported as having said, the difference in assessments is in the six figure range for homes recent sold over those with longer-term residents, then you must admit that the system is inherently unfair and unreasonable. For example, how long have you lived in your home? Would you volunteer to file an appeal of your own assessment to see it raised to its current "market value"? Do you think that if you sold your home it would be reasonable for the buyer to pay taxes on an assessment that is six figures higher than that on which you are paying? Or, put another way, is it fair for you not to pay property taxes on the same current "market value" that you would expect any buyer of your home to pay? You see it is a case of whose ox gets gored: so long as you can live with an outdated low (hence unfair) valuation, you don't care if someone else is taxed on an unjust higher basis than you are. I recently asked you if you would file an appeal to raise your own taxes, and your response was "Why would I do that?" Well, I agree that none of us wants our assessment increased -- and it is not reasonable of you to insist that some pay based of "market value" (meaning sales price) and some on another basis (by the way, "sales price" is not the standard, as you know -- even though "sales price" is the basis for assessment that the municipality argues in the property assessment appeals it files against its citizens). If market value is to be the measure, why should you not pay property taxes based on a current market value assessment like any new buyer? You see, this is one way in which the local governments (the municipality and the school district) enforce inequality and unfairness in order to support their profligate and excessive spending, without feeling the pinch themselves personally. This is a case of moral and ethical callousness towards your fellow citizens that is unworthy of a public official; you are a lawyer, are you not concerned with Equal Protection of the Law?

Second, property taxes are, in their nature, regressive. As you know, property taxes are a holdover from the Middle Ages when such taxes were imposed on the premise that the ownership of land implied income (or ability to pay), predicated on the agricultural nature of European society hundreds of years ago. Today, it is simply ridiculous to assume that living in a home is any measure of "ability to pay." We receive no rents from tenant farmers, or from our own farming (even if we can legally keep half a dozen chickens in Mt. Lebanon). Moreover, many of our residents are seniors living on fixed incomes. There is no reason for "ability to pay" taxes -- such as sales taxes (which are used for the purpose in Europe today), or income taxes (which reflect actual cash flow) should not replace property taxes entirely for single family residential property. Yet, I hear no clammer for such reform from municipal hall.

Third, the school district is in deficit because of its own excessive spending (which you are known to support). The municipality is not far behind. To rectify such spending errors, public entities should be forced to go into bankruptcy, as individuals who incur debts they cannot repay must do --- not drive the local citizens into individual bankruptcy or foreclosure because we cannot afford the overspending of undisciplined public officials who seek to spend other people's money too freely, or to buy reelection by pandering to political "wants" in excess of the means of the community.

I appeal to your own sense of fairness and common sense -- stop the abuse of municipal appeals of assessments on home resale, unless you are prepared to live by the same measure of taxable equity as everyone else.

Respectfully. Steve.

PS. I note that your public posture and your private assurances to citizens are not always the same -- why? SD

Steven A. Diaz
Mt. Lebanon Resident and Taxpayer.

Dr. Tim Steinhauer Speaks, Again

The following letter to the editor was submitted by frequent commenter and Mt. Lebanon resident, Steve Diaz.

In the September 2011 edition of Mt. Lebanon Magazine, Dr. Tim Steinhauer, the Superintendent of the Mt. Lebanon School District, offers comments on the high school renovation project and more.  What Dr. Steinhauer has to say should be of interest to the residents of Mt. Lebanon.  Dr. Steinhauer's published comments include the following items of note:

1.  "We are currently in the redesign phase [of the high school renovation]."  Really?  What phase is that, Dr. Steinhauer, as no "redesign" was ever on the original project time line.  What he means is that the district will try to save its project from the recent bidding fiasco, but not go back and review whether it was properly scoped in the first place.  For example, he somehow manages to clarify by continuing that "..we don't see any significant loss in space...[e]verything that we had anticipated will be there,...[b]ut we've cut out about 30,000 square feet..."  Apart from the fact that his words directly contradict themselves on their face--how can you have "everything" anticipated if you cut 30,000 square feet out of the design, a very significant amount, unless you admit that there was that much excess in the original plan as bid.  Thank you for your clearly unintended admission, Dr. Steinhauer.  The student population of the school district is in the process of significant decline and we simply do not need more space.  One might at this point also ask, if the last plan (as bid) was styled "the minimum necessary for a 21st century education", don't we need some further explanation?  Will the administration and the school board stop hiding behind their fingers and recognize how "ridiculous" your position is under any rational evaluation (the quote is an adaptation of a characterization of the current political situation in the school district by citizen Josephine Posti, as attributed in the press)?

2.  "The board has set a maximum total cost of $113 [million].  So we're working hard to bring that cost back down."  So, in plain English, it sounds to me like the district plans on spending $113 million, regardless of what they can get for the money, and will nonetheless call the expenditure a "win".  Just as with the 30,000 square feet Dr. Steinhauer indirectly admits was not essential to the program benefits in his interview, one has to read between the lines for what is not said to find the meaning of Dr. Steinhauer's words.  Among the matters not addressed is why so much money would be spent for fiber-optic cables, when in the 21st century everything is migrating to wireless...there is another huge unnecessary cost for the lack of alternatives analysis still in the board's plans.  It seems clear that behind closed doors nothing has changed, the board and the administration yet do not hear the popular lack of confidence in the due diligence and decision making of those in control of the district.  The administration and the school board still do not hear people saying that the total cost has to come way down below 100 million, and/or there needs to be an election to give the public the final say on our schools and the massive economic impact that an over 100 million dollar project (and the taxes needed to sustain it) will have on our community. $113 million it is, though, because that is what they want and such a sum does not legally require an election.  But, be careful, project critics, to be "respectful" while you are being bulldozed.  Where is the respect for the obvious public sentiment in Mt. Lebanon either from Dr. Steinhauer or the board?  4,000 people have objected to the $113 million expenditure, Dr. Steinhauer and members of the school board, are you listening?  Rhetorical flourishes are no substitute for substantive change in response to public input.  Are you listening?  You have admitted that the project scope was too grand, so rather than cut "cost" to evade an election, why don't you consider the popular will as to the scope of the project--why can't you fix and maintain rather than trash and overspend?  Are you listening?

3.  On the topic of administrative reorganization, the superintendent states:  "...[O]ur venues of communication weren't always as strong as they should have been."  It is less than obvious what that peculiar syntax may mean, Dr. Steinhauer (ignoring your "Gorceyism"--what is a "venue of communication" anyway?).  In this part of the interview, Dr. Steinhauer goes on to say:  "I think the lines of communication, the lines of deployment of initiatives will be much cleaner, much more input from the grassroots level of the teachers."  So much is well said, I think, if he means that teachers should be allowed sufficient leeway to reach the students as they encounter them.  So long, that is, as there is accountability for performance and results, too.  It is never the child's fault if the curriculum fails---our falling academic rankings demonstrate that such deterioration takes place over years, meaning not because of the transitory student population, but because of the permanent administrative and teaching regime (have you seen "Waiting for Superman" yet, Dr. Steinhauer?).  While giving teachers accountable flexibility because he believes in "much more input from the grassroots level", Dr. Steinhauer and the school board seem to compartmentalize that value when it comes to paying any attention to the grassroots level of parents, voters and taxpayers on the subject of the renovation.  Our superintendent seems confused, if not hypocritical in his approach.

So, again, it is a fascinating interview for the insight it provides on the rationalization and politicization of our schools by the current administration and leadership.  There are more tidbits overtly stated, and even more yet to be gleaned from this timely interview.  I commend reading Dr. Steinhauer's multiple messages to the citizens of Mt. Lebanon as part of the continuing effort to comprehend "the riddle inside the mystery wrapped in an enigma" that is the policy of our school district (and the original quote is from Winston Churchill for those of you may wish to know the source of my adapted, but borrowed, phrase).

From behind my reading glasses.  Steve Diaz.

Compensation Policy

The following letter was written by Mt. Lebanon resident, Steve Diaz.

Sat, Aug 20, 2011 2:07 pm
Members of the school board:  Well, another interesting unanimous decision has come down from you disposing of our money.  Apparently you have now, cumulatively over the past 2 years, given a total of some 11% of salary increases to the district superintendent, and given him more time off as well.  Given the state of the economy in general, and of the finances of our school district in particular, it bears some analysis as to what might be the basis for such a decision.  I suppose there were objective professional criteria used to justify such a decision, but in examining those I personally think might be pertinent I find myself once again baffled by the seemingly careless way you dispose of other people's money (in this case, the money of the taxpayers of the Mt. Lebanon School District.)

Among the criteria I would expect the school board to consider in determining any potential increase in compensation might be:  (1) academic performance of our schools; (2) management of the school renovation process; and (3) our general fiscal condition.  By any of these objective standards, your decision is unwise and unfounded.  First, with regard to academic performance, since the superintendent was hired we have realized a steady decline in our standing against other competing local districts, including the currently No. 1-ranked district in Allegheny County, which it may recalled "lost" our current superintendent (many residents of that district tell me due to his performance there, while others say he left to find a new construction project).  Second, in view of the incredible fiasco we have had with bids, consultants, estimates, failed and mismanaged public hearings and processes, ineffective permit presentations (including a lost lawsuit against the municipality for which the taxpayers had to pay the costs of both sides), the school board seems to have completely exculpated its chief manager, the superintendent, from any performance responsibility for the results (which is curious, given that you don't accept any responsibility either, leaving no one accountable for the waste and failures in that matter to date--oh, I'm sorry, I forgot that it is the outside consultants, whose contracts you have also not terminated, who bear all the political blame, but none of the performance responsibility for that).  And lastly, there is the matter of the fiscal shape we are in. You have significantly raised our taxes this past year, and but for the tradition of no tax raise in an election year, you will certainly to do so again next year, regardless of public input and pressure against it (most of those of us who pay the bills have not enjoyed 11% increases in the past 2 years).  We are hopelessly undone by the likely costs of our ever-shrinking "renovation" project, and we have had no special insight or leadership from our top staff member, who you generously reward financially.  We have a massive coming pension obligation that will have to be paid for, somehow, but I guess you are prepared just to raise taxes as much as "necessary".  Nonetheless, money is an object in this district at this time.  Do you have any idea, from the earned income tax or otherwise, whether the taxpayers of this district have, on average, had such a generous increase in income?  Did you measure your generosity with our money against our ability to pay?  Is there some rational fear of losing a uniquely qualified employee or other "special" reason to ignore the fiscal facts of the day in setting the pay for the superintendent?  Once again, your judgement in fiscal and oversight matters is demonstrated to be callous to the needs of the community you serve and to the efficient and economical use of our money.

The first time I ever addressed the board I told you that "now is not the time" for lavish expenditures and tax increases.  You did not heed my advice.  Since that time, not only has the financial situation deteriorated to Depression conditions (I remind you that there is an effective unemployment rate in excess of 16% according to all mainstream economists, and there have been more home foreclosures in the US in the past 3 years than in the 1930's), but the situation has only gotten worse, worldwide.  We now find that all of your contrived "planning" to allow our valuable school assets to deteriorate by a deliberate policy of not maintaing them in a cynical attempt at self-justification for building a new high school, regardless of need or affordability, has come to a dead-end--unless you tax us even more (the limit to your willingness to borrow, however, seems to be reached at your desire to do anything to avoid a public choice, that is, and election, as would be necessary if more borrowed funds are required, apparently because you understand that you would lose such an election).  I have yet to mention the underlying inconvenience (from your perspective) that our already small school district of a mere 5,000 or so students, is on a downward population spiral, according to your own figures.  We simply don't need to ruin this community financially to educate our kids. Have you forgotten that this is about the quality of education we offer in Mt. Lebanon?  The strongest argument can be made that you are not only tax-insensitive and arrogant, but that you are pursuing policies that inexorably lead only to the destruction of quality education in this community.  If all the points are ultimately about the children and their education, then your misuse of our assets is a true man-made disaster of intellectual dishonesty.  Your decision to grant an economic reward for the kind of leadership under which this school district currently strains is merely an indication of how education unfriendly you truly are.

I would be disappointed, but, being a rational man, I have come to expect the irrational and the irresponsible from this school board.

With Due Respect.  Steve Diaz

It's not sitting well with us, members of the School Board.

Letters, documents, and articles are coming my way at a fast pace this morning.  (Not complaining, keep 'em coming!!!) They support Dirk Taylor's letter to the School Board. Maybe it is too much to put in one post, but I thought I would do it anyway.  They are not listed in any particular order.  I don't want to bury Dirk's letter, so make sure you read it!

From Steve Diaz:
Members of the Board:  Given your new decision to break up your project so that you hire multiple prime contractors, can you explain how you justify the redundant administrative and overhead costs, the added delays and costs of likely jurisdictional disputes, and other unnecessary cost-overruns that are invariably associated with such an approach?  What benefit do you see in doing this?  You have gone from tone-deaf to the legitimate concerns of the community to a place that has no connection to reason or common sense.  It is time to look forward to the high likelihood of continued frustration and failure as you mire yourselves down in one ill-conceived step after another:  It is time for a breather -- you should take at least 6 months to study the options and consider how your plan can be made more efficient (not less so) while taking immediate steps to minimize the financial damage that your premature issuance of bonds has caused.  The clock may be running on a process you have played with and mismanaged for years, but simply doing "something" is no guarantee of success.  In fact, it would be good to do what most decision makers would do in a situation such as the one in which you now find yourselves:  go back over what has gone wrong so far, change the team that has been unable to pull it together (including your own membership and committees, not just pointing fingers at third parties), and consider what merit there may be in the advice and opinion you have consistently rejected out of hand.  If you are even now not willing to admit that your building project has been mishandled right along, you underscore your own ineffectiveness.  There is no reason for the public to have any confidence in you or your process.  If you cannot change course, then you must resign in recognition of the totally failed leadership you have offered this community.  This is the third time I have called on you (yes, all of you) to resign for malfeasance, and I will continue to do so if you cannot find a way not to continue doing that which has led to unmitigated failure to date.  You know what they say about people who continue doing the same ineffective thing over and over again expecting a different result.  Look in the mirror, look to the paltry number of "supporters" for your project and ask yourselves "why have so many interested and concerned citizens simply given up on the school board".  There is a reason people are walking away:  no one believes that you listen or respond to anything but your own voice.  You cannot believe you are admired or successful stewards of this community's affairs.

In the meantime, I have to ask, again, why you do not answer the questions I have posed about Federal arbitrage penalties the school board may face on the bonds you issued almost 2 years ago, how you can justify borrowing so much money when you did, and what you plan to do now about the cash- and debt-management fiasco in your building program.  Just a reminder: you also refuse to say how you will pay for the pension funding obligation given the fact that no "bailout" is on the horizon.  Does such conduct strike any of you as responsible or worthy of public confidence?  You must recognize your own failures and take personal responsibility for them.

With Due Respect.  

Steve Diaz

****

Here is the application waiver that Baldwin-Whitehall submitted to the PDE for their auditorium renovation after using multiple-prime contracts for their high school. Baldwin-Whitehall waiver See the PG article here.
Update: Letters from the Baldwin-Whitehall architect have been added here and here. 

***

The Petersen Event Center was a public school multiple prime contractor project partly managed by P.J. Dick.  You cannot make this stuff up.  Read the PA Separations Act Report and Post Gazette articles.

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04102/299310.stm
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04103/299740.stm
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07121/782379-85.stm
http://www.postgazette.com/pg/05001/435755-85.stm

Ideological Gridlock from The Post-Gazette

Members of the Board:  Attached is a pdf of a column from the Post-Gazette "Forum" section today (Sunday, July 17, 2011).  The column is written by Marc Dunkelman, a fellow at Johns Hopkins' Center for Advanced Governmental Studies.  It is an analysis that I hope you have all read, or will read.  Mr. Dunkelman addresses the very concern for community, open-mindedness, and the ability to interact with those whose views we do not share I have tried, along with many others, to pose to you as one reason why you have been unsuccessful in developing broad-based support in our town for your policies.  Mr. Dunkelman goes squarely at the "Posti Postulate" ("surround yourself only with people who completely agree with you").  In fact, he specifically cites schools as one of the local social institutions to which we all should be able to turn for social mediation, intellectual tolerance, compromise--imagine that (a message you have heard from me and many others for a long time).  Now that the Posti-Gazette has published such a viewpoint, you might even hear the message from an outside party.  I urge you to read and consider Mr. Dunkelman's thoughtful views (just as I have also urged you to view and consider the documentary "Waiting for Superman").

You may not agree with my views on the specifics of policy, but you must learn to hear, consider, and respond in a mature and appropriate way (that is, in a non-manipulative and non-stonewalling manner) to the divergence of reasonable opinion among your constituents.  Especially when it appears that the opinion you are shutting out is majority opinion. You know that you do understand that the majority of citizens in our town does not support your actions.  Isn't your private concern that your building and spending plan would be rejected the true underlying reason why you will do anything to avoid letting the voters cast a ballot in a plebiscite on your "renovation"?  Isn't your private view one of fear of losing if the majority are allowed to prevail (remember The 4,000)?   Before the entire community, I challenge you to practice some open-mindedness and responsive democratic leadership from your lofty official aerie.  I challenge you to reject the Posti Postulate, openly, vigorously, and completely.  Change your ways to become responsive and responsible.  Change your attitudes to become receptive to the full range of public opinion.  Allow the majority you fear to be your ally instead of hunkering-down to resist the popular will to the bitter end.  Remember, you are elected officials.  Remember the call to work with and represent your neighbors that presumably led you to seek our support when you first campaigned for office.  You asked for the responsibility, now show us you are wise and able enough to handle it.  Prove me wrong when I conclude that you are incapable of representing this community fairly or with integrity---it is an argument I would love to lose.

With Due Respect.  Steve Diaz

Gridlock: maybe it's our fault
Update: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11198/1160646-109-0.stm 

Bonds, Debt and Taxes

I want to thank both Steve Diaz and Dale Ostergaard for having an open dialog.  It is refreshing to get more from a school board director than just, "Call my cell phone to further discuss." Thanks, Dale. I hope you aren't getting any grief from the others for your willingness to communicate.  And Steve, always a pleasure to read your eloquent letters.  Thanks.

Dale:  I respond to your message (text below).  It makes no sense to present a "millage equivalent" from non-millage charges, and there is nothing in your chart to hint at such an approach.  If, again, as you did in your last email to me, you are telling me that the figures provided are not transparent, you underscore the problems of stewardship and credibility under which the school board labors -- problems of the board's own making.  

I will not comment further as this has become a game of district officials consistently offering a moving target, never standing in one place even by the clear implications of their own numbers.  It is another example, just as you may remember the district's reference to "20 year" enrollment projections--which do not exist--during the Act 34 process.  This is part of what is wrong in this district.

The other most significant part of what is wrong in this district is reflected in your complete failure to address the "renovation" issues.  It is beyond cavil that the school board postures and games the public, and then attempts to blame everyone from it's own paid advisers and consultants to a virtually non-existent "inflation" for its own failures of judgment.  This nonsense has to stop: take responsibility for your own performance.  You yourself ran on a platform opposed to the then board-majority's blind support for the renovation plan, but in the face of pressure from your new colleagues you capitulated and caved-in.  Now, the public is not supposed to notice or hold you to your own pledge of independence?  And what of the other matters that no one on the board will discuss as to the failed renovation?  You saw how James Fraasch was bullied and intimidated, and you just bent in the wind to avoid the same fate - and make no mistake that is exactly how it looks to those of us who voted for you, including me.  When does the board accept any culpability for the decisions it makes?  

Let's take a concrete example.  You say that the near $70 million in bonds for the "new building" should never have been sold when they were, and you are absolutely correct in that.  We could not spend the money at that time, nor since for years afterward.  We are paying what is clearly too high a rate of interest and we are paying now, on funds the district cannot use for a project that may never happen and will most certainly not approach the scale for which the school board thought it was borrowing.  Moreover, there is a threat of a Federal arbitrage penalty looming in a matter of months because of the board's imprudent rush to raise money.  It is not unnoticed that you have chosen not to answer such funding, arbitrage, and financial stewardship questions as posed in my email, nor to address what, if any, action alternative(s) the board may be considering to deal with the matter.  The board is like a dog chasing its own tail: no one else sees any benefit in the motion.  How much would this district have saved if the bonds had not been prematurely sold?  Why does not the board admit responsibility for a clearly foolish and improper decision to issue bonds when it did?  It is a classic case of taking a mortgage before you go looking for a house, then only to find that you cannot buy the house after all.  Unfortunately, you used this community's credit to "buy a mortgage" - that is, to issue bonds - because it was other people's money at stake and you thought you could use the borrowing to justify a project for which there is overwhelming community disapproval (remember The 4,000).  A clear example of gaming the community and trying to coerce acquiescence in a project in which most of us have no faith and frankly see as counter-productive and wasteful.  Does the board still insist that the "essential" elements of the building project as extolled in the Act 34 submission, the board's sales brochure for the public, and in its published "FAQs" are "essential"?.  If you do think that, how can you throw yourselves, as you have, into an exercise of jettisoning the LEEDS certification, the 3rd gym, the "crystal tower", the replacement of the entire theater building and the flex-space building "C", etc. etc.?  How can you not answer these questions in simple declarative sentences?  What are you doing and why are you doing it?  Why does no one on the board have the courage to ask the obvious questions about the board's own conduct and stewardship?

The lack of introspection or open-mindedness on the school board are its most salient features.  Note, for example, that when James Fraasch left the board for work-related reasons, an otherwise unanimous board, cognizant of the petition of The 4,000 and the obvious majority sentiment of the community in opposition to your building plans, rather than acknowledge that Mr. Fraasch had been elected by a significant constituency that would have no voice whatever on the board in consequence of his leaving, and that the board, in turn, would have no internal insight into the concerns and interests of that constituency, chose a new member to replace him who, on the contrary, opposed all of the ideas and positions Mr. Fraasch represented on behalf of that constituency so you would be a monolithic "Leviathan" (to borrow Edmund Burke's famous phrase).  This was thoughtless for a local governmental entity, although it was quite consistent with your president's unconscionable commencement address to our graduating seniors this year in which she told them that they should only surround themselves with people who agree with them. This board is as anti-intellectual as it is anti-social and anti-democratic.  We seem to be governed by megalomaniacs.

It is increasingly clear that excuses and explanations are more important to a self-justifying board of politicians than any reasoned accounting of the handling of the public's business in this school district.  It is no wonder this board has failed in its own self-defined mission, and is failing by all objective standards in every aspect of its responsibilities.  In the process, you are also offending and frustrating an entire community of your neighbors.  If this board cannot handle the job, as it now appears, the members should voluntarily step aside and resign so that more insightful, effective and representative members of the community may take a turn to serve (to answer your question:  no, I would not be among those ever seeking a seat on this or any other public board as I did that already, for some 40 years).  

Dale, these are plain words, not disrespectful, but reflective of the facts and realities of the community relations situation developed by this school board as either a conscious policy or by social/political ineptitude.  It is time for someone to say:  "the Emperor wears no clothes".

With Due Respect.  Steve Diaz

                          

--- DOstergaard@mtlsd.net wrote:

From: Dale Ostergaard To: "Steve Diaz, School Board Email list, Lawrence Lebowitz

CC: Ronald Davis Subject: RE: Bonds, Debt, and Taxes...
Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2011 03:14:15 +0000

Mr. Diaz,

I want to clarify the numbers I provided you concerning the PSERS rates and millage.  The "Budget Required for Pension" column represents the total amount payable to PSERS. That includes the District contribution and the state contribution.  The state reimburses 50% of the total cost back to the district.  So the cost to the district is half of what you see in the chart. You are also seeing the total cost, not the incremental cost year-to-year which is a fraction of those numbers.

I calculated the "Millage Eqv" column simply by dividing the Total amount payable to PSERS ("Budget Required for Pension") by the current millage rate to arrive at an equivalent  millage value.  It was not calculated by the District, does not represent the millage imposed on our community for pension costs, nor does it represent any increment in millage to the community for the coming years. The possible millage increment year to year above our current contribution is more in the range of .3 mills to .6 mills depending on the PSERS rate and is already reflected in the Forecast  the District puts on the website.

As part of our annual update of district financials, this forecast will be updated and posted in August with the latest projections .  Our debt service forecast will also be updated.

Sincerely,

Dale Ostergaard

Thoughts about last night's school board meeting

Last night's meeting was one of the shortest in quite a while, but I feel that there were comments made that should be noted.

Dan Remely is incorrect about the time needed to replace a school board director.  As with finding a replacement for James Fraasch, the process must be completed in thirty days, not two or three months as he first claimed. David Huston was correct. Another thing that bothered me when I watched the meeting this morning, the school board directors reacted inappropriately towards Mr. Huston's comments.  Personal attacks were made towards Mr. Huston, and that was uncalled for.  He was merely pointing out policy and tried to handle the situation as delicately as possible.  I see it as another example of bullying, which the school board does so well.  It is unfortunate that Director Sue Rose has been out of commission for as long as she had been, but there was no communication until last night's agenda about her status. We were due an explanation, don't you think?  And for school board directors to be insulted, was not necessary or appropriate.  The community was uninformed again.

Steve Diaz's ongoing conversation with Dale Ostergaard has been fruitful. It will be a topic of future discussion.  Thank you, Dale.  Here is another letter from Steve Diaz.

Bond restrictions?
Dale and Members of the Board:  I have been advised that the bonds you sold on behalf of the district for the "renovation" project, commencing in the Fall of 2009, may be restricted to construction and renovation purposes.  Such restrictions may now limit your options given the failure of your effort to move forward with the project as proposed.  Given this fact, what are you doing with the money in the interim?  We are certainly paying interest on it.  Are you drawing any income off the idle funds?  If you are drawing such income, is the district subject to IRS arbitrage penalties if the funds are not spent within a certain time (say, two years)?  What is the full scope of permitted uses of the proceeds?  What do you intend to do under the obligations of the bonds as issued?

If you can only spend the money on "renovation" and construction, what happens if you cannot deliver the project you promised to the public as reflected in the Act 34 Handbook and the glossy brochure you mailed out to all of us? Or, what happens, as now seems quite likely, if you cannot even commence construction before the end of October of this year?   Do you have any constraint of law or policy to revisit major changes in the scope or nature of the work with the public, or anyone else?  I realize that you, as a collective body, feel absolutely no obligation to advise the public of your plans or activities (I think one of your number put it most accurately at the public meeting when you passed the "no release of email without the author's consent" rule, saying: "If they don't know we have it, they cannot seek it under the Right to Know")---but will you tell me, now that I ask, how you plan to proceed?  The current hearings and agenda items seem a jumble of posturing and confusion, with no clear approach.  You seem just to want to build anything, to prove you did something.  It is actually amusing (but for the devastating financial and educational results) to watch your members scramble for "solutions" that entail back-tracking from everything you formerly said was "essential" to the project, and now trying to claim as your own the very criticisms of the original proposal The 4,000 put before you time and again only to be ridiculed and bullied by your undemocratic antics.  

All the while, not the board corporately, nor any individual member has stepped forward to take any measure of personal responsibility for your stewardship or oversight of the project.  For example, how about the chairman of the renovation committee, Mr. Remely, and his erstwhile side-kick, Ms. ("it's only a latte a day") Cappucci, or other board members, such as Mary Birks, who rather than listen to the public at the Act 34 hearings, first told the public that those hearings were "too late" an occasion to raise any objections (have you actually read Act 34?), before lecturing the public on why only your now discredited and failed plan was acceptable to you.  Does it occur to any member of the board that the "buck stops here"?  If the public is not to hold each of you personally responsible for your project, to whom do we turn?  Why do you think the school board is elected by the people?  The members of the board need to demonstrate the courage of their convictions, to accept the consequences of their own public acts, and to admit that "Sun Gods" they are not, nor do they enjoy a Divine Right to rule over us.  If you are responsible, you should at least be mature enough to say so, admit error and arrogance, apologize to your constituents who have placed a public trust in your hands - but whom you have failed.  

You can certainly continue to "stonewall" and hope the scandal will blow over.  You can tough it out.  Hide behind your secrecy and your bullying (and the bullies you send out to intimidate your legitimate critics).  But, you cannot face your neighbors walking through Uptown, or at the dry-cleaners or the grocery, with any assurance that behind the polite greetings, or the discrete evasion of face-to-face contact that the old admiration and support is still there. Sometimes, on the other hand, you do show symptoms of shame by avoiding contact with your local critics, as, yes, has been noted in recent select table-hopping by Ms. Cappucci and Mr. Remeley, for example.  The point is that you have not only lost respect in this community, you are dividing us and causing deep social and economic injury.  Is that why you "offered" to serve?  The best service you can do at this time for Mt. Lebanon is to show your own respect for the people who live here, who parent the students you are supposed to be educating, and who pay the bills you rack up, even when the interest we pay is for money that you leave laying around for years with no legitimate use, by taking responsibility for the taking and use of our money and the education of our children.   Your cavalier and ineffective stewardship has degraded the effectiveness of this school district and threatens our strong and proud academic tradition. You cannot substitute intrigue for policy, or bullying for leadership.

Dale, you recently asked me why only one "outsider" is running for the school board, given all that I have raised.  It is a good and telling question, the answer to which is as sad as it is obvious:  the school board has created an atmosphere of fear and intimidation in which people are afraid of what the board members and their cronies will do to harass them and their families.  It is very troubling that 4,000 people would sign an historically unprecedented petition in opposition to your center-piece policy, but then give rise to only a single candidacy at the next election for multiple directors.  You decry student bullying, as you should, but how can you not see the impact of your own bullying on the social and political life of our town?  So, the ball is in your court:  will you engage the authors of what you now concede are very practical concerns with your program, or will you continue to demonstrate hubris and arrogance beyond sufferance?  It is your decision as to how you want to engage the public and how you will comport your duty of public responsibility now that you have committed to pursue the authority of elected office.

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz

Jan Klein reported at last night's meeting, that she was having a conference call with the financial advisor this morning.  I hope the issue of IRS penalties is discussed, as well as bond restrictions.  The podcast is online at 7/11/11 School Board Discussion Meeting.

Meeting with Mr. Ostergaard, Part 2

Steve Diaz continues his discussions with Dale Ostergard in this email sent to the School Board.

Dale:  Good morning.  I want to thank you for taking the time to read and respond to my email on the PERS obligation and the proposed 2014 bond (your clarification of the figures is reprinted below following the text of this email).  You will forgive me for missing the 1/4/2011 district posting, obscurely labeled "debt service" and not posted under a more transparent heading, such as, say, "proposed new bonds" -- so that it could easily be found and called-out for what it is, just as I hope you will understand how I might have missed the unlabeled change of subject on a chart showing the PERS funding obligation and might have attributed the bond to cover that expense.  The problem is, your clarification only makes the problem worse.

If, as you now clarify, the proposed bond at 1.2 mills on the ad-valorem rate (on top of the 10% increase we suffered just this past year for the building project) is just more "renovation" expense, then we in fact face a total of 5.39 mills for the PERS underfunding, plus the 1.2 mills for additional building expense, meaning a total prospective increase of 6.59 mills on school taxes alone in 2014 (compared to my initial impression that the 1.2 was included in the 5.39).  None of this includes the base operating and maintenance budget base, salaries, or other items.  This is an impossibly unaffordable burden for homeowners to bear.  Inasmuch as you tell me that your chart does not reflect any expense for financing the 539 mills, can you advise me what options the school board may be considering to fund this sum?  Are you advised that the district has sufficient credit, capacity or resources to cover such a level of spending?  Can you tell me in one simple "bottom line" number what the millage rate becomes after 2014 in consequence of the school boards intentions regarding "renovation", the PERS obligation, and all other spending, combined?  So, you may now understand why your "clarification" is even more troubling than the chart before explanation. 

Again, I have an idea the school board may wish to consider, given the untenable financial position its adventurous building dreams have place us in.  Let's start with the roughly $70 million the district unwisely borrowed years before it could possibly have needed the money for a building project with which it still cannot proceed, at rates that are too-high given the actual market for such securities in the intervening period and at the present time (unsound public policy and very poor planning and exercise of judgement).  Of such funds, why don't you pay the $11+ million PERS obligation in cash, and use the balance to correct the negligent deferral of maintenance of the public school property, using any "left-over" cash for such upgrades as we can afford, scaled to the significant decline in school population in this district?  If the board should find that it, at that point is some relatively smaller sum short for necessary maintenance, updates and appropriately scaled facilities, perhaps a new renovation plan could be proposed. Such an approach would put the school board's feet back on the ground by covering, on a priority basis, our necessary legal obligations, while restoring confidence in the common sense and fiduciary responsibility of the school board, preserving our enormous investment and assets in existing public property and infrastructure, while also allowing the district to revise much of the platinum-plated, unnecessary and unaffordable waste the board is currently trying to trim from the building plan (after ridiculing such ideas for the past several years and excoriating those members of the public who proposed such ideas, but were ignored, during the Act 34 "process".

To regain public confidence, the school board must demonstrate the ability to admit some measure of self-doubt, admit very substantial errors of judgement (for which it must take responsibility, not point fingers), and exercise creativity and responsibility in the management of the educational and financial affairs of our community.  I hope the school board is capable of admitting that there is no serious question of merely pushing ahead on the disastrous course by which they have arrived at the present situation.

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz

 

Mr. Diaz,
The bond issue you are referring to in 2014 is the anticipated bond necessary to complete the HS financing. This proposal can be found in the ACT34 hearing noted as the "Series 2012" bond on page 35. It shows up on the district's forecast of 1/4/2011 posted online in the Devt-Service row under Expenitures for 2014-2015.

There is no bond issue proposal to account for pension obligations. I apologize if in our discussions you came away with that interpretation.
Regards,
Dale

Meeting with Mr. Ostergaard

Now, it's getting scary.  Thank you, Steve Diaz, for sharing this with the community.

Members of the Board:  I had the pleasure of sitting down to discuss school issues on Thursday evening for two hours with Dale Ostergaard, whom I had never met before personally.  Dale is a gracious and cordial man whom I found to be thoughtful, decent and considerate (he is also a Purdue graduate).  My conversation with Dale was most interesting in that he actually provided some highly pertinent and important information to me which the public has a clear right - and need - to know.  Attached, in his own hand, are the district's projections of the funding requirements for the teachers' pension fund, and its implications to the property taxes in our town.  I have to assume you have all seen the same figures, but now is the first time that the broader public may come to know of them.  The facts are stunning and daunting -- this school district is in a financial hole much deeper than has previously been revealed. Your current disarray over academic performance and school administration as well as over the "renovation" fiasco that you have completely mismanaged, now come into perspective as your lack of candor or any sense of fiscal responsibility has outgrown any mask behind which you may try to hide.

As demonstrated in the attached chart, we are facing a teacher pension funding obligation that reaches a district-projected burden of 5.39 mills on the property tax rate within the next four years.  Add this to the 40% increase in school taxes already estimated by many observers to pay for your $113 million proposed "renovation", and the residents of Mt. Lebanon will effectively have to buy their homes all over again, mortgaged by the school district to pay for educating a substantially and rapidly declining school population with, as I have already noted in prior emails to you, an ever less effective academic program (we are still 3rd, down from 1st in the county).  We have only 5,000 students in this district, but you spend as if we were a major population center (I feel the need again to urge you to see the documentary, Waiting for Superman).  The fact that you are planning for a new bond issue to fund the pension liability in 2014 has never been mentioned by the board in the context of your renovation budgeting, which indicates to me that I was exactly correct when I wrote to you complaining that it seems you will bond us up to maximum levels without an election (one you know you would lose), just to then lay before us an additional bond issue that we "must" pass to finance the legal obligation under the pension plan.  Either you are utterly irresponsible or you simply have no compassion for the elderly living on fixed incomes, or young families struggling in an economy with a rising 9.2% rate of unemployment, let alone the rest of us, many of whom are also negatively impacted by the current depression and the dual threats of increased Federal and state income taxes.  Your fiscal universe is hallucinatory and deeply destructive to this community on every level: socially, politically, economically, and educationally.  You are well aware of the deep rifts your policies have created in this community, so I ask you:  is your "success" worth it?

Time has come for the school board to exercise some introspection as to the means and goals they have set for themselves and this district.  Time has come for the members of the school board to demonstrate some measure of humility (or at least self-control).  Time has come for the school board to demonstrate some respect for the dignity, intelligence and legitimate concerns of your constituents.  I close with one random thought I had the other day reading about the effort in one of our neighboring communities to consolidate itself with the Chartiers Valley schools:  perhaps the public in Mt. Lebanon should consider a similar petition to merge with, perhaps, Bethel Park or Upper Saint Clair to form one manageable district to get control of our out-sized administrative costs for an economically nonviable small district such as our own.  What do you think the fate of such a petition might be here?  Remember "the 4,000"?

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz

Ostergaard Pension Projections

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

Athletic Boosters?

The following letter was sent to the School Board by resident, Steve Diaz. Perhaps he will be acknowledged by the School Board this time.

Members:  This is just a note from a proud Blue Devil parent about our magnificent boys' lacrosse season this year, winning WIPIAL and with a finish at the PA State (PIAA) Semi-Finals at Penn State in State College.  Since you have accused those of us who have questioned your now failed "renovation" plan, in part, of not supporting the athletic program, I thought it worthy of note that not a single one of you attended the Semi-Finals, nor did any of you even bother to go to the Quarter-Finals that were played right nearby in Hampton.  This, of course, is another issue that is not about money, just about where your hearts and minds may be. Next time you claim the high ground, please be sure you are actually standing on it as hypocrisy is rarely an effective platform.

On the issue of your renovation, I urge you to watch the documentary "Waiting for Superman" (available through Netflix).  It is a thorough review of what reform is needed in American education, but has particular relevance for Mt. Lebanon as to its review of the wealthy, but troubled, Woodside High School in Redwood City, CA.  The campus of Woodside is resplendent with all of the "modern" facilities you dream of buying for Mt. Lebo, but the documentary points out how these facilities are a mask for a very troubled academic program.  While the documentary covers other situations that are not pertinent to our community, the Woodside segment is very significant to us as we, too, have a very troubled and declining academic program while you go off on diversions seeking to spend all you can for glamorous bricks-and-mortar that may be pretty but are not the stuff of an excellent education, and do so without obtaining the approval of those of us who pay the bills, if we can.  You should see this piece, it might move you as you consider whether your mission is to educate or bankrupt this community.

Respectfully,  Steve Diaz

High School Renovation and the Election

The following letter to the editor comes from Mt. Lebanon resident, Steve Diaz.

May 19 2011

To the Editor:

Re:  High School Renovation and the Election

The results of the election this week confirm that despite the continuing use of nasty personal attacks and gang mentality by the incumbents, an open, honest evaluation of the high school renovation fiasco necessarily reveals a sloppy, inadequate, and prejudged rush through a complex project with no regard for the facts or legitimate public concerns.  How embarrassing for the “officially” endorsed Republican candidates that an outsider, James Cannon, outpolled all of them, and the Democrat cross-filers as well.  He beat all comers, incumbent and newbies, by a significant statistical margin.  In the general election he has every opportunity to garner the top final vote, which should, by any fair and reasonable measure, make him the next president of the Mt. Lebanon school board.

The article in the Post-Gazette today underscores why James Cannon is so popular.  First, the incumbent “officially endorsed” candidates are scrambling to do a complete volte-face.  Mr. Kubit and Mr. Remely are quoted to the effect that many of the project elements as to which they articulated absolute support and commitment, such as renovations for the high school theatre and LEEDS certification, now are stated by these board members to be either not as economically viable or productive as they previously claimed without doubt (see the infamous flyer mailed to us by them at our own tax-paid expense).  In fact, if they addressed such matters as seats and sound system in the theatre and other items of deferred maintenance (such as wiring or wireless upgrades and disability access), they would not need to spend anywhere near the scope of their planned project budget.

Second, they omit to mention how throughout the Act 34 public hearing process, these two, and indeed all of the incumbent school board members (save Mr. Fraasch, whom they bullied unmercifully), opposed and ridiculed ANY criticism of the plan that produced the calamitous bid results.  Specifically, Mr. Kubit, Ms. Capucci and all the then incumbents who now seek re-election, loudly and consistently accused those who raised similar and other points of concern of “being against the children” and “not understanding” the needs they “had” to address.  Who doesn’t seem to understand now?

Third, in an unbelievable exercise of hubris, the school board members yet seek to salvage as much of their discredited approach to school maintenance as possible (see the Post-Gazette this morning).  Even now, after the petition of “The 4,000”, after the disastrous bidding, and after a primary election in which an outsider opposed to the program out-polled all the incumbents he opposed on the ballot, the board persists as if only some cutting and trimming will salvage their ill-conceived, vain, and wasteful project.  We are supposed to accept that the “irreducible minimum renovation” can now somehow be reformed by the same clueless gang-that-couldn’t-shoot-straight in the first place.  Pardon my candor, but I find it unlikely to be so.

Moreover, the school board persists in planning a high school renovation in a vacuum, pretending we do not also have a major, as yet unquantified, teacher pension funding obligation that will likely easily compete with or exceed the proposed cost of the White Elephant project the school board will not give up.  The school board has given no accounting of how we will pay for both their grandiose spending on unnecessarily monumental building schemes and for the promised labor benefits we offered to secure the best teaching faculty possible.  This from a school board that had done nothing to support the scholastic program even as our academic performance and standing has continuously and seriously deteriorated.

Finally, I object to the lack of accountability and responsibility.  Why do none of the incumbents apologize to the opponents they savaged during prior public debate as they now proceed to incorporate many of the very suggestions the opposition offered before the project was finalized?  Why do the incumbents, who were so strident in their “leadership” before, not accept any personal fault for the decisions they themselves made?  It’s all well and good to blame the consultants, but who hired them and who took their advice while refusing to consider any criticism?  The incumbent members of the school board had a clear field and made the policy choices that followed their own judgment, in the face of strong community opposition.  Why does the school board fail to meet the No.1 priority of arresting and turning around our slipping academic program and why do they fail to accept any responsibility for it ?  They don’t even talk about the academic record, let alone campaign on it.  Now that the numbers are in, it is time for the same power brokers who want to lord it over this community by raising our taxes to unsustainable levels, to take “credit” for what they have “achieved”. 

It is not good enough for failed decision makers to just posture a cosmetic change of direction.  They must admit their failures and take responsibility for them.  The members of the school board need to be adult enough to accept the failure of their policy and of their policy making process.  It is time to step aside and let new leadership clean up.  Not only those incumbents on the ballot, but the entire incumbent school board should resign to demonstrate good faith in their promise to look after the best interests of this community.  As things stand now, no one has gained anything under the guidance of this school board; the only responsible course of action for them now is to go, not to sit tight and make new promises they can’t keep (or if they do “keep” them by whatever means, only spend us into oblivion when the bill comes due on the teacher pension fund).

Respectfully,

Steve Diaz

Mt. Lebanon

Renovation Redux

The following email exchange comes from Mt. Lebanon resident, Steve Diaz and was sent to the School Board on May 5, 2011 at 8:22 a.m.

Members of the School Board:  Even with the benefit of hindsight, your chosen consultants give the appearance of being confused and ineffective (see, for example, yesterday's edition of The Almanac).  Mr. Celli, who vaguely and without much specification suggests that there are scores of "deducts" that the board should consider while he ponders the scope, necessity and even the desirability of many elements of the plan he designed and recommended to you.  Such responses to your inquiries as to why the project bids were so out of line with expectation, in themselves, however, strongly suggest either that the thoroughness and care needed to make the recommendations in the first place may not have been taken, or that saying "yes" to whatever he perceived the customer - you - wanted, was more important than any other value, simply to get and keep the work (that is, the fee).  This is not helpful to anyone, no matter what one's views may be on the general scope of the project or the tax situation.  In this case the problem may truly be with the choice of consultant.  In two meetings now, Mr. Celli seems not to have provided clear and convincing answers to reasonable questions to anyone's satisfaction.  What gives you confidence he can remedy a situation as to which he played such a large role in creating?  How much confidence to you have in the manner in which he has conducted his responsibilities as your consultant and advisor?  I would suggest that the most important thing now is not avoiding a public vote, as several members of the board have publicly acknowledged that there is NO support in this community for the scale of costs which are clearly associated with the present iteration of the project.  The board now has a duty to heed the urgent request of the 4,000 petitioners and change course by seeking a proper, and appropriately limited, renovation rather than a disguised construction of an essentially new high school.  The board also serves both the public and itself best by acting on the evident collapse of confidence in Mr. Celli.

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz

Josephine Posti's response to Mr. Diaz, May 5, 2011 11:29 a.m.

Mr. Diaz,

I'd be happy to talk to you about this.  Freel free to call any time.

 

For the Board,

Josephine Posti
President
Mt. Lebanon School Board
412.667.1479

Mission: To provide the best education possible for each and every student

To which Mr. Diaz responded with on May 6, 2011 at 8:47 a.m.:

Ms. Posti:  Thank you for your reply, although I am not sure what purpose my calling you might serve.  I am not interested in a "he said, she said" "conversation." I am interested in an honest reprise of the stewardship of the renovation process, from the picking of advisers forward.  Those in opposition to the manner in which the school board has proceeded are uniformly, falsely, and unfairly painted by the board and its few supporters as against a variety of generally positive things:  we are putatively and variously alleged to be against the athletics program (you do realize that my son is a stalwart both of our highly successful LaCrosse team and our Varsity Football Team); against fine arts and music programming (an accusation that comes out of thin air based on nothing); "the children" (a general all-purpose allegation of misanthropy, indicating the nastiness of the project proponents); and other such make-weight inventions offered as a substitute for any response on the serious questions that now, after bidding, even the board (which, as you will recall, on several occasions publicly ridiculed those who have questioned your process--we all remember Mr. Remely and his paper napkin fumbling with an overhead projector to snidely criticize the notion that the financial analysis of the board could be in any doubt, joined that night by several others--see the tape) acknowledges.  None of this addresses the additional abuses the board committed in the Act 34 process.  You yourself have been nasty to me personally, even to the point of reporting an "I don't know this person" when I extended to you a professional connection on LinkedIn.  Frankly, "private discussions" or phone consultations with you are not to be trusted to result in anything other than a "set up."  I also remind you how, against formal school board policy, my emails to you (those before I started copying "outsiders" to protect myself) were leaked by board members and used to incite unlawful invasions of my property, including the photographing of my license plates), while, in response to my complaint, every member of the board denied being the source of the "leak" (therefore, some member or members did not tell the truth).  I find your credibility to be dubious and your methods to be odious.  I am amazed that you have the cheek to start any communication to me without an acknowledgement, let alone an apology, of the seriously unnecessary past rudeness and abuse I have experienced from the school board and its supporters.

If you are serious about changing tone and now reaching out to those who have been merely critical of policies now demonstrated to be flawed, then you will have to show some good faith.  I suggest a face-to-face meeting, not alone, but with a small delegation (perhaps me and two or three others on my side), and including the superintendent, as well as any willing member of the town council (with whom you have no compunctions of meeting in private out of public view), on neutral ground (perhaps the Mt. Lebanon Library), would be a first step on the road to redemption and reconciliation.  If you are truly extending an opening to move past the uncivil situation the school board has created and nurtured, I will sit down with you and seek to explore such community-based reforms as my like-minded fellow citizens and I believe would be efficacious and beneficial.  No one would be more pleased, or more surprised, to have your affirmative response to this offer.

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz

The Way Forward

The following letter, written by resident Steve Diaz, was sent to the School Board Directors on Apr 28, 2011 8:34 am.  It is being reprinted with Mr. Diaz' permission.

Members of the School Board:  In the midst of the din and disappointment over the bids received on "the new high school", it was a pleasure to see the board finally upset with its advisors, particularly Architect Celli, over the failure to accurately comprehend the likely range of project bids.  Most significant, to me, was the board president's cry that Mr. Celli's undisclosed list of 75 candidate reductions "should have been presented to the board a year ago."  Indeed they should.  But many suggestions from the CAC and others on such points were received by a stone ear, as the board was not really interested in such cuts.  One example arises in the LEEDS certification matter. This is a policy value of high significance in the community in Mt. Lebanon, one that was an essential element of the advocacy for the project (see your own brochure, written, printed and mailed to us at our own expense).  Now, Mr. Remely says that LEEDS certification is an easy take away--really?  The underlying issue with the effort to reform the bloated proposal that went out for bids (a rebuild, not a "renovation" project, if we are honest with ourselves) is that the credibility of the board is directly in issue. You seem to have lost your soul by suddenly now demanding answers to questions that you failed to address when the community, including a petition signed by 4,000 voters, asked you to do so. Question the LEEDS standards and the true returns for the cost?  That was deemed unreasonable and unacceptable by the board back during the Act 34 public hearings.  What else might be cut? The third gym? Mr. Remely went shouting after a Municipal Planning meeting that it was a mandatory element of the project to satisfy community demands.  The extra over-sized addition to the new pool?  Notwithstanding substantially decreasing student population trends, that has also been ridiculed as an absurd and miserly approach--the pool was even defended at the risk of not telling the truth when, contrary to published board policy, our superintendent told the Municipal Commission that parking was not in issue because the facility would definitely not be open to the public. Not tear down the newest building on campus?  This was also openly mocked when suggested to the board by the public on many occasions.  Given such items, what do you expect to see on Mr. Celli's obscure list of "75" reductions that might, at this time, have become acceptable (remember, you told the public that the project was as tight as it could be, with no fluff--again, see your own minutes, tapes of meetings, and your boastful brochure)?

The result of such behavior, your own unprompted but closely observed conduct and words, is that you seem to have slight regard for facts, and no actual plan or value other than spending as much money as you can without obtaining review from the voters. With such a decision process, no wonder you find yourselves confused and in disarray.  But on you push.  As Mr. Rothschild has insightfully observed, you cannot push on without completely re-scoping and re-conceiving the nature and the purpose of a "renovation."  It is time to show a modicum of humility and admit that the process has been badly mismanaged for a long time.  Admit that you have not listened to the people.  Admit that you may not be the right decision makers. Has it occurred to any of you who were so invested in the absolute correctness of the proposal that at this juncture you have had your turn at the wheel and perhaps it is time for you to voluntarily step down and allow new leadership to clean up and lead us forward?  Has it been worth all the damage and rift in this community you have caused by your intransigence, disrespect for public opinion and single-minded refusal to compromise, only to come to this juncture?  

It seems to me that a public apology is due from all of you to Mr. Fraasch for the manner in which you treated him.  It seems to me that a clear sign of new-found respect for the petition of 4,000 of your neighbors and constituents is also in order.  It also seems to me that any self-respecting board member with a sense of shame should be willing, publicly and voluntarily, to accept personal responsibility for what you and your policies have done.  Don't look to blame others, chosen by you in the first instance, for your own failures in formulating and achieving successful public policy.  Show true leadership and some measure of maturity---you have not succeeded, don't keep doing that which has not worked for any of us.  

Respectfully.  Steve Diaz

The Way We Are

The following letter, written by resident Steve Diaz, was sent to the School Board Directors on Apr 21, 2011 9:49 am.  It is being reprinted with Mr. Diaz' permission.


Members of the School Board:  It is now clear that after years of bobbing and weaving, the efforts of the Mt. Lebanon School Board to avoid a vote of the people on the appropriate scope and purpose of renovations to the High School have come to naught.  There is no reason for us to be at this juncture, but here we are, so, "quo vadis"?

One response could be to continue to plot and plan to avoid engaging the entire community in the decision process in a meaningful way.  That approach has so far produced nothing more than unreasonably deferred maintenance (including roofs allowed to go to leaking causing interior damage, neglect of desirable upgrades such as new seats for the auditorium or wiring upgrades, or the relatively modest alterations required to come into full compliance with the Americans With Disabilities Act).  You could choose to avoid facing the fact that your methods have sometimes reflected more enthusiasm for your own views than respect for facts---such as when you allowed and then remained silent after representations were made by our superintendent to the town commission that the proposed swimming pool would not be open to the public (when that came into issue because of parking requirements) even though your official and published policy is that the pool is to be open to the public; or, when 4,000 voters petitioned you to reconsider the economics of what you are doing, and you ignored this historic public outcry; or, when you gamed the open hearing process by never evaluating, responding to, or even tabulating the Act 34 submissions that were supposed to be your guide as to public sentiment on the project; etc., etc.  It is for you to choose if you will continue a most undesirable polarizing policy that has created a public rift that threatens the social fabric of our community for years to come.

Another response would be to take responsibility for not heeding other voices or considering seriously enough whether your aspirations might exceed the fiscal reach of this community.  A small, "maybe we could have been more careful and listened a little harder" would go a long way to restoring your credibility and effectiveness as a public, purportedly "representative", body.  This is an opportunity to circle back and bring the community together, rather than to feed on the division which has largely been occasioned by the stone wall tactics you have employed in recent years.  You sit in the chairs of privilege, it is up to you to initiate reconciliation or to choose another policy. Everyone wants the best education for the children of Mt. Lebanon, most support our outstanding athletic and creative and performing arts programs.  Nonetheless, creating a false crisis by negligently allowing our assets to waste for want of maintenance and routine upgrading shows disrespect for those very educational and enrichment programs that have been entrusted to your stewardship -- it does not bootstrap you into overblown expenditures no one can afford (not raising taxes just before the election does not fool anyone into thinking that the coming increases are not as "unacceptable" as the bids you have just received on your project).

Therefore, as a citizen and taxpayer, and father of students in the high school, I call upon you to live within our means, to do your public duty by addressing the legitimate maintenance, wiring, ADA and related issues, and use the already borrowed funds to care for our common school property.  Stop wasting time and money chasing dreams that are unlikely to lead to success for anyone.  Mistakes have been made, please do not compound them by papering them over or denying that change is urgently needed in the management of our school affairs.  I urge you to usher in a new age of cooperation and communication with your constituents, starting with an admission of past shortcomings and a rededication to our common goal of superior education in this community.  It is time for you to take another look at the path you have followed toward your goal and, with the benefit of hindsight, make a mid-course correction that will reflect thoughtful policy making and dedicated stewardship of the public trust.  It is Easter-time: a small mea culpa is in order.  The bids you have received create the perfect opportunity to engage in a cy pres exercise of realism and open mindedness.  I hope you will take the high road forward--should you choose to do so, many of us in opposition may, to your surprise, join you on that path.

Respectfully,

Steve Diaz