posted by Tom Moertel at 10:01 AM /
With an illuminating article by Kaitlynn Riely, the Post-Gazette has expanded its coverage of the recent town-hall meeting and protest to include a detailed examination of what happened inside the meeting. The article begins:
And what about the high-school project? Yes, it was discussed briefly, but not in the way the protesters probably had expected. The Post-Gazette explains:
Read more:
At an invitation-only meeting in the Mt. Lebanon municipal building Saturday morning, residents posed questions about the current and future state of taxation in the town to a panel consisting of Mt. Lebanon Commissioner Matthew Kluck, school Director James Fraasch, Coldwell Banker real estate agent Eleanor Carpenter and Allegheny Institute for Public Policy researcher Frank Gamrat.The article also provides what I think is the first honest explanation for the protest that took place outside:
Outside the municipal building, about 50 people picketed. Many of the protesters held signs supportive of the high school project and against the town hall meeting and Mr. Kluck.That’s an explanation I can believe. And my hat’s off to Mr. Reese for just saying it.
“I would say people looked at the guest list, the organizers, and the history of their involvement and probably reached a conclusion, good or bad, that part of the agenda was a discussion of that project from the opposition side,” said David Reese, one of the protesters.
And what about the high-school project? Yes, it was discussed briefly, but not in the way the protesters probably had expected. The Post-Gazette explains:
The high school renovation was not the main focus of the meeting, but the topic did come up. A question was posed about whether student safety would be affected if renovations were not made to the high school. Mr. Fraasch said there are some issues with safety and that something needed to be done.The P-G article reveals much more than the tidbits I’ve quoted above. If you weren’t at the meeting and want to know what really happened in one easy read, read this article.
Someone asked whether the project was a “done deal,” and Mr. Fraasch said some planning issues remained but he believes they will be worked out.
Read more:
- Mt. Lebanon residents invited to talk taxes with panel (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
Labels: matt kluck, post-gazette, protest, town hall meeting
11 Comments:
One correction, no one looked at the guest list. I had the master list and did not share it out of respect for the privacy of the attendees. I still do not know what the invitees think about the high school project. Had the “pro current high school project” supporters seen the list, they would have seen names of people who actually share their view. – Charlotte Stephenson
I think many people are missing the point of the protests. The term "town hall meeting" implies an open community forum, which this meeting was not. The fact that it was held in the commissioners' chambers further reinforces the notion that this is a municipal meeting at which the general public may raise questions and have their voices heard. If there was limited seating, then the organizers should have done a call for applications for thoses seats.
This event was by invitation-only, with presumably a carefully screened guest list, and was presented in an environment which implied that it was an open, sanctioned meeting of the municipality. If this meeting is now aired on the municipal TV station that will further reinforce perception that the audience, and their questions, are a cross section of our community and representative of its views. The protests were much more about the process than about the specific discussion which took place behind those closed doors.
Anne Kemerer
Anne,
Can you imagine the uproar if those opposed to the high school plan were denied access to a meeting to discuss what types of chips to sell at jv football games (or something equally inane)?
The very same people who are defending this closed door "town hall meeting" (i.e., those who will criticize my comment in 3, 2, 1 ...) are the very same who are screaming that they have not been heard by the school board. The hypocrisy is astounding.
Chris Frenie
Anne, the discussion was posted on www.lebocitizens.con under PODCAST.
See the picture of the Municipal Building and click on it and the audio of the meeting is available for ALL to hear.
Please listen to the contents of the meeting before you cast dispersions on the good character of others, Anne. Shame on you!
Kaitlynn Riely reported, "An audio recording of the meeting was posted by someone who attended on the website for Concerned Citizens of Mt. Lebanon." That is a mistake. I posted it but I was not at the meeting. It was recorded by someone who attended the meeting. Kaitlynn, if you read Blog-Lebo, and I am sure you do, please correct your article. Thank you.
Elaine Gillen
This is what I struggle with ---
+/- 80 citizens get together behind closed doors for a chat and the republic is threatened!
15 folks get together behind closed doors, deciding to spend $800,000 and no one says boo!
Let me explain:
On February 8, 2010, the Master Design Team assembled and according to their minutes:
Fourth floor labs were shown to pick up the count of labs … and we showed a fifth floor lab … These will be presented to the board at the up-date meeting tonight but the decision on whether to proceed was made by the MDT. This action adds $800,000 to the budget according to Dana. The money will have to come from design contingency.
That very evening, the Architects represented to the Board that the outstanding science lab issue was “resolved”.
Neither the Architects nor Dr. Steinhauer thought it worth mentioning to the Board (or public) that the issue was resolved at a cost of $800,000.
Nor did they provide any detail on how the issue was resolved.
Nor did they indicate they wanted ANY input from the Board.
Nor did they report they were digging in the contingency fund sandbox.
They had moved on.
To this day, I am surprised the assembled 15 had not read Mr. Kubit’s Community FAQs, posted not two weeks earlier, to understand who was to be calling the shots.
From Mr. Kubit:
Who is making the decisions about the High School project?
The School Board makes all decisions about this project with input from the Superintendent, administration, teachers, architects, construction manager, consultants, Master Design Team and community.
Now --- which meeting was really threatening the republic?
Should we be focused on who attended, who was invited, or what was discussed about the high school project; or should we be talking more about the issue of whether we should be looking for alternatives to tax revenues to fund the school district or our municipal government?
Our community faces formidable challenges. The question is not if we need to act, but what course of action we must take. Therefore, we must continuously challenge ourselves to think of innovative ways to equitably fund both our school district and municipal government.
Many of our residents realize the tremendous role that philanthropy presents. If our community makes an investment, like the building of a new school, and uses a tax increase to finance the purchase, the tax increase has a detrimental impact on household cash flows and lowers the values of all property that is impacted by the tax increase. Alternatively, if the community makes the same purchase by seeking contributions from residents, school alumni, corporations, and foundations then the same investment is possible without raising taxes.
Mt. Lebanon has demonstrated that charitable contributions are an excellent funding alternative to tax increases. The Mt Lebanon Public Library and the Municipal Public Safety Building are both excellent examples of how private contributions helped our community to gain valuable assets with only positive impacts on our property values. I have often wondered, "Would the community have resisted the construction of the new high school project if the funding for the project came entirely from private contributions?"
So my thought is, "How can we institutionalize philanthropy to fund our municipal government and our school district?"
The fund raising for the Denis Theater, led by Ann Kemerer, is another positive contribution to Mt. Lebanon’s future achieved through voluntary giving.
Contrast the accomplishments of the Dennis Theater, the Library, and the Public Safety Building with the 45% projected compulsory tax hikes projected by the School District’s Finance Officer to the School Board last February. The release of this information followed a late January Audit and Finance Committee public meeting, about a week earlier, where a 3.7% tax hike was presented to the public.
The trouble with the information presented at the public Audit and Finance meeting was the District REVENUES presented in the Forecast at the public meeting were LOWER THAN the projected District EXPEN$E$ producing an unrealistically LOW MILLAGE INCREASE in the public Forecast.
Fortunately, the truth came out one week later in a District Forecast to the School Board. The REAL FORCAST was exposed in an email.
When questioned by a citizen about the email it was reported that two District Administrators told an individual who received the email that it was not a district document. Further information was denied.
Presenting the truth at the public meeting would have given the Board an opportunity to form a fund-raising committee to promote voluntary gifts to the school from alumni, residents, parents, corporations, foundations, and friends. Unfortunately, the District is saddled with the athletic supporters promises to raise funds, the ineffective Mt. Lebanon Foundation for Education and a projected 45% millage hike, made more onerous by a county-wide reassessment of home values.
The School Board ignored another opportunity for supportive citizens to be involved in building the new High School. Voluntary giving could have solved the lack of financial support for the High School Project exposed by the Petition circulated by The Concerned Citizens of Mt Lebanon.
The Board needs to act to encourage voluntary giving to support our children’s education.
John Ewing is correct.
I'd like to see the school district institute a process for philanthropic contributions. There are many programs that should seek private contributions.
For instance, who is the school district's bank? Wouldn't it be nice if rather than advertising to the general public, the bank use the advertising dollars to pay the school district a higher rate on their deposits? In this way, the bank would be gaining community support while making a positive contribution.
I don't see this mindset in our school leadership or school management today. It's always the same approach - tax, tax, tax...
The basic tools are already available to the school board to encourage voluntary contributions from alumni and other folks. We have a Directory of Alumni with contact information, we know where residents and parents live and who in the community is interested in philanthropy.
Yearbooks are available to show alumni interests during their student years. If turf is a need we can solicit those who played sports on the turf on a regular basis; if we need a swimming pool we could solicit past swimmers for donations and so forth for other sports, fine arts and club activities.
In addition we could upgrade our website to show schematic and design drawings of projects that need to be financed. The website could be expanded to include email communication among those who are supporting the school. Many colleges already have this feature so the implementation could be easily duplicated in Mt Lebanon.
After email addresses are available the Internet could be used to communicate with friends of the school. Our Athletic Director could write a weekly email to alumni and friends about the success of our athletic teams and the Superintendent could write a Message to Friends two or three times a year about the plans and successes of our District.
Professional fundraisers could be employed to solicit larger gifts and our Solicitor’s law firm could provide some basic legal advice to donors about planned giving, gifts of stocks, and bequests from estates.
The Board needs to authorize startup funds; fortunately we have the funds balance to accomplish these tasks.
John Ewing is completely correct.
This mechanism has worked very effectively for our colleges and universities for decades; but we've never tried to aggressively apply this approach to our public schools and that is unfortunate for the children and all of the property owners in any community.
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