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The new “Coackroach” thread is foremost on my mind at the moment but there are other bees buzzing about which I simply must address today. I haven’t even finished the preceding Cockroach 4 post and I’m stopping now to attend to some other items before proceeding. This is a continuing difficulty for the larger threads I have undertaken. Some of them, like the “Sell Central Nowthread of a week or two ago, I’ve never really finished.

The Cockroach thread has been prompted by something Art Johnston told me when we met a month ago and lots of other stuff that’s been stewing in my head for six years. It involves a mysterious $40 million dollars which could become one of the next big deals for the Duluth School Board to deal with. If I’m elected it surely will be. I got more information which I’ve been eager to get from Art yesterday. That was one of two important meetings I had both of which would make interesting reading if I felt I had the time to elaborate on them. In the case of the meeting with Art I’ve sort of been sworn to secrecy to protect other people. Besides that Art is strongly opposed to having me put words in his mouth and I can appreciate that. (I should state here (parenthetically) that I’m over my spat with Art. I am now neutral about who should be elected to represent the 4th District. David Bolgrien is a fresh new face who does not trust me – yet. Art is a wounded warrior who has deep and important knowledge about the Red Plan’s history and the many duplicities with which it has infected our schools)

Art handed over an interesting, and to my eyes credible, analysis of the Duluth School District’s finances vis a vis the two levies. It could easily be construed to contradict my dire warnings. Since I am flagellating myself with my supposed honesty I feel compelled to share it with readers of this blog. I’ll do so by putting it on my campaign website today with my comments to counterbalance its thesis that the levies are not that critical for the School District’s continued operation.

It does not change my mind about the spread of “gangrene” from the Western part of Duluth’s School District to the East which my DNT commentary spelled out. Hiring new teachers is the only antiseptic to that gangrene and that means new money from the levies. To that end I do not intend to let the new teacher’s contract give more to the teachers than the current contract. However, should I be elected I’ll only be one vote on a seven member board. I can not guarantee what the majority of board members will do when offered a settlement by the teachers. I can reasonably expect to cast a vote on the new contract because, as the document Art handed me points out, they will want to see how much money is given to the District by voters in the November 5th levy vote.

I do not think that November and December will be a long enough period of time to come to a settlement before new school board members are seated in January. If, however, that should happen I’ll feel absolutely free to criticize a poor settlement for the next two years and the people on the Board and in the Administration who settled it before I could be seated.

One thing should be made very clear. I do not think ISD 709 teachers have the stomach to strike at this time and have the utmost desire for my stated goals to succeed, to wit: hiring more teachers. They will want my goals to succeed in order to relieve them of the stress from overcrowded Red Plan classrooms that are shortening their lives. If the teachers, especially the newer teachers, are not rooting for my victory they are either ignorant or foolish or deluded.

After the levy vote, and after the seating of a new school board and after the settling of the teacher’s contract it may well be time to wrest back some of the mysterious $40 million from Johnson Controls to benefit the badly disadvantaged Duluth School District. That story will continue with Cockroaches 5 after I attend to the analysis Art handed me. Let me make this clear. Art would not tell me who authored the document but I believe he vouches for its contents and analysis. I think I can vouch for its general accuracy as well even though I remain a strong advocate for both levies.

If anyone disagrees with this analysis they are free to submit their critique of it and I will publish their rebuttal. That rarely happens but it might be to take advantage of my offer. With less than two weeks to the election suddenly there are thousands of people reading my blog. They compose the audience in Duluth that is most concerned about public education. Surely, if I’m misinforming them about what is going on in the District some spokesman will want to address the fallacies that Art, his secret analyst and I are disseminating.

Or they can go to the Duluth News Tribune’s editors. But remember “once burned, twice shy.”

In my next post I’ll link to the document and my analysis of it.

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