“Councilors,
The Trib reports today that Councilor Krause is once again attempting to put the Red Plan up for a referendum. Councilor Krause apparently wants to gauge public support or opposition before the City begins cooperating with the building. The paper reports that Krause does not anticipate any expense due to a special election so he must be thinking of holding this referendum during the coming primary or general election.
This year about $10 million will be spent on the Red plan. That leaves $283 million left to spend. My personal prediction is that the Red Plan will never be built in its entirety. The School Board is scheduled to borrow another $90 million in 2011 to complete the Red Plan. That will be two years after next year’s School Board election. I do not expect any of the School Board members who support the Red Plan to be reelected. Without them the Red Plan will be cut short.
Some of us are confident that legal action will bring the plan to a halt in the year between this and next year’s construction seasons. If a referendum was to pass we would cease all opposition to the Red Plan and it could proceed unhindered. This alone would be a great blessing.
The Duluth School Board is greedily eating into resources that the City desperately needs for new schools of dubious necessity. To ignore this is to ignore the elephant in the living room and dismissing Councilor Krause’s measure out of hand flies in the face of the public’s wishes. Tough talk about the City Council only acting where the City Council is concerned completely ignores the School Board’s hogging of tax resources which are critical to the City. Its the City Council’s job to take forceful action on this matter rather than rolling over and playing dead.
Harry Welty”
