Yo, Homies,
Dis be mah sign, sukahs.
but it ain’t da way it waz
So let me giv ya sum schoolin
It be a V fo VOTE, fool.
Only I ain’t foolin!
If you want 2 pass.
Don’t mess wid my V
or it will be
your a**
Our view: Do Harry Welty and gang really want a return to chaos?
The mission of Harry Welty and gang all along has been to wreak havoc, to cause confusion and to create chaos.Mission accomplished -to the detriment of all.
For decades, Duluth battled and debated just what to do with its abundance of outdated, deteriorating school buildings and how to handle its declining student enrollments. Finally, more than two years ago, a School Board actually made a decision, a decision driven by input from more than a year and a half of public meetings with anyone and everyone who cared enough to get involved and a decision guided by leading experts. The School Board then didn’t buckle under pressure from vocal opposition, as happened so often -and far too often -in the past.
Now, well into the implementation of the desperately needed and sensible long-range facilities plan, along comes a new wave of opposition, this one led by Welty and others. They have an alternative plan they don’t even completely like but have managed anyway to force onto a ballot. A meaningless advisory vote will be scheduled, probably before the end of the year. Meaningless except that it’ll cost the district at least $40,000 to $43,000, based on a 2008 estimate. That’s an expense taxpayers will be stuck shouldering thanks to the opposition.
And what happens with the result of the vote? It could depend on the outcome of Tuesday’s School Board elections. Returning incumbents probably would stay the course. Opposition candidates could push the alternative plan, or some variation of it, allowing the fracturing of Duluth to continue, the turf wars, neighborhood border battles and watching-out-for-mine to rattle on.
The alternative plan was created with no public meetings and with zero input from the community. It calls for taking care of can’t-wait repairs during a first phase of construction. A blue-ribbon panel would then be convened to determine whether more work should be done. That panel could do little more than continue the battles and debates that have mired the district for decades and even generations. Its work could easily devolve into an unhealthy rehashing and refighting of all the same arguments considered – and settled – in the creation of the long-range facilities plan.
How does that help the community? And what if the result is yet another plan? Wouldn’t that just restart Duluth’s circle of gridlock with a new wave of opposition?
Anyone livid that the long-range facilities plan is creating a high school at Ordean can’t be thrilled by the prospect, under the alternative plan, of cramming a new middle school building somewhere on the Denfeld High School campus.
And anyone steamed by the long-range facilities plan’s price tag had to be shocked to learn Plan B actually would cost them more every month: $9.50 vs. $9.22 for a median-sized home. That’s because Plan B doesn’t include the long-range facilities plan’s money-saving building efficiencies and its liquidation of excess properties. Plan B instead keeps open more buildings than the district needs, each one requiring the expense of upkeep.
The long-range facilities plan isn’t perfect. Even its most ardent supporters acknowledge that. But it is positive and it is forward-looking. And it is growing stronger with every tweak made during its implementation (at least 11 changes have been made at the Ordean site alone, based on neighborhood and community feedback).
The alternative to the long-range facilities plan? A return to chaos and a deepening of divisions that long have held Duluth back.
Hard to believe even Harry and gang would want that.
