I talked with Loren Martell over the weekend. He’s thinking about filing for the School Board. Good for him. When Gary Glass retires we may have a replacement who also pays attention.
Loren noticed that JCI said a six lane swimming pool would cost us something like five million in its estimates. Now the District is claiming that two count-em two EIGHT LANE pools are only costing six million to build. Like an economist Kerry Leider, the District’s building manager, keeps redefining what the expenses mean. That could be because the District is desperate to reelect its Red Plan champion Judy Seliga-Punyko.
You see Judy was the head of the swimming pool committee that lobbied after the Red Plan and its costs had already been fixed for a second pool and two pools with eight not six lanes. That’s a bit awkward now that the School Board has voted to add another fifteen million to the cost of the Red as well as voting not to put this additional Red Plan cost up for a public vote.
How much of that fifteen million Red Plan addition is Judy’s doing for having added ten more swimming lanes to the Red Plan’s costs? Maybe her husband will find a student to explain how you can build six swimming lanes for five million but sixteen swimming lanes for a mere one million extra. That’s just one more Red Plan bargain….No, excuse me, I mean miracle.
This is only the annoying part of the story. The disgusting part is that the District has put the blame for the extra cost on parents of special education students. The District says they lobbied for more Red Plan spending for disabled children.
