With all due respect to the honorable Ray Wambolt, I am troubled by his conclusion that passage of the Edmonds School District's technology levy would be a reduction in property tax. While it is misleading to suggest that passage would mean a slight reduction in our tax obligation, rejection would be a reduction in property tax that you might actually feel. More importantly, it would result in something the District might feel.No one would argue that technology isn't an essential ingredient in the modern classroom, but the sheer volume of equipment being carted off after dark is enough to make one's heart shudder.
The Edmonds School District seeks your approval because they love spending your money. To convince you to pass this levy, they tack on anything and everything that might tug at your emotions.
In the coming days, you will discover a number of reasons not to support this levy. Until the current management model is eliminated, I won't be voting in favor of any district proposals.
Mark Zandberg
www.esd15.org
Ray Wambolt's letter to the editor encouraged voters to pass the District's Technology Levy. I won't bother linking it here. It isn't worth reading. Of course this forum appears to have more readers anyway.
5 comments:
There are only two effective pressure points that school district administration feels, image and funding. Attack either, justifiably or not, and you will see some form of response.
Please people...expose what you know and vote NO.
With Marla Miller and the other cronies so active in Lynnwood and Edmonds Chambers of Commerce, etc., it is no surprise that a second rate (and lergely ignored by the community) publication such as the Edmonds Beacon would be afraid to embrace the truth.
The editors of the Beacon may in fact be hoping that they gain from such loyalty the possibility that in the event difficult economic times, the school district may consider allowing the Beacon to merge with one of the high school newspapers rather than see it go out of business. Not a particularily bad idea actually, as the content, quality of journalism and overall appeal of the new Beacon-Teenybopper would undoubtedly improve.
At the moment only the advertisements printed in the Beacon rival the level of journalism found in the Hawkeye - and I suspect more of MLTH students read their paper than Edmonds residents read the Beacon.
Mind you that I often grab several copies of the Beacon - but only to assist in starting my woodstove. In this way I find some redeeming value in what would otherwise be a waste on paper and ink.
It seems that the newspapers around here are afraid to run anything negative about the Edmonds School District my question is WHY? Taxpayers buy this papers and we need to know what is happening in our district and where our money is going? Should all taxpayers refuse to buy a local newspaper until we see real journalism both negative and positive about the places we live.
It isn't even negative journalism that I would demand they report. Why doesn't the Beacon simply investigate and report all facts in regard to the Edmonds school district. It sounds like Beacon might be influenced by Marla Miller as well. That is terribly unfortunate if that is the case. Then I think I would sight at that point, an inability by the Beacon to do even decent work for their coverage area.
That's why you have to get KING 5 looking into the story. The Herald, Enterprise, and Beacon live here. They have to face and deal with the District administration on a daily basis. If they started to investigate these activities, there would be great pressure put on the local media by the local power brokers; "If you don't stop investigating, I'll see to it that your advertisers pull their ads from the paper!" The local media (which, remember, is just another business) will be hard pressed to ignore the pressure. Besides, they don't have anybody on staff who is either TRAINED or PAID to INVESTIGATE; they are just set up to gather and disseminate. KING 5 doesn't have to sit next somebody at a Rotary meeting that they are investigating and pretend to be nice; they are also more at liberty to go to more than the one local source for information as KING 5 obviously did.
1850's, Bleeding Kansas, slave state or free? A mob from Missouri (a slave state) crossed the state line into Kansas Territory and attacked the offices of an abolitionist newspaper and threw the printing press into the nearby river. They left threatening the editor/publisher that they would return if he continued to print his "lies."
It's hard sometimes being a good local newspaper. Under the current circumstances, it would be more shocking if the local media DID investigate and print their findings as opposed to merely reprinting the single source's version of events.
Don't expect them to and don't be too hard on them when they don't. Takes more guts than they have.
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