Live Blog - April 2009 Board Meeting

$43 million dollar Dell contract (ratification) FAILS over trustees' concerns!

Carla Ranger points out that the District has been violating the Open Meetings Act by failing to take minutes or record all its meetings!

(...and to think I'm considering giving all of this up in December!)

It's 5:30 and we're under way. Refresh your browser often.

All the board members are here. There's a fairly contentious crowd in the room. Apparently today was "axe" day for maybe as many as 700 employees.

The non-renewals are based on low CEI scores. The CEI, as you'll recall, was developed by Dr. Bob Mendro before he hit the trail. Nobody really seems to know how it works, but they're still using it to fire folks--something that, as I recall, they said they weren't going to do when they originally sold it to the Board.

Anyway, Jack Lowe (President) is telling the teachers they're going to limit the teachers to 15 minutes total time--instead of letting the dozens of them speak for 3 minutes apiece.

It's 5:40. We're into the Superintendent's report.

...and the summary reports from the committees (Education, Policy and Business).

We'll shortly be on to the Dell lease agreement. I've been doing the math, and it looks like somebody at Dell made a killing on DISD.

But that's a story for another day.

5:50 - Kimball High School Lady Knights wrestling team is being recognized for their achievement in winning the regional championship.

"These ladies can not only pin you down... but they're excellent scholars," said Carla Ranger.

Proud night for these girls. They look pretty athletic. Let's put it this way... I wouldn't try and take them. Good work girls.

5:55 - Just talked to Rena Honea (AFT/Alliance). They have chosen 5 speakers to speak for 3 minutes apiece. We'll tell you how many more didn't get the chance.

6:15 - Now we're up to the speakers on agenda items. Ron Price is bringing up, and taking issues with, the policy limiting speakers to 15 minutes per agenda item.

"That's un-American," said Price.

There was much applause.

Jack Lowe is basically telling Price to eat dust. He's reaffirming the 15 minutes-per-group, or the 1-minute-per speaker.

AFT/Alliance and other teachers are speaking about using CEI's to fire, uh, "non-renew" teachers.

What we're confused about is how the District can rely on a metric to judge and fire teachers whose students all pass.

Al Lipscomb is speaking! He's talking about renaming Booker T. Washington. "I've never known a white man named 'Booker T.'," Lipscomb said!

Al, though his days on the council are over, is a city treasure. I hope he sticks around.

6:33 - Change of plans! There seems to be some confusion over who gets to speak. So Jack has decreed that all speakers will get one minute with the option to yield to another speaker.

Ever get the feeling that the Board, with representatives, is more like a cabinet with a president? It sure seems like he's more like a ruler, sometimes, as opposed to a peer.

6:43 - An impressive crowd of teachers is standing while the one designated speaker talks about cutting the budget (changing the staffing formulas) at the learning centers.

6:48 - Since this is such a contentious issue, Carla Ranger moves to suspend the rules and let everyone speak. Motion fails, 4-4 with one abstaining.

The learning center issue is an interesting one. What's the difference between a "learning center" and a school? Well, a longer day, special focus on problem subjects, etc. The question is: do they work? Is the achievement there?

According to sources we've talked to, the answer varies. Some say "yes" while others say "no." One thing for certain: there's no middle ground. Either folks feel one way or the other.

We'd sure like to hear from folks who have been through the learning centers or anyone else who has quantifiable data.

7:00 - We're on to an interesting topic. Carla Ranger pulled an item ("minutes") from the consent agenda for discussion. Carla says that the Texas Open Meetings Act requires minutes be taken at each of its meetings.

She points out that board retreats are considered meetings as defined by the Open Meetings Act and, therefore, minutes must be taken.

Superintendent Michael Hinojosa noted that minutes were taken when something "important" was discussed.

Ron Price asks, "are we in violation of the open meetings act."

"The law requires that you have either minutes or an audio recording," answered District lawyer Jack Lowe.

It would appear, friends, that Carla is right.

Price also pointed out that the District was in violation of its own policy with respect to taping of ... (more later)

The Dell Contract!!!

Leigh Ann Ellis indicates that she won't be supporting the $43M contract with Dell. Neither will Carla!

Lew Blackburn asks for details.

Some great questions. District CIO Patricia Viramontes can't answer details about the details of the agreement.

This jives with what we got which was essentially nothing, or very little, on our open records request looking into this matter.

Jerome Garza is asking Patricia, rather pointedly, how many computers are going to teachers. He wants to know why only 25% of these computers are going to teachers.

Patricia isn't doing to well. She doesn't have a lot of the figures.

Ron Price: "Just for the record, how many computers are we getting?"

"You tell us that we're getting $790 PCs, but Dell makes $500 PCs."

Viramontes responds that they're buying a 5 year warranty.

So I'm not buying this logic. Let's suppose that the District buys $500 PCs. They could get 3 for the same amount of money they're using to buy 2. So 1/3rd of their computers (which, by the way, are under warranty) could break before the 5-year warranty would be worth it.

To say nothing about the interest on a lease! We still can't figure that one out.

One thing is clear: Patricia seems not to know a bunch of details about the whole thing. The Board is really grilling her, and she's doesn't seem to be doing a very good job of answering questions.

Scare tactics... if it doesn't pass, the sky will fall.

They're voting...

IT FAILS - with only Lowe, Nancy Bingham and Edwin Flores voting to approve it!

My opinion: this can be retooled into something really good that will ultimately benefit kids and teachers. $43M buys a bunch of computers. At $790 apiece, it buys 54,430 of them. It seems we can do so much better for $43 million dollars.

7:56 and we're debating an "anti-Carla" policy. This one keeps single trustees from pulling items from the consent agenda and putting it on the regular agenda for discussion.

"We should all have the right to pull an item from the consent agenda," said Ron Price.

Price points out that everyone is an elected official from a district and should have the right to pull something that concerns them.

More discussion.

Nancy Bingham: "So one board member could pull every item for 2 readings."

Jack Lowe: "Could."

Carla points out that she's never seen anyone do this.

Down to the vote. It fails. Supporting Ranger were Adam Medrano, Ron Price and Lew Blackburn. Carla still can't pull things herself. She needs one other trustee.

8:09 - On to another contentious topic: Campus Staffing Formulas.

We're going to get a presentation courtesy of Larry Throm.

Basically DISD is not in compliance with a federal law that dictates how funding is allocated on a per-student basis. Simply put, there is a 10% tolerance for funding per-student, per-grade level, per-campus.

So if DISD's average spending is $10,000 per student, basically we can't spend more than $10,100 per student or less than $9,900.

The formula is quite a bit more extensive. But the main issue is the learning centers--which get quite a bit more per student than most schools.

If we violate the law, we risk Title 1 funds (tens of millions of dollars--maybe enough to buy all those Dells!) and stimulus funds which would, obviously, significantly impact the budget.

My opinion: there is bound to be a creative way to solve this problem. There's never "choice A" or "choice B"--especially when you're playing with big numbers.

Lew Blackburn is asking how the figure "cost-per-student" is derived. How do they come by the number? "What is included in [the number] .. what kind of expenditures are we referring to?"

Throm is giving a fairly comprehensive reply. Basically: everything.

The bottom line question may be: how do we know? Last September, the budget was in shambles. $64 million dollars in shambles to be accurate... or as accurate as they knew.

So how do we know how much we're spending per student?

8:30 - Waivers.

Ron Price is asking if we can get a waiver. He points out that he doesn't trust the numbers.

Ron is really going to town over the learning centers.

Ron points out that if the learning centers are "low performing," what happens when you cut their budget even more?

Carla asks the question: what about a waiver?

Throm responded that TEA said "just because we approved them [in the past] doesn't mean it was right."

So a waiver may not be an option. But have we asked for one?

8:53 - Carla is on a roll. She points out that this item (Campus Staffing Formulas) was on the consent agenda and she had to pull it.

Jack Lowe answered that he was Carla's "second" to pull the item for discussion.

Carla responded that Jack put it on the agenda in the first place because he "plans the agenda!"

Now Carla is chastising Throm and the rest of the staff for not pursuing a waiver. She's also all over them for not being responsive to a trustee (her).

The crowd is all over it. There is much cheering and applause in support of her.

"When I have to dig and search for [this stuff on my own] ... I am quite troubled."

The crowd is applauding loudly.

Jack Lowe is wearing out his gavel and warning the audience to quiet down--lest they be thrown out.

The lawyer is explaining that federal law specifies that TEA can't waive the requirements that are central to the issue. He's actually doing a good job laying out the requirements.

Still, one wonders if something has been overlooked. It seems that a letter ruling from TEA might be an easy compromise. Maybe everybody can agree to go with what TEA says?

Leigh Ann Ellis puts this well. She points out that "we only got this 2 weeks ago, [...] now we're being asked to vote on this."

"How do we build civic capacity on this?"

She moves to table this for 2 weeks to get questions answered before proceeding.

9:14 - Jack tries to get a vote. Carla wants to say something. Jack replies that Carla has been talking all evening.

The audience doesn't like that.

Carla makes a friendly amendment to put it in the main board room so more people can attend.

Well, Jack doesn't like it.

"The reasons we're trying to move is to preserve all of our options [...] to preserve jobs." "My concern is we're putting jobs at risk by delaying it 3 weeks."

The vote (postpone/table until May 14 at 5:30).

IT PASSES (5-4)!

The crowd approves!

9:20 - We're on to speakers on non-agenda items. The big one: Lincoln High School. Everybody gets "1 minute".

First up: Alberto Rodriguez.

Someone takes the mike, but it isn't Alberto! It's somebody else.

"Are you Alberto Rodriguez?" asks Lowe.

No!

The crowd erupts in hysterics.

The next one up: William Hopkins! Hopkins is always a treat!

Tonight's topic: Willie's son was robbed at Kimball. Willie called the police. They took Willie to jail. Now he's really getting weird. Something about a sexual assault of a 3 year old that involved Willie. Somebody is still in prison and "nobody is trying to help."

"Thank you Mr. Hopkins, your time has expired."

Well, that was different.

Another speaker: cameras that aren't working at Skyline.

Next up: "do not change the employees' pay date."

9:33 - Dianne Reed talking about using the CEIs to fire ... uh ... non-renew contracts. Lots of teachers standing. Much applause.

Next up: Mary Beth Kemper who was fired ... uh .. non-renewed because of her CEIs. She points out that she's been given lower performing students, but she's held to the same standard as those given higher performing students.

Of course since nobody seems to be able to really tell you how CEIs work, no one can tell you how people can fail them.

9:41 - Another speaker pointing out flaws with how the CEIs are computed.

He points that to base the CEI on one day, one exam and exclude the rest of the year, is flawed. But if nobody can tell you how it works... never mind, I've beaten that point to death.

Next up... a whole bunch of people talking about CEIs.

Maybe the new slogan for the District should be: "DISD: where we can't tell you why you're getting fired!"

It's late. I'm getting hungry. Can you tell?

The Reverend Horace Bradshaw is up reading a list of things followed by "Hinojosa must go."

Ooh, now he's bashing Channel 8 and the South Oak Cliff investigation blaming Hinojosa for not standing up for the school.

The crowd applauds.

9:52 - The Lincoln High School/learning center funding affair. The other half of the auditorium that wasn't standing for the CEI stuff is standing now.

She closes with: "don't pass the buck on my child."

Much applause.

Next up: it looks like we're talking about H1B visas. All the Alliance/AFT people are now standing.

Carmen Diaz was brought in from Guatemala as a bilingual teacher. The District is, apparently, not helping many of these folks get residency.

"Our dreams of a normal life are paralyzed." "Please, let me keep teaching."

Many of the speakers on this subject seems to be complaining that the District's immigration lawyer, charged with helping these H1B visa holders, is ineffective.

10:12 - We're up to the five "official" speakers about Lincoln's principal Earl Jones and his suspension.

Most speakers are expressing disappointment about Jones being held accountable, and suspended, for the paddling of a student by Lincoln's head coach Jerry Sands.

9:27 - The comment period is over, but another person is trying to speak. They turned off the mic.

It's Mr. Chambers.

Ron Price asks that the mic be turned on.

Jack said OK. So the mic is on.

Mr. Chambers started out directing his comments at Jack. He knew Jack's dad when he went to South Oak Cliff. Then off into an empassioned plea for Jones.

It's clear that there are many who believe Earl Jones received a little too harsh a punishment.

OK, I think that's it for tonight.

My fingers are tired.

I need pizza.

Good night.