It’s always good to have an outsider’s perspective.  One interesting thing about my Board service is that Dr. Finan and I came into this at the same time.  So we learned about the inner workings of the district together and both of us noticed that the way the district is run isn’t efficient or even, at times, sensible.  That points to the structure of administration and the way the district is governed.

I’m lucky in that I’m a teacher and I’ve been following the Board (and proposing ideas) for the better part of a decade.  Right after I was sworn in, I was STILL swamped with information in a way that was overwhelming.  Board members past, present, and future simply aren’t equipped.  It isn’t their fault.  But it needs to be addressed and this section of the plan helps.

On the administrative side, I’ve publicly complained about some of what I’ve dealt with.  This also addresses a lot of it.  For example, admin can’t talk to Board members without the superintendent’s permission.  Huh?

Here’s what the plan does:

• Provide annual training for School Board members.  Hallelujah.  Over the years, I’ve seen craziness.  There’s grandstanding, micro-management, sheer ignorance of issues, and my personal favorite: not paying attention.  As in, Board members will historically ask questions that have already been answered.  So, you know, read your packets, read your e-mails.  That kind of thing.  While this is a good solution, it brings me to one major caveat.
  • Board members should be paid.  This initiative requires 10 hours of training.  I spend hours and hours of my week on Board-related issues.  I’m glad to do it.  I’m glad I have a supportive wife who understands.  I’m glad my kids aren’t old enough to resent me yet.  I can justify the sacrifice of my time because it benefits my kids directly, and no dollar amount can replace that.  But this is my philosophy of work: labor has value, and should be compensated at that appropriate value.  I don’t need a paycheck and wouldn’t take one, since I’m proposing this.  But requiring Board members to take this training and making it uncompensated is simply unfair.
• Be more transparent.  Damn right.  All documents Board members receive that can be made public, should be made public.  This is easy.  Some Right-to-Know requests take way too long, and I’ve complained to admin about this to no avail.  If it can be public, it should.  ASAP.  Period.  I would add that this information should be easily searchable and user-friendly.
• Adopt an Ethics policy and form an Ethics committee.  YES.  Voting on anything involving big donors to directors’ campaigns is a problem.  One Director did that before I was on the Board and got called out and did it anyway.  Financial support shouldn’t buy votes.  The Scranton PAC just spent a fortune to elect 5 people.  If anybody who has donated to that PAC wants a contract and any of those 5 vote for it, that would be unethical and should be grounds for removal.  Most of the drivers of the PAC already have government contracts with the City and County.  I’d hate to see them buying contracts on the SSD level.  This part of the plan would help prevent that.  The Ethics Committee would be an oversight tool made of community members, so it wouldn’t be the Board policing itself.  The plan also includes an ethics code for employees.  This is also important.
• Create a Budget Advisory Committee.  I see this as the SSD version of what Henry Amoroso’s firm did for the city.  Local stakeholders should be involved in advising the district on the budget.  Directors aren’t experts.  Administrators don’t think of everything.  The more ideas and eyes, the better.  Not that this new Board would choose me, but I’ll have free time come December!  And its advice and input is non-binding for the Board.  So people could continue to ignore me if they wanted!
• Establish budgetary reserves.  This basically means: have money.  I get that it’s essential to put this in the plan, but it was funny to read.  The actual technical and financial advantage of this is that the district would have to borrow less for Tax Anticipation Notes (TANs).  This would save money on the massive interest payments on that borrowing.
• Engage in Debt Management.  The district has historically been balancing budgets for operating expenses via borrowing.  That mountain has fallen upon our heads.  We can’t deal with the debt we have.  So we need to work on what we’re spending.  I hope this includes refinancing, but it reads like we’ll be forming a plan to deal with it.  There aren’t specific recommendations yet.
• Reorganize the central office.  This is big.  There are definitely problems with the way central admin on both the admin and clerical levels need to be reworked.  It’s worth looking at the chart on page 55.  It’ll make the district operate more smoothly, especially paired with some of the other changes, like removal of NDAs (which I’ll cover shortly).  It’s worth a read on your own, because it’s a massive reorg.  It’s needed.  Ultimately, it’ll make the district run far more efficiently.
• Reports to the School Board.  Basically, this is about getting more information to Board members regarding the goings on in the district.   As I said earlier, more information is always better.  These would be quarterly.
• Get agreements in writing.  This isn’t a joke.  I was informed of “a gentleman’s agreement” regarding one of the buildings the SSD leases.  That’s absurd and there should never be any such thing.  There are evidently numerous unwritten agreements involving the district.  (Insert bus contract comment here?)    The report cites two such agreements and suspects there are more.  This is absolutely absurd that the plan would have to address something like this.  In fact, a lot of the plan includes things the district should’ve been doing for years.
• Stop NDAs.  Non-disclosure agreements are NONSENSE.  And it caused me a headache when I got on the Board.  Basically, administrators are not allowed to talk to Directors without the Superintendent’s consent.  That is yet another SSD absurdity.  Ostensibly, it’s about helping the Super to help Board members.  But really it’s about controlling the flow of information.  It took me a bit, but I figured out how to navigate it so I could do my job.  But I shouldn’t have had to wade through that bullshit.
• Adjust the Stadium Fund.  Evidently the district separates stadium-related revenue (ads, tickets, etc) from the general fund.  The suggestion here is to re-allocate maintenance to where we are understaffed and see about maintenance being done by groups that use the field.  It doesn’t specify, but I smell an agreement with Lackawanna: they maintain the stadium for us, they get to use it.  That’s my guess here.
• Move to a Fiscal-Year budget.  We are the only district, other than Pittsburgh, that is calendar year.  It is insane for us because we pass budgets without knowing what state funding will look like.  This switch is essential.

I’m particularly happy with this section of the plan, because it’s talking about management.  The district, going back a long, long time, hasn’t been run as efficiently as it could have been.