A Win for Debate

At about 8PM Tuesday night, it became official.  Victory!  Lakeville Debate is back in business and so are many other activities.  A generic thank you will have to suffice for now because I want to write a much more detailed thank you this weekend.  Your letters, calls, emails, speeches, and presence all worked together to achieve the result we desired.

A special shout out to Dylan Slinger and Jayant Tripathy who attended every single board meeting throughout the entire process.  Your dedicated attendance was not unnoticed and signaled your commitment.

We will have a unified team for the purposes of practice and will compete as two schools, Lakeville North or Lakeville South.

There will be an all-Lakeville Debate team meeting on March 2nd at 7PM in the Lecture Room at Lakeville South.  All returning debaters will need to attend along with at least one parent.

THANK YOU!

 

Getting Closer, Waiting For Vote

Tonight the board was presented a new proposal, which is really a re-shaping of the proposal made two weeks ago.  The numbers are good. The savings to the school district are the exact target number released on Jan 5th.  So, we had a 4 week struggle, the result of which was the re-shaping of the fee structure and preservation of all activities that were targeted for elimination.

The final decision and vote will happen on Tuesday.  We may need to do one last round of emailing to reinforce the fee structure that we think makes the most sense for debate and activities in general.

Below is a PDF of the handout from the Lakeville School Board study session on February 3rd.  It summarizes two things: The proposed fee structure, most likely debate will end up at the $215 level.  Also, the last two pages are the “detail” of the $500,000 administrative overhead.

Update: The numbers for activities here are accurate.  The fees for sports will change slightly due a $25 per participants season pass to attend events that was brainstormed and added at the meeting, so the sports numbers are going to move around a little. [Lakeville’s School Board Stands Behind Last-Minute Activity Fee Plan]

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Tuesday, February 8 – 7:00 p.m. – Regular Board of Education Meeting, District Office. Board of Education will consider approval of budget adjustment plan.

Last Study Session Tonight

Tonight will be the final board study session.  We will learn the fate of activities at this meeting — the board can’t conduct official business, but can come to agreement prior to the final meeting next Tuesday.  We will monitor the happenings at the meeting and react accordingly.  I don’t really think the board is seriously considering the $725 fee for many reasons — maybe, but I think unlikely at this point.

This study session on Thursday, February 3 at 4:30 p.m. will be held at the Lakeville South High School Auditorium located at 21135 Jacquard Avenue.

Outline of Dylan’s Speech

Here in what Dylan managed to crank out in 3 minutes last night –

Applaud the Board’s directions towards equitable reductions and restoring programs

25/75 split is the right approach, we can be leaders with new plan that can be fair BUT this plan ruins it

SURPRISE: $500,000 addition to cost of activities without ANY details, secrecy cannot continue

This plan is NOT equitable.

– Fixed admin cost: Activity cost is $1 to $4. Debate fee is $1 for fixed admin expense $1 for own funding.

– The expense of this excludes a wide array of students from participating

– This plan leads to a death spiral of all activities and is nice way of asphyxiating us all

- cant pay for fixed expenses if people don’t join and leads to death of all programs

- cut programs and they will NEVER come back, they’re gone

– This assumes that enrollment, costs and adjustment are fixed: we can grow enrollment and cut costs

- why weren’t our AD’s working with programs to cut cost in November?

Debate cut 80% of our budget, golf, lax, gymnastics did too

-       were doing the AD’s work and carrying the burden of paying for their jobs? NO, not anymore.

We want to partner with the school but the ADs are just forcing us out and killing solutions with secrecy

25/75 CAN work

Cut fixed administrative expenses: why do we need 2 AD’s each with an assistant for one district

Distribute fixed expenses fairly: Debate pay for Trainer? Golf pay for fields? Gymnastics for gym cleaning?

$377,000 ADDITIONAL savings of this plan vs original can pay for fixed expenses

-       board agreed earlier that when we cut in one area, that money stays in that area

-       CUT THE ADMIN AND MAKE THEM SURVIVE OFF A BUDGET

We ruin our programs, you lose students QUICKLY and lose money even QUICKER to other districts

 

Bring On The Sunshine

How much is a sheet of paper worth?  About four million dollars!

Other than the original PDF handed out of the first night — a summary document at best — ISD 194 has produced ten single-sided sheets of paper to share with the public since the process began – and 6 of these 10 were merely timelines and a memo to a contractor.

After a month of discussion over cutting $15.8, four sheets of paper represents totality of information shared with the public.  And even that information has been woefully incomplete, lacking even the most basic details a reasonable person ought to expect.

The budget cutting process in Lakeville was packaged as being reasoned, thoughtful, and engaging.  There have been numerous public hearings and meetings, creating the façade of a fair and democratic process.  But when the dust settles, the few elite decision makers – the gatekeeper of District information – have disengaged the public keeping vital information out of public view.  Why does the Administration fear sharing information so much? Citizens of Lakeville want to help – imposing an information blackout creates suspicions and distrust.

In 1913, historically important United States Supreme Court Justice, Louis D. Brandeis famously wrote, “Sunshine is the greatest disinfectant.”   Almost 100 years later our leaders struggle to embrace his words.

$325: Unequal Distribution of Burden

Here is a simple fact that summarizes it all – Each debater is expected to provide $325 in administrative expenses. This obviously points out that the other activities aren’t paying their fair share of administrative expenses since the fees for many activities are at/near/below $350 TOTAL for all expenses!

Overcharging The Debate Team, So That Others Can Pay Less

Updated: Math added at the bottom of the story.

The proposed addition of the still-mysterious and yet-undocumented “administrative expenses” creates an oddly disproportional assignment of financial burden.

If you are in debate, for every $1 that your family pays in activities fees to cover the expense of your team, another $1 is given to be used for salaries of the activities directors, the athletic trainer (debaters, you are paying an equal share of the athletic trainer – I was told this last Thursday night by a district official), the secretaries, and their office supplies.

We are still not being given the participation and expenses figures for the programs not on the chopping block (we asked for this 3 weeks ago), so we have no way to compare to other teams.  But we do know that the overall ratio in the budget of administrative expense to program expense is about 1:3.5 – that’s a rough number from the budget sheet handed out Thursday.

To summarize:

Debate pays 1:1
The overall budget is about 1:3.5

That is unquestionably an unfair assignment of expense.

Under the 75/25 as presented last week:

$1,767, 300 for program expense
$500,000 for administrative overhead expense
The results ratio of admin expense to program expense is then 1:3.5

For the debate team, assuming 33 students:

33 students x $725 = 23,925 in fees
budget of $12,630, leaving $11,295 for overhead
that’s pretty much a 1:1 ratio

If we recruit 10 more students, the school colllects $31,175 in fees
budget of $12,630 means $18,545 is applied to admin expenses
resulting ratio of program expense to admin expense then become .66:1

Death Spiral of Activities Fees

Our talking points for the week:

First, the proposed fee structure that results in a $725 activity fee for debate and speech is a program killer.  It is a backdoor method of choking to death many activities in the near term.  This plan sets into motion a death spiral for all activities: As the pool of participants in activities shrinks, those fixed administrative expenses will be spread out over even fewer students. As more and more students are priced out of activities, the fees will continue to rise to a level so lethal that even the most robust activities will struggle to survive.

Second, this fee structure is something done only when every other alternative has been exhausted. There are options and nobody is looking for them:  The Activities Directors need to charged with meeting with every activity and figuring out where cost saving can occur.  (How this wasn’t done months ago is unfathomable.)  Debate found a way to cut 70% of our budget and still operate, we did the work the ADs should have done 3 or 4 months ago.  Before we saddle every activity with these program killing fees, we need to explore all other options first.

Meetings this week:

The Board of Education will host a Community Information Night on Tuesday, February 1 at Kenwood Trail Middle School, 19455 Kenwood Trail, beginning at 6:30 p.m.

The study session on Thursday, February 3 at 4:30 p.m. will be held at the Lakeville South High School Auditorium located at 21135 Jacquard Avenue.

The $500,000 Secret (and what to do about it)

It is time for the secrecy to end. In choosing to not engage the community on budget cuts, the Administration of the Lakeville Schools made a big mistake.  Secrecy builds a climate of distrust and kills opportunities for valuable input.  The Administration has scheduled numerous board meetings and public hearings, but keeps the greater constituency in the dark.  Our community is filled with people who are good thinkers, close to the impact of budget cuts.  Secrecy squelches their ability to contribute useful ideas and solutions.

A prime example of this was the $500,000 surprise let loose on Thursday night.  When asked, school officials at three levels in the decision process denied me access to the spreadsheet that details the newly added $500,000+ in “overhead” that was added to the activities budget.  “We are not sure we want to make that public right now,” was the answer one person gave me.  (24 hours later I received an email saying it would eventually be released at an upcoming meeting, but that’s not a lawful answer either.  Furthermore, who presents a $500,000 item that has no details?)

This is not the only incident. I asked a series of questions about the decision making process and for access to budget information that was used to make cuts in activities, I was told, “I can’t give you that information until I first share it with the school board.”

It would be my hope that the Administration would have a change of heart and follow the example of ISD 197 West St. Paul and put everything online for the public to view.   Embrace the power of our citizens, don’t blind us!

The State Legislature has a remedy.  Citizens can request documents from the school district under terms of the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act.

Lakeville Public Schools are subject to Minnesota Government Data Practices Act requests, just as any other government entity in the state of Minnesota — see https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/?id=13

Sect. 13.03 states “All government data collected, created, received, maintained or disseminated by a government entity shall be public unless classified by statute, or temporary classification pursuant to section 13.06, or federal law, as nonpublic or protected nonpublic, or with respect to data on individuals, as private or confidential. The responsible authority in every government entity shall keep records containing government data in such an arrangement and condition as to make them easily accessible for convenient use. Photographic, photostatic, microphotographic, or microfilmed records shall be considered as accessible for convenient use regardless of the size of such records.”

This includes not only paper documents, but also electronic files, videotapes, and email.

Sect. 13.02 subd 7. “Government data” means all data collected, created, received, maintained or disseminated by any government entity regardless of its physical form, storage media or conditions of use.

This process is simple. A guide for citizens has been posted online.  It is not a process that requires a lawyer. Try it out, post what is returned to you.  Think about it like this:  Your tax money is being used to pay for the salaries of these people,  taking action means you are directing them to end the secrecy. Free the information, improve our schools.

Cocurricular Program Changes Summary

This is the document that was distributed at the meeting last night.  No supporting data for this spreadsheet was made available either during meeting or by oral request after the meeting.  We are making a request for supporting information under the Minnesota Data Practice Act.

We will need a couple community members willing to make that request once we complete writing the request.  How to Request Public Information is a document created by a Minnesota state agency that explains what must be in the written request for information.

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Lakeville Public Schools are subject to Minnesota Data Practices Act requests, just as any other government entity in the state of Minnnesota — see https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/?id=13 

Sect. 13.03 states “All government data collected, created, received, maintained or disseminated by a government entity shall be public unless classified by statute, or temporary classification pursuant to section 13.06, or federal law, as nonpublic or protected nonpublic, or with respect to data on individuals, as private or confidential. The responsible authority in every government entity shall keep records containing government data in such an arrangement and condition as to make them easily accessible for convenient use. Photographic, photostatic, microphotographic, or microfilmed records shall be considered as accessible for convenient use regardless of the size of such records.”

Subdivision 3A-F outline the circumstances, timeline and manner in which government entities MUST provide data and what they can charge for providing photos copies.