Tim,

You know much more about the bond issue then do.

What went wrong? I see the reasons you listed. Do you believe in any or all fo the reasons? Is there a way to prevent this in the future? I have a feeling it is not just "more" oversight, but maybe a structural idea.

Is it just hard to estimate costs on such large projects? Do we need another bond in a few years to keep up to date.

Basically, i am asking, What is your opinion:

Is this anyone's fault.

or just bad luck?

Brian,

Great question, but probably too early to tell. Without knowing the details, and the # of bids, and how competitive the bids were etc.. We simply don't have enough information to make that determination at the moment.

There is no project breakdown, bid listings or construction details or budgets on the district web site, so we're all in the dark.

There is no question that material costs are escalating dramatically, as well as labor costs (workers comp) etc.. But much of this should have been covered by the contingency budgets built in to each project. To be 60% over budget at Atherwood, having just started, is blowing all contingencies to heck.

I have no judgment or pre-conceived blame at the moment - But I think the parents/taxpayers of Simi Valley deserve to know more about what's going on with the bond funds.

Maybe the school board will host a separate meeting to discuss just the bond issue and the spending-to-date. This is taxpayer money they are dealing with and one or more people need to be held accountable. At my company, when a project manager overruns a contract, it has to be covered out of profit. Needless to say, a project manager who does overrun rarely gets a second chance. In fact, they are often removed when it is apparent that they cannot contain the overrun. We use a cost/schedule control system that highlights potential overruns early on. The project manager gets a short period of time to correct the situation, then he is gone. The company has to answer to the stockholders, and they can be very fickle.
Jerre

Hello:

This a very sad issue, but really goes to the heart of the matter on education funding from top to bottom. We can give more and more money to education and see very little in return regarding child performance or facility improvement. As has been said in this blog, the education establishment really just wants to raise taxes, keep spending as high as possible and be unaccountable for outcomes and improvements.

When you question the fact that child illiteracy is on an upward trend despite increases in funding over the last decade or that a much needed bond has been squandered by gross mismanagement and liberal accounting practices, you are classified as anti-education. How is this possible?

How come anyone with a new idea is immediately putting down teachers or the establishment that runs education that continues to tell us everything is just fine if you just turn over 50% of your income?

Scott

Jerre - If the public demands a public meeting, where the board and oversight committee have to lay it all out, then I would imagine they would have to. How would we go about getting such a movement going?

Scott - well said. The silence on this issue is very telling.

T

So we were planning on having some home improvements done on our home, so we had them costed out by vendors before going to the bank for a home equity line.

New Carpet = $4,000
New Outside garden = $1200
Paint = $1500
Rain Gutters = $2000

Total $8700

So we went to the bank, and got a $10,000 line of credit. Then we went back to the vendors and said

"Ok - we'd like to have the work done"

The vendors said OK, but the combined total was now $14,000, but only if you don't get other bids, and we start NOW...

We said, "Well, it's more than we have to spend, but we'll just get it done faster, so materials won't cost as much, and we'll not do stuff we had intended to do down the road, but these 4 projects have to happen, regardless of the overruns, so LET'S SPEND!!!"

NOT A TRUE STORY - Well, except YOU KNOW WHERE.

Scott,

Watch your use of the word "liberal". You are interjecting idealogy where I don't think you intend to. How about a different adjective for the accounting style you don't like.

And, I don't think this issue has anything to do with teachers really. Does it?

Brian

I can think of a few adjectives for their accounting style:

Criminal
Poor
Flagrantly mismanaged
incomprehensible

Sven

Brian:

I really think this has everything to do with teachers. For example, they are the ones who will either receive air conditioning or not because of the poor and non-existent budget management with corresponding cost controls related to the bond. Many of the upgrades that the teachers would benefit from are not going to happen as promised during the C4 initiative, March 2004. I am not sure why educational working conditions is not an issue for most people, but here is why it should be.

In management studies in the private sector, good working conditions can directly be correlated to productivity improvements, so I think one could argue that because the bond will short upgrading working conditions, it reduces educational performance for teacher quality and student achievement.

This should be unacceptable for kids, teachers, administrators, taxpayers, and the community, specifically because state and federal deferred maintenance allotments will continue to be scant for another year until revenues line up with spending like a normal “family budget” does.

Brian: When 1/3 of the entire bond money is already gone in a year and three months on a ten year bond, would you describe it as a "conservative" approach to bond finance? At this rate the bond money will be gone in three and a half years.

From what I hear, some of the bond schedules that were promised to be completed won't be... Liberal or conservative, it's just a real problem...

Lastly, In the LA Times on Saturday, it stated that NCLB funding will drop by 1/3rd this year because the administration has other priorities. I want to say that I am against reducing NCLB funds for schools. It should go up by 1/3rd not down. We can only get full nationwide accountability and ensure no child is left behind by enticing districts and states to participate in NCLB.

The administration should also read some of the GAO reports and recommendations and look at ways to make applying for grants and opting in for funds less of an administrative headache for local jurisdictions. It appears that the Department of Education is more of a problem than a solution in getting needed federal money to local schools.

Scott Blough

Scott,

I heard a quote and a I will paraphrase it here:

There is no liberal or conservative way to pick up the trash.

When you say liberal, you are using a political idealogy as a put down. If you intend to do that, go ahead. But I think it puts oversight of a bond issue into a partisan frame.

It makes it seem like it is a red state vs blue state, Bush vs Kerry, Swiftboats vs Moore ( F 9/11) cultural divide.

Now, if you mean that, tell me the names of all the "liberals" in charge of this money. You can't. You can name a few Democrats, but last time I checked the board wasn't party controlled.

Now, when I said this doesn't have anything to do with teachers, I meant it wasn't individual teachers, or the union that had anything to do with the spending of the money or cost overruns. In the same way this has nothing to do with students. Get it? I know it IMPACTS students and teachers, but they were jot the reason for the over runs.

Lastly, Scott in your last paragraph you advocated for more federal spending on education. That was a change of pace, and really surprised me. Thanks for keeping it fresh.

Brian Dennert

Ps- Tim, any thoughts on the health book debate in Conejo?

Brian:

I have always advocated higher spending on education, but only in moderation to the other needs of the state. I do not support massive "Great Society" type spending proposals that lack even a small understanding of implementation and risks financial ruin to the state. Please read any book on President Johnson's "Great Society" proposals and you will see that America needs a revolution in implementation studies and is gradually working toward a better implementation strategy. The GAO is part of that revolution.

I reject higher taxes or overspending on programs that do not meet their objectives. Instead, I advocate better financial management and frugality in the money we already pay in taxes. I am not sure why the left fights for more spending and taxes while remaining silent on government waste. If the left would actually respond with outrage with the waste and abuse that occurs, it might find itself back in national contention.

I advocate getting more with less such as to use reinventing government tactics to save money. If government could do more with less and innovate like the private sector and non-profit sector do, we could lower taxes even further without destroying programs ends.

Now back to the use of the term liberal. I want to point out that as I understand it, the school board is going to have to shelf some of its objectives because it did not manage and anticipated costs. You seem more fixated on the term liberal in the form of labeling and understand it to be only a partisan term. The bond was promised to the be all things to all people and the answer to every ill was the bond money. This to me is not a conservative approach to manage public expectations, but a liberal one. Instead of being outcome based and focused on results and the bottom line, the school board acted liberally with the kids' funds. I'm not calling them liberal, I am saying their spending methods, management of public expectations, and bond finance skills are liberal.

If you go back to my original statement, I said, "liberal accounting practices", which meant that they were more or less not very conservative with their budgeting and accounting methods.

Brian: If a painter came to paint your house and went overboard, which cost you more money in the end, what would you do?

Common sense tells me that you would say, I'd make sure all costs were discussed up front and the painter did not waiver from the plan. Why is this issue any different for you? Why didn't the trustees and administrators ask the tough questions and ensure everything was on budget and there were no surprises?

If only we had an intrepid newspaper reporter to start digging up why these things weren't asked and why the budget went overboard and where the money is going? I think it's sad that the Daily News led with this story and the Star wrote a piece that included many other jurisdictions to kind of imply to the reader, "well it's happening everywhere, so there is nothing wrong with it."

Thank the good lord for the blog...

Scott