Portland Public Schools Empire-building Empress of Education, Superintendent Carole Smith, like all liberal “progressives” in government who live their oh-so-good-intentioned lives consuming rather than creating wealth to carry out their expanding government dreams of bureaucratic empire, is urging taxpayers to vote ourselves into further enormous bond indebtedness by approving Smith’s monstrous $548-million dollar Bond Measure No. 26-121, allegedly to “update, renovate local public school buildings,” and, on the same ballot, Measure 26-122, allegedly solely “for teachers and educational programs.”
This is all being done, of course, in the name of “the children.” Like all taxpayers, we have been bombarded with expensive daily mailings soliciting us to abandon all fiscal prudence in these hard financial times and vote for further indebtedness so that Education Establishment Empress Smith can empire build as the state and nation are threatened to be overwhelmed by public debt.
Almost all of these solicitations bear a cutesy little goo-goo liberal logo containing the word “Yes” in the middle of a “heart.” Ah, yes, it is all about “the children.” At the risk of being branded as “heartless” if not an awful “racist” or other of the epithets with which the politically correct pillory those who pay the taxes on which the so-called “public servants” (sic) like Smith feed, I confess that I am voting “no” on both measures.
While there are many good reasons to do so, not the least of which is the fact that there is no a single reform of fiscal or educational policy identified in the solicitations to vote for further debt, one is the advocacy of Superintendent Smith, herself, indicating that funds are needed more to help her learn to count, and teacher advocate Eric Swehla, to learn to spell, which can be accomplished without a bond measure.
That is, in carefully reading and considering the arguments for hundreds of millions in bond funds to the education bureaucracy, I admit that the advocacy suffered when I read the appeal signed by “Eric Swehla, César Chévez, Elementary Teacher.”
“César Chévez”? Who is that? Could it be Cesar Chavez? Could it be Cesar Chavez who, unlike the politically-correct but spelling challenged Teacher Eric Swelhla, never, as far as I know, put an accent mark over the “e” in Cesar or the “a” in Chavez when he signed his own name. I was one of Cesar’s attorneys for some twenty years, and in all those years, he never put accent marks in his name. Now, Hugo Chaávez, the Marxist-Socialist in Venezuela, in contrast, he does that; but not Cesar Chavez, the American. Maybe Teacher Swelhal was thinking of Hugo, not Cesar.
But is it really a confidence builder to be solicited to provide even more funds for teachers and a half-billion dollar bond issue by a teacher like Eric Swelhal, who can’t even spell the name of the person for whom the school in which he works is named? Pobrecito. But if he can’t spell Cesar Chavez, how can he teach our kids, how can he and others like him be trusted to ensure that the bond funds are competently administered solely for what is claimed – for the education of the students, not for deals with the City or other issues?
Even more importantly, Education Empire Empress Smith, in effect, tells us taxpayers that we should vote to go into this enormous further debt based upon, well, trust that she and the other bureaucrats, this time, will not have costs run over as so often happens, will not divert funds intended for one purpose to be used for another.
Is it a confidence-builder that she who will be most responsible for administration, the Empress Smith, in soliciting us on the face of the ballot and in the Voters’ Pamphlet can make schools magically appear and disappear, informing that we have “95 school buildings” in soliciting us to vote Measure 26-121, and “85 schools” in soliciting taxpayer-paid money in Measure 26-122?
More particularly, in reading every one of Empress Smith’s words in order cast an educated vote, Empress Smith states in the Explanatory Statement on Measure 26-121, the $548-million bond measure to renovate schools: “Portland Public Schools is the largest public school district in Oregon, with 95 school buildings and over 47,000 students.”
But in the Explanatory Statement for Measure 26-122, “levy for teachers and educational programs,” Smith tells us that: “Portland Public Schools has growing enrollment, currently serving almost 47,000 students in 85 schools….”
So, which is it? Is it “95 school buildings and over 47,000 students,” or is it “almost 47,000 students in 85 schools…”? Whatever it is, both cannot be true, and relied upon by the taxpayers being called upon to vote this enormous further indebtedness.
Is Education Establishment Empress Smith arithmetically challenged? Does Superintendent Smith have a counting problem, as Teacher Swelhal has a spelling problem? Are scarce resources needed for remedial education for both, so that the children, and taxpayers may learn?
Or does Empire-building Education Bureaucrat Carole Smith simply have a “truth” problem as she seeks to seduce taxpayers into further enormous debt for the education establishment in a failing economy in which taxpayers are being squeezed by gas prices, food prices, and faced with an uncertain economic future?
There are, of course, other and perhaps more weighty reasons upon which to oppose and vote against these bond measures. Portland property taxpayers are already overburdened. The arguments raised by the Taxpayers Association of Oregon in opposition to bond measures of this size at this time are salient and persuasive.
But it is insulting, in my opinion, and the farthest thing from a confidence builder, to be solicited to be taxed hundreds of dollars more each year to pay for bond indebtedness in order to provide more money to school bureaucrats and teachers, by a teacher who cannot spell even the name of the school in which he purports to teach, and a School Superintendent who either cannot count, or cannot tell the truth, but asks us to go even deeper in debt in a failing economy based upon trust and not proven performance.
(Rees Lloyd is a longtime civil rights, workers rights, and veterans rights attorney and a member of the Victoria Taft Blogforce.)
