Revisited: Rediscovering Civility and Purpose in America's Public Discourse

Sharing this March 2005 blog post with someone today was a pleasant reminder to me of how much I still agreed with what I wrote back then.

Which naturally means I now encourage you to read it again as well!

No Way Out but Forward

No doubt there are some who've shoved this story in their "Bush's eyes off the terrorist ball" file folders, but I see it as further evidence that the end game cannot be otherwise than a transformation of the entire region:

A suicide bomber wearing an Afghan military uniform detonated his concealed explosive vest near a bus full of Afghan soldiers on their way to work here in the capital early Saturday, killing at least 30 people, including two civilians, officials said. The bombing was among the deadliest in Afghanistan this year.

Later in the day, President Hamid Karzai said that he was willing to travel to the hide-out of the Taliban’s leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar, to conduct peace negotiations, and that he was prepared to allocate the leadership of some ministries to Taliban officials if they renounced further violence.

The comments seemed to reflect a more conciliatory and open posture toward peace negotiations with the Taliban, and they came a day after Mr. Karzai’s return from a trip to the United States that included talks at the United Nations and the White House. Earlier this year he forswore direct negotiations with Mr. Omar and has apparently never publicly said he was prepared to name Taliban fighters as ministers.

And the only way to transform the region is to make it crystal clear that we will not be true to form (as some folks perceive our form) and flee from media savvy insurgencies that leverage the suicide cult mentality of their followers.

NEA "Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 9

Still nothing from the NEA so the "pay cut" analysis hostage day count continues. Day 9 is now history.

We eagerly await a response! The offer to post it here on Anchor Rising remains open.

Here is our blog post describing how there is NO "pay cut." It even includes spreadsheets with documentation of data sources and assumptions for public scrutiny!

Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim about East Greenwich teachers taking a "pay cut" is false. It is crossroads time for the NEA.

Until we see a quantitative financial analysis response from the NEA, we will continue with daily blog posts noting that their "pay cut" analysis is being held hostage at NEARI against the wishes of East Greenwich taxpaying residents.

See more thoughts in the Extended Entry below.

FURTHER CLARIFYING ISSUES IN THE "PAY CUT" DEBATE:

In response to questions about the model presented on Anchor Rising, I would offer these points for your consideration:

Some analyses are built on assumptions about assumptions and are, therefore, subject to analytical manipulation. We all would do well to be skeptical of such financial models.

However, this analysis debunking the "pay cut" claim is most certainly not that kind of model. Which means that anybody could independently confirm every primary assumption used in my analysis. And the analysis itself could be done by any student who successfully passed Finance 101.

Specifically:

• I copied 10 historical salary numbers for 2006-07 from 1 salary table in the recently expired and publicly-available contract.

• I copied 2 historical co-pay percentages for 2006-07 off that same contract.

• I asked the East Greenwich School Department for publicly-available information on the actual 2006-07 and 2007-08 costs of family and single person health insurance premiums for teachers, a total of 4 additional historical numbers.

• At my request, the School Department provided me with its assumed annual growth rate for health insurance premiums during the next two years, another 2 numbers.

• I took the latest School Committee 3-year offer for salary step increases (3 numbers, 1 for each year) and co-pay percentages (3 more numbers, 1 for each year), as quoted previously in a public newspaper, and used them after confirming they were accurate.

Those are the ONLY essential pieces of information needed to do the analysis and derive the NO "pay cuts" conclusion I did.

24 confirmable data points, 16 of which are documented historical data, all of which came from just 3 public sources. It doesn't come any more easily verifiable than that!

Instead of responding with cogent arguments, all the opposition does is engage in name-calling. Meanwhile, as many of the blog comments show, the public is noticing their evasiveness and keeps asking for a meaningful counter-argument from the NEA. In other words, the public is asking the NEA and its supporters to stop with their dismissive tone toward East Greenwich residents where they declare the Anchor Rising analysis wrong without any analytical support and without showing in a substantive way why they disagree. Meanwhile, they continue to propagate their false claim that the teachers are being asked to take a "pay cut."

This is not rocket science and here is what the opposition could do if they were genuinely interested in engaging in a meaningful public debate: Confirm the 16 publicly available historical data points and the 2 projected health insurance cost increase numbers central to my publicly available analysis. The good news is that nobody has to file any legal paperwork to get the information I used in the model because it is all publicly available to concerned citizens. An earnest call/meeting or two - like I did - is all that is required.

Plus, once those 18 data are in hand (and I assure you they will be identical to mine) and using the latest publicly-disclosed School Committee offer, anybody can then go back to my model available here on-line for review. Walk through each table of the model to see how the confirmed data form the basis for the analysis in it.

For a sensitivity analysis, though, don't stop there: Vary the step increase numbers and copays for the 3 years using less favorable numbers that we have been told were discussed - for example, try 2%, 1.75%, and 1.75% with a 20% copay in all 3 years, which was publicly disclosed in the media as the School Committee's original offer - and show how even that does not yield a "pay cut."

For anyone willing to make this effort, I can state with certainty that they will be pleased to confirm the validity of the Anchor Rising analysis and reporting.

So we return to the issue at hand:

The NEA has made and continues to make its "pay cut" claim central to its PUBLIC relations campaign in East Greenwich during the current contract negotiations time period. Their "pay cut" claim has been shown to be false here on Anchor Rising, using verifiable data from public sources - not just unverifiable words like the NEA prefers to use. Anchor Rising has invited the NEA to back up their public claim with facts, even to post it on this blog site. They refuse. If the NEA really had the data which discredited an outspoken public critic, why would they hold back sharing it publicly? What could the NEA be afraid of? Could it be that maybe - just maybe - their "pay cut" claim is false and they know it?

The ball is in the NEA's court.

Or, to have a little fun with this from a musical perspective, the NEA is at a crossroads.

Wary of the News from Russia

I hate to say it, but I'll be looking for Garry Kasparov to have a horrible chess accident during the next few months:

The former world chess champion Garry Kasparov entered Russia's presidential race on Sunday, elected overwhelmingly as the candidate for the country's beleagured opposition coalition.

Kasparov has been a driving force behind the coalition, which has united liberals, leftists and nationalists in opposition to President Vladimir Putin. He received 379 of 498 votes at a national congress held in Moscow by the Other Russia coalition, coalition spokeswoman Lyudmila Mamina told The Associated Press.

They Were the Best of Times, They Were the Worst of Times

I thought of A. Douglas, from Providence, today:

This past summer has been the bloodiest summer of the war for U.S. soldiers; Iraqi deaths from sectarian violence have doubled this year; and there is no political progress in Iraq. This is not a policy that deserves more time.

It is way beyond the time to redeploy our troops, time's up for this illegal invasion, and let Iraqis take hold of their own government, without outside interference.

When I read this:

US military losses in Iraq for September stood at 70 on Sunday, the lowest monthly figure since July last year, according to an AFP tally based on Pentagon figures.

The figure also marks the fourth consecutive drop in the monthly death toll following a high of 121 in May. June saw 93 deaths, July 82 and August 79. The monthly toll in July 2006 was 53.

Yeah. We're definitely doing something wrong. Let's pull the troops out so the real bloodbath can begin.

Like Sympathizer, Like Oppressor

Ed Kinane must be so proud:

Iran's parliament voted Saturday to designate the CIA and the U.S. Army as "terrorist organizations," a largely symbolic response to a U.S. Senate resolution seeking a similar designation for Iran's Revolutionary Guards.

The parliament said the Army and the CIA were terrorists because of the atomic bombing of Japan; the use of depleted uranium munitions in the Balkans, Afghanistan and Iraq; support of the killings of Palestinians by Israel; the bombing and killing Iraqi civilians and the torture of imprisoned terror suspects.

"The aggressor U.S. Army and the Central Intelligence Agency are terrorists and also nurture terror," said a statement by the 215 lawmakers who signed the resolution at an open session of the 290-member Iranian parliament. The session was broadcast live on state-run radio.

I note, also, that AP writer Ali Akbar Dareini appears to have gotten the same talking points memo from the powers that be in Iran from which Kinane derived his op-ed:

Iran and the U.S. have not had diplomatic ties since Iranian students took American diplomats hostage in Tehran following the 1979 overthrow of U.S.-backed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

Iranians have a long list of grievances against the United States, including a CIA-backed coup in 1953 that overthrew democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh and put Pahlavi back on the throne.

From limited research, my understanding of the history is that Pahlavi appointed Mossadegh based on a fit of popular nationalism. Mossadegh proceeded to expand his power and undermine mechanisms for ousting him. But, you know, "democratically elected" is yet another relativist phrase in the hands of the progressive press and their friends in the Middle East.

Speaker Murphy Supports Loughlin's State Pension Reform

In a press release, Republican State Rep. John Loughlin II touts House Speaker William Murphy's support for Loughlin's pension reform plan:

State Representative John J. Loughlin II ( R ) Tiverton, Portsmouth, Little Compton today applauded an announcement made Sunday on WJAR’s 10 News Conference that House Speaker William J. Murphy (D) West Warwick supports his idea to eliminate defined benefit pensions for newly hired state workers. Loughlin introduced House Bill 5447 {PDF}, February 27, 2007, an act that would require newly hired employees to belong to a 414(k) retirement plan, (the government’s version of the 401K plan) and not to the current retirement system under chapters 8-10 of title 36.

Loughlin says he introduced the bill because of the unsustainable current retirement system. He contends that only through moving to a defined contribution plan and away from a defined benefit plan would workers have more control over their retirement while providing taxpayers relief from ever-escalating pension costs.

“I am extremely pleased that Speaker Murphy has listened to the arguments made by me and the Republican co-sponsors of this bill and recognizes the need to be fair to current state employees and build a system for all newly hired state employees that is beneficial to them and fair to Rhode Island’s taxpayers,” Loughlin said.

As to whether he felt the Speaker had co-opted his initiative, Loughlin said, “I once had a Battalion Commander in the Army who told me ‘it’s amazing what you can accomplish if you don’t care who takes credit for it.’ I look forward to working with the Speaker to move my measure into law, regardless of who’s name appears on the bill.”

“With all the news about Republican’s becoming Democrats and Independents, its very gratifying to see one of our state’s most prominent Democrats becoming a Republican, at least in his approach to affordable government,” Loughlin said.

Not sure if I'd go that far! And I'd add that real "initiative" would've been exhibited if it was passed the first time around and wasn't still languishing in the House Finance Committee. Nonetheless, it is still promising.

Then again, like so many other good ideas proposed up there on the Hill, I'll believe it when I see it.

We Now Return to Our Regularly Scheduled Anti-Americanism

The phrase "useful idiot" comes to mind, and as disinclined as I am to further its reach, an op-ed by Ed Kinane in today's Providence Journal — "The U.S., not Iran, is the terrorist nation" — is simply too stunning (if predictable) not to note:

This drumbeat of war displays a grotesque double standard. Who is really on any axis of evil? Who is really a terrorist state, a nuclear threat?

Well, certainly not that democracy-loving victim of Western aggression, Iran! "In the last two centuries," Kinane asks, "has Iran — or Persia as it used to be called — invaded any other nation?" Nukes? Please. The Iranians would never use them. "It's the United States that occasionally threatens to use the nuke and that keeps alive its first-strike option."

Truly, the likes of Kinane have paid no attention to the changing methods of war, when it comes to actual terrorist states. Moreover, he seems to have had no ear for evidence that disagrees with the worldview that he, in his commitment "to nonviolence and social justice," would like to believe. Such folks have been out there all along, but one senses that they're veritably titillated that the bad old times in which they thrived may be making a comeback.

NEA "Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 8

Still nothing from the NEA so the "pay cut" analysis hostage day count continues. Day 8 is now history.

We eagerly await a response! The offer to post it here on Anchor Rising remains open.

Here is our blog post describing how there is NO "pay cut." It even includes spreadsheets with documentation of data sources and assumptions for public scrutiny!

Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim about East Greenwich teachers taking a "pay cut" is false. It is crossroads time for the NEA.

Until we see a quantitative financial analysis response from the NEA, we will continue with daily blog posts noting that their "pay cut" analysis is being held hostage at NEARI against the wishes of East Greenwich taxpaying residents.

See more thoughts in the Extended Entry below.

FURTHER CLARIFYING ISSUES IN THE "PAY CUT" DEBATE:

In response to questions about the model presented on Anchor Rising, I would offer these points for your consideration:

Some analyses are built on assumptions about assumptions and are, therefore, subject to analytical manipulation. We all would do well to be skeptical of such financial models.

However, this analysis debunking the "pay cut" claim is most certainly not that kind of model. Which means that anybody could independently confirm every primary assumption used in my analysis. And the analysis itself could be done by any student who successfully passed Finance 101.

Specifically:

• I copied 10 historical salary numbers for 2006-07 from 1 salary table in the recently expired and publicly-available contract.

• I copied 2 historical co-pay percentages for 2006-07 off that same contract.

• I asked the East Greenwich School Department for publicly-available information on the actual 2006-07 and 2007-08 costs of family and single person health insurance premiums for teachers, a total of 4 additional historical numbers.

• At my request, the School Department provided me with its assumed annual growth rate for health insurance premiums during the next two years, another 2 numbers.

• I took the latest School Committee 3-year offer for salary step increases (3 numbers, 1 for each year) and co-pay percentages (3 more numbers, 1 for each year), as quoted previously in a public newspaper, and used them after confirming they were accurate.

Those are the ONLY essential pieces of information needed to do the analysis and derive the NO "pay cuts" conclusion I did.

24 confirmable data points, 16 of which are documented historical data, all of which came from just 3 public sources. It doesn't come any more easily verifiable than that!

Instead of responding with cogent arguments, all the opposition does is engage in name-calling. Meanwhile, as many of the blog comments show, the public is noticing their evasiveness and keeps asking for a meaningful counter-argument from the NEA. In other words, the public is asking the NEA and its supporters to stop with their dismissive tone toward East Greenwich residents where they declare the Anchor Rising analysis wrong without any analytical support and without showing in a substantive way why they disagree. Meanwhile, they continue to propagate their false claim that the teachers are being asked to take a "pay cut."

This is not rocket science and here is what the opposition could do if they were genuinely interested in engaging in a meaningful public debate: Confirm the 16 publicly available historical data points and the 2 projected health insurance cost increase numbers central to my publicly available analysis. The good news is that nobody has to file any legal paperwork to get the information I used in the model because it is all publicly available to concerned citizens. An earnest call/meeting or two - like I did - is all that is required.

Plus, once those 18 data are in hand (and I assure you they will be identical to mine) and using the latest publicly-disclosed School Committee offer, anybody can then go back to my model available here on-line for review. Walk through each table of the model to see how the confirmed data form the basis for the analysis in it.

For a sensitivity analysis, though, don't stop there: Vary the step increase numbers and copays for the 3 years using less favorable numbers that we have been told were discussed - for example, try 2%, 1.75%, and 1.75% with a 20% copay in all 3 years, which was publicly disclosed in the media as the School Committee's original offer - and show how even that does not yield a "pay cut."

For anyone willing to make this effort, I can state with certainty that they will be pleased to confirm the validity of the Anchor Rising analysis and reporting.

So we return to the issue at hand:

The NEA has made and continues to make its "pay cut" claim central to its PUBLIC relations campaign in East Greenwich during the current contract negotiations time period. Their "pay cut" claim has been shown to be false here on Anchor Rising, using verifiable data from public sources - not just unverifiable words like the NEA prefers to use. Anchor Rising has invited the NEA to back up their public claim with facts, even to post it on this blog site. They refuse. If the NEA really had the data which discredited an outspoken public critic, why would they hold back sharing it publicly? What could the NEA be afraid of? Could it be that maybe - just maybe - their "pay cut" claim is false and they know it?

The ball is in the NEA's court.

Or, to have a little fun with this from a musical perspective, the NEA is at a crossroads.

Gingrich Not Running

From the Associated Press, via Drudge...

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich will not run for president in 2008 after determining he could not legally explore a bid and remain as head of his tax-exempt political organization, a spokesman said Saturday.

"Newt is not running," spokesman Rick Tyler said. "It is legally impermissible for him to continue on as chairman of American Solutions (for Winning the Future) and to explore a campaign for president."

Re: Information or Poor Bargaining Practice?

Westerly Sun reporter Chris Keegan has answered, via email, my question about the complaint that the NEA's Peter Gingras filed with the State Labor Relations Board against Bill Felkner. Apparently, Gringas specifically mentioned Felkner's blog during a phone conversation with Keegan.

In other words — although I don't know whether any penalties exist for doing so — Mr. Gringas appears to have filed an utterly frivolous complaint. If you can't force them out, I guess, shut them up. The problem is that such strategies don't work so well in the Internet Age.

Re: Forbidden Opus

Last month, Carroll Andrew Morse noted the controversial Opus cartoon, which the Providence Journal ran but many newspapers, including the Washington Post, did not.

In today's classic Bloom County cartoon on Yahoo News, Berke Breathed seems to have presaged the incident sparked by his own cartoon.

Toward a Unified Movement

Although it's wise to hesitate before giving too much weight to one exchange and one piece of writing, I'm very encouraged that my general approach to movement politics appears to have resonated with Randy Jackvony (pixellation victim):

I asked another blogger, Justin Katz of www.anchorrising.com, what he thought about political discourse over the Internet. His comments — much like his blog posts — were enlightening and made me think of the whole situation in a different way. "Since it is so open and free, there's certainly an element of coarseness. One of the advantages that I find blogs to have is that they are somewhat immediate ... people don't spend days on end composing comments, but they are written and chronological, so readers can more easily observe how arguments are constructed."

But if cyber political commentary is rough (as with nappylies.com), is the message more or less effective? "If a generally mild and considered commenter reacts acerbically to something in particular, the biting nature of the response has some power," Katz wrote in an e-mail. He added, when politeness "subdues a just anger, it distorts the reality for those who derive their understanding of the situation from the public debate ... as long as a group makes a conscious effort to be honest and willing to address counterarguments, a bit of acerbity is justified."

After corresponding with Katz, I began to look at nappylies.com in a different light. While many Internet comments are posted under the protection of anonymity (which can be used as a shield by cowards unwilling or unable to defend their arguments), I’m sure the Cranston GOP would be willing to discuss these issues as much as possible.

So if they don’t overuse this tactic, the Cranston GOP may have a good tool in nappylies.com for getting its message out.

NEA "Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 7

Still nothing from the NEA so the "pay cut" analysis hostage day count continues. Day 7 is now history.

We eagerly await a response! The offer to post it here on Anchor Rising remains open.

Here is our blog post describing how there is NO "pay cut." It even includes spreadsheets with documentation of data sources and assumptions for public scrutiny!

Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim about East Greenwich teachers taking a "pay cut" is false. It is crossroads time for the NEA.

Until we see a quantitative financial analysis response from the NEA, we will continue with daily blog posts noting that their "pay cut" analysis is being held hostage at NEARI against the wishes of East Greenwich taxpaying residents.

FURTHER CLARIFYING ISSUES IN THE "PAY CUT" DEBATE:

In response to a comment in an earlier post, I offer these further thoughts:

Ken conveniently ignores that it was the NEA who first turned this claim about "pay cuts" into a PUBLIC debate. They did it in the context of trying to influence public opinion during a labor contract negotiation.

They made it public when some of their member teachers made and continue to make PUBLIC claims about "pay cuts" to East Greenwich residents via strike signs, comments to parents at open houses, letters to the editor, etc.

They started a PUBLIC debate but now that they have been called on it in an equally public way - and been asked to justify their public claim - they have gone into hiding. How convenient.

So perhaps Ken can explain why he is comfortable letting the NEA off the hook after THEY started the PUBLIC debate.

It is also a fantasy to claim that the same labor negotiation process which allowed them to make PUBLIC claims to town residents in the first place suddenly restricts them from responding publicly to justify their position. Perhaps Ken can justify why NEA members can still write letters to the editor as recently as last week reiterating their "pay cut" claim but he thinks labor negotiations restrict them from providing analytical proof to support the ongoing PUBLIC claim they continue to make right now in public forums like newspaper opinion pages or in quotes for interviews found in newspaper articles.

And isn't it interesting that some people are so eager to question the legitimacy of an activist concerned citizen digging into issues by researching and gathering together publicly-available information? Isn't that exactly what America is about? Isn't that what self-government is about?

I am further struck by how negative responses like Ken's love to use phrases like "made up figures" and "slanted facts." Instead he will only find satisfaction in words from politicians and government bureaucrats - as long as it is delivered on their letterheads!

But nobody, including Ken, can offer any specific fact-based comments which identify what exactly is made up or slanted in my analysis:

• Is it when I copied 10 historical salary numbers for 2006-07 from 1 salary table in the recently expired and publicly-available contract?

• Or copied 2 historical co-pay percentages for 2006-07 off that same contract?

• Or asked the School Department for publicly-available information on the actual 2006-07 and 2007-08 costs of family and single person health insurance premiums for teachers, a total of 4 additional historical numbers?

• Or used the School Department's assumed annual growth rate for health insurance premiums during the next two years, another 2 numbers?

• Or took the latest School Committee 3-year offer for salary step increases (3 numbers, 1 for each year) and co-pay percentages (3 more numbers, 1 for each year), as quoted previously in a public newspaper, and used them after confirming they were accurate?

Bluntly, those are the ONLY essential pieces of information needed to do the analysis and derive the NO "pay cuts" conclusion I did. 24 confirmable data points, 16 of which are documented historical data, all of which came from just 3 sources. It doesn't come any more easily verifiable than that! This is not rocket science.

In other words, some analyses are built on assumptions about assumptions and are, therefore, subject to analytical manipulation.

This analysis debunking the "pay cut" claim is most certainly not that kind of analysis. Which means that anybody could independently confirm every primary assumption used in my analysis. And the analysis could be done by any student who successfully passed Finance 101.

Instead, all the opposition can do is engage in name-calling.

And yes, Ken, I did make it through 5th grade! Even made it through Finance 101 at business school!

So we return to the issue at hand: The NEA has made and continues to make its "pay cut" claim central to its PUBLIC relations campaign in East Greenwich during the current contract negotiations time period. Their "pay cut" claim has been shown to be false here on Anchor Rising, using verifiable data from public sources - not just unverifiable words like the NEA prefers to use. Anchor Rising has invited the NEA to back up their public claim with facts, even to post it on this blog site. They refuse. Yet the NEA is known nationwide for its ability to play hardball politics well. So if the NEA really had the data which discredited an outspoken public critic, why would they hold back sharing it publicly? What could the NEA be afraid of? Could it be that maybe - just maybe - their "pay cut" claim is false and they know it?

The ball is in the NEA's court.

Or, to have a little fun with this from a musical perspective, the NEA is at a crossroads.

There's Only 1 Party of the Rich?

The Anchoress makes a keen observation:

Chelsea Clinton works for Avenue Capital and makes an estimated 6 figure salary. Not bad for a woman in her mid-twenties and I certainly don’t begrudge her; Chelsea seems to be a private and perfectly nice person, and if either of my kids could make that kind of sugar not long after college, I’d say “buy Mama a condo near the water when she is old” and be happy for them.

But one cannot help noting that all we ever hear about President Bush is that he is “rich,” from “old money” and he represents “greedy capitalism” etc, etc…yet, his daughter Jenna is a public elementary school teacher in Washington DC, by no means a glamour gig. The Dems talk about how they’re all about taking on the big greedy capitalists and terrible corporations that hurt the middle class and the environment, yadda, yadda, yet the Clintons friends are all incredibly wealthy - mostly “new” money - they’re all very “Corporate” and their daughter works in the “corporate” world. Seems like there are stereotype templates at work here (GOP evil, greedy, uncaring, rich - Democrats Middle Class, compassionate, unmaterialistic, good) that don’t quite jibe with the reality, no?

Reality: they're all rich. We need someone with a thinner wallet (you know, just an "average" millionaire), so let's hope that the streak doesn't continue.

Firefighters' Picket Line Cancelled; Homeland Security Drill to Proceed

Projo 7-to-7 is reporting that the Providence firefighters' union has cancelled the job action that had been threatening to impede Sunday's Homeland Security disaster drill. Formal announcement to come from union president Paul Doughty at 3:00.

Was the General Assembly Controlling the Narragansetts' Casino Choice All Along?

According to the Warwick Beacon's Russell J. Moore, the Rhode Island legislature is planning to revisit the gambling issue in the 2008 legislative session. The decision is unsurprising, in light of the State of Massachusetts' apparent plans to allow casinos to be built there...

Larry Berman, a spokesperson for Rhode Island House Speaker William Murphy, said the House is poised to take up the gambling issue when the General Assembly reconvenes in January.

“Come January, when the legislature comes back into session, Speaker Murphy would like to do everything we can to protect Rhode Island’s gambling revenues,” said Berman.

“He wants to have Rhode Island in a position where, if Massachusetts were to bring out three casinos, we’ll be able to respond to that.”

With respect to Massachusetts’ plan, and its emphasis on inviting gambling companies to bid for the licenses, Berman said the legislature sent out feelers before going forward with the Harrah’s/Narragansett Indian casino deal, and Harrah’s was the only bidder interested. It wasn’t until late in the process that casino mogul Donald Trump came forward with a plan that lacked details, and would have held up the process, Berman said.

What is at least a tad surprising is Mr. Berman's description of the casino process that ended last year with the rejection of a constitutional amedment that would have permitted the establishment of a single destination casino in West Warwick. The language of the amendment led people to believe that it was the Narragansett Indians who would be choosing the casino operator for Rhode Island...

Notwithstanding sections 15 and 22 of this Article, and provided that a majority of the electors of the Town of West Warwick have voted to approve this amendment, the establishment of a resort casino and games located therein is authorized in the Town of West Warwick. The resort casino shall be privately owned and privately operated by a business entity established pursuant to Rhode Island law by the Narragansett Indian Tribe and its chosen partner, which entity shall be: (i) legally distinct and separate from the Narragansett Indian Tribe, (ii) subject to the laws of the state of Rhode Island, including regulation and taxation, and (iii) required in its organizing documents to expressly waive any sovereign immunity relating to any and all matters of the resort casino, including compliance with and enforcement of the laws of the state of Rhode Island, and the regulation and taxation thereof. The per annum tax rate shall be established by the general assembly with all of such tax proceeds to be dedicated to property-tax relief, as prescribed by statute

According to Mr. Berman, however, the legislature was directly dealing with multiple casino operators, early on the process. What good were those "feelers" that the legislature -- not the Narragansett Indian tribe, according to Mr. Berman -- was putting out, if the legislature lacked the power to influence or even control the Narragansetts' choice?

Bob Kerr on the Providence Firefighters' Union and the Statewide Disaster Drill

When you manage to get David Cicilline and Don Carcieri and Bob Kerr and Gio Cicione all aligned against an action you're taking, it's time to consider that you might be doing the wrong thing. Bob Kerr says it best in today's Projo, talking about the Providence Firefighters' Union plan to use a picket line to impede Saturday's statewide disaster drill...

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — you can earn a year’s pay in one horrible night.

But don’t do this. Don’t put a lasting stain on a fine tradition. Don’t let this showdown with the city lead you to do something that insults the very thing you’re supposed to stand for.

If you do this, if you use the picket line to screw up a statewide terrorism drill, you lose. You lose credibility and respect and professional standing. You come across as petty and arrogant, even childish. You are having a snit, and your snit is dangerous....

This one is going to stick to the firefighters union for a long time. It will be cited as an example of a union that lost its way and let long-standing grievances lead to a dumb and dangerous slap at the city union members are supposed to protect. It is a gift to anyone who sits on the other side of the bargaining table.

It is also an insult to hundreds of people who are very good at what they do.

From now on, perhaps, union meetings can open with a prayer, a prayer that a real attack similar to the one acted out on Sunday never happens.

And while heads are bowed, perhaps an added heavenly plea would be in order — that no one dies for lack of proper preparation.

The Hostage's Objection

In a letter to the Sakonnet Times, Class of '09 Tiverton High School student Lexy Halpen expresses her frustration with the ongoing contract negotiations of those responsible for her education:

... Not only is it ridiculous that the school committee won't fix this problem, but myself and my classmates are losing out on everything until they stop arguing. There won't be a homecoming dance, any proms for the juniors and seniors, no after school activities that aren't graded, nothing. ...

The thing that bothers me the most is that they're canceling math team, National Honor Society, and mock trial in the new contracts. Once again, why should the students suffer by losing these things when they try hard enough to win them? Mock trial is my road to college. Without mock trial, I don't get any scholarships or accepted to colleges I need to go to. Without mock trial, I can kiss college goodbye...

This contract had better be fixed. This whole situation needs to be looked at from the students' point of view. Let us have a say. The least they could do is allow students in to represent themselves.

Perhaps I'm missing something, but inasmuch as none of the activities for which Ms. Halpen argues are explicitly included in the union's previous contract (PDF), it would seem more likely that the loss of her groups isn't part of the new contract (which, after all, hasn't been settled on, much less implemented, yet), but a casualty of the current work to rule strategy. In other words, she ought to direct her ire at the teachers and their "maneuverings", even those whom she believes are "trying their hardest to get [their activities] back":

As one move to put pressure on the school committee, the teachers last Thursday voted to begin what is called "contract compliance," which Patrick Crowley, assistant executive Director of NEA Rhode Island, said "means that teachers will only perform duties officially called for in the current union contract."

Amy Mullen, president of Tiverton's union local and its lead negotiator said "contract compliance" as a practical matter meant that teachers would not be volunteering for activities.

For example, she said, guidance counselors will not be volunteering for the college fair in October. Teachers will not be volunteering for the school improvement meetings in the evenings, or paying for school supplies for students out of their own pockets, or volunteering for field trips (except for those already scheduled and paid for by students).

Mike Burk, co-chairman of the school committee said the "contract compliance" actions by students are beginning to hurt students, for instance he's hearing that seniors aren't getting college letters of recommendation written by teachers.

Mr. Burk said that not everything a teacher does as a professional can be written into the contract. The teachers counter by saying that if a time-consuming task isn't specifically written into the contract, and they aren't compensated for doing it, they should not be required to do it.

As "an active student at THS," Lexy is many times over being made a pawn by a unionized workforce that — despite allowing the percentage of students with math proficiency, as measured by state standardized tests, to drop 8.7% — "continue[s] with their demand for a salary increase of 3.75 percent in each of the next years." That's 25% more than the annual raises (compounded by step increases) in the previous contract.

I only caught the tail end of A Lively Experiment yesterday evening, but during a closing discussion on improving the state's circumstances NEARI's Bob Walsh asserted that organized labor unions "aren't going anywhere." Judging from the statewide test results, I'd say that much is obvious (albeit taken differently than intended). Be that as it may, it's unconscionable that teachers would seek to leverage students' anxieties that they won't be going anywhere unless the townspeople cough up the demanded ransom.

Higher Education, Lower Behavior, and Bad Advice

So you've traveled with your daughter on the journey that has led her to freshman year at the University of Rhode Island, and within a couple of weeks of looking to the student paper, The Good 5¢ Cigar, to understand the community of which she is now a part — perhaps to glean some tips on how to behave, now that she's away from Mom and Dad — she comes across an advice column by "Misty Pink" titled "Sex and the Cigar: Boring sex requires a visit to your local porn shop," offering the following nugget of wisdom to a girl who complains that her "sex life is normally more exciting than it is now," with her boyfriend of one month, and wonders how to respond to his suggestion that they "go visit a sex shop":

Well first of all, your oh-so-wise resident sexpert here commends you on being open to even going to a sex shop with your boyfriend at all. My guess is that he probably senses you are disappointed with your dwindling sex life and doesn't want to come out and say it. Poor guy is probably embarrassed. So, his roundabout way of making things a bit more exciting was to suggest a visit to a sex shop, which is, in fact, a great idea if you want to spice things up a bit in the bedroom.

I'm not saying you have to go all out with whips, chains and strap-ons, but try some flavored whipped cream, some edible panties, or maybe even some sexy lingerie. That's sure to put the heat back in your relationship. For the faint of heart, there's always penis pasta.

"Life," Ms. Pink explains, is "too short for bad sex." It's certainly too short for non-flavored whipped cream.

Now, I know that this anonymous giver of sex advice has achieved the height of daring, with her writing. I also know that I'm a stodgy old thirty-something in the notoriously prudish field of construction. But I'm still not sure why it is that higher education must be accompanied by low behavior. Perhaps some adult supervision would help students to develop more richly formed lives. It might (and only might) result in better advice about a wide range of topics, including sex, that is not objectifying, dehumanizing, and more likely than not to lead students away from actual fully satisfying relationships.

Yeah, yeah, I know. College is all about exploration, self definition. It's still disappointing, though, to come across reminders that it's often less about growth than about playacting maturity.

NEA "Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 6

Still nothing from the NEA so the "pay cut" analysis hostage day count continues. Day 6 is now history.

We eagerly await a response! The offer to post it here on Anchor Rising remains open.

Here is our blog post describing how there is NO "pay cut." It even includes spreadsheets with documentation of data sources and assumptions for public scrutiny!

Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim about East Greenwich teachers taking a "pay cut" is false. It is crossroads time for the NEA.

Until we see a quantitative financial analysis response from the NEA, we will continue with daily blog posts noting that their "pay cut" analysis is being held hostage at NEARI against the wishes of East Greenwich taxpaying residents.

FURTHER CLARIFYING ISSUES IN THE "PAY CUT" DEBATE:

Ken offers some rathering "interesting" words in the Comments section, to which I offer this reply:

Ken conveniently ignores that it was the NEA who first turned this claim about "pay cuts" into a PUBLIC debate. They did it in the context of trying to influence public opinion during a labor contract negotiation.

They made it public when some of their member teachers made and continue to make PUBLIC claims about "pay cuts" to East Greenwich residents via strike signs, comments to parents at open houses, letters to the editors, etc.

They started a PUBLIC debate but now that they have been called on it in an equally public way - and been asked to justify their public claim - they have gone into hiding. How convenient.

So perhaps Ken can explain why he is comfortable letting the NEA off the hook after THEY started the PUBLIC debate.

It is also a fantasy to claim that the same labor negotiation process which allowed them to make PUBLIC claims to town residents in the first place suddenly restricts them from responding publicly to justify their position. Perhaps Ken can justify why NEA members can still write letters to the editor as recently as last week reiterating their "pay cut" claim but he thinks labor negotiations restrict them from providing analytical proof to support the ongoing PUBLIC claim they continue to make right now in public forums like newspaper opinion pages or in quotes for interviews found in newspaper articles.

And isn't it interesting that some people are so eager to question the legitimacy of an activist concerned citizen digging into issues by researching and gathering together publicly-available information? Isn't that exactly what America is about? Isn't that what self-government is about?

I am further struck by how negative responses like Ken's love to use phrases like "made up figures" and "slanted facts." Instead he will only find satisfaction in words from politicians and government bureaucrats - as long as it is delivered on their letterheads!

But nobody, including Ken, can offer any specific fact-based comments which identify what exactly is made up or slanted in my analysis:

• Is it when I copied 10 historical salary numbers for 2006-07 from 1 salary table in the recently expired and publicly-available contract?

• Or copied 2 historical co-pay percentages for 2006-07 off that same contract?

• Or asked the School Department for publicly-available information on the actual 2006-07 and 2007-08 costs of family and single person health insurance premiums for teachers, a total of 4 additional historical numbers?

• Or used the School Department's assumed annual growth rate for health insurance premiums during the next two years, another 2 numbers?

• Or took the latest School Committee 3-year offer for salary step increases (3 numbers, 1 for each year) and co-pay percentages (3 more numbers, 1 for each year), as quoted previously in a public newspaper, and used them after confirming they were accurate?

Bluntly, those are the ONLY essential pieces of information needed to do the analysis and derive the NO "pay cuts" conclusion I did. 24 confirmable data points, 16 of which are documented historical data, all of which came from just 3 sources. It doesn't come any more easily verifiable than that! This is not rocket science.

In other words, some analyses are built on assumptions about assumptions and are, therefore, subject to analytical manipulation.

This analysis debunking the "pay cut" claim is most certainly not that kind of analysis. Which means that anybody could independently confirm every primary assumption used in my analysis. And the analysis could be done by any student who successfully passed Finance 101.

Instead, all the opposition can do is engage in name-calling.

And yes, Ken, I did make it through 5th grade! Even made it through Finance 101 at business school!

So we return to the issue at hand: The NEA has made and continues to make its "pay cut" claim central to its PUBLIC relations campaign in East Greenwich during the current contract negotiations time period. Their "pay cut" claim has been shown to be false here on Anchor Rising, using verifiable data from public sources - not just unverifiable words like the NEA prefers to use. Anchor Rising has invited the NEA to back up their public claim with facts, even to post it on this blog site. They refuse. Yet the NEA is known nationwide for its ability to play hardball politics well. So if the NEA really had the data which discredited an outspoken public critic, why would they hold back sharing it publicly? What could the NEA be afraid of? Could it be that maybe - just maybe - their "pay cut" claim is false and they know it?

The ball is in the NEA's court.

Or, to have a little fun with this from a musical perspective, the NEA is at a crossroads.

Re: Information or Poor Bargaining Practice?

Having investigated the laws cited in the complaint against Bill Felkner, I'm reasonably confident that I'm either missing something or somebody else is misstating something. In his Westerly Sun article (subscription required), Chris Keegan wrote the following (emphasis added):

In a letter to the Rhode Island State Labor Relations Board filed on Thursday, Peter Gingras accused Felkner of circumventing negotiations between the committee and NEA Chariho Educational Support Professionals — the union representing 166 support staffers employed by the tri-town school district. Gingras' two-page complaint centers on Felkner's public communications through his Internet blog — the Chariho School Parent’s Forum (cspf.wordpress.com) — and names the Chariho Regional School District as a party to the labor grievance.

However, the the textual explanation of the complaint doesn't refer to the blog:

On or about September 14, 2007, and on dates thereafter, an agent of the Chariho Regional School District has purposely attempted to communicate directly with bargaining unit members represented by the union.

The purpose of these communications was to discourage union membership and is tantamount to a refusal to bargain with the certified representative of the union.

If the blog is the "communication," then it's a bit of a stretch to call it "direct." Indeed, the first two subsections of the unfair labor practices law cited by the complaint are plainly inapplicable to blogs, and the third — a legal catch-all — is still (again) a stretch:

(5) Encourage membership in any company union or discourage membership in any labor organization, by discrimination in regard to hire or tenure or in any term or condition of employment; provided that nothing in this chapter precludes an employer from making an agreement with a labor organization requiring membership in that labor organization as a condition of employment, if that labor organization is the representative of employees as provided in §§ 28-7-14 – 28-7-19.

(6) Refuse to bargain collectively with the representatives of employees, subject to the provisions of §§ 28-7-14 – 28-7-19, except that the refusal to bargain collectively with any representative is not, unless a certification with respect to the representative is in effect under §§ 28-7-14 – 28-7-19, an unfair labor practice in any case where any other representative, other than a company union, has made a claim that it represents a majority of the employees in a conflicting bargaining unit. ...

(10) Do any acts, other than those already enumerated in this section, which interfere with, restrain or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed by § 28-7-12.

The only way in which Felkner's blog violated 28-7-12 is if there was "coercion," and a quick perusal of the blog posts around the time of the complaint didn't reveal anything that could reasonably be interpreted thus. (Unless the behavior and demands of teachers' unions is so egregious that merely pointing them out could be seen as an effort to persuade upright teachers to cancel their membership.)

I've sent Keegan an email asking what led him to call the blog central to the complaint, but for the time being, I'm not sure there hasn't been a misunderstanding somewhere along the line.

ADDENDUM:

Mr. Keegan has confirmed that the reference to Felkner's blog came from Peter Gringas, during a telephone interview.

Leslie Carbone: Schools versus the NEA-borhood Bully

Leslie Carbone, an adjunct scholar at the Lexington Institute, writes these words in a ProJo editorial entitled Schools versus the NEA-borhood bully:

With the new school year under way, students, parents and teachers hoping for quality education face an ironic opponent: the National Education Association, America’s premier teachers union. When it comes to opposing common-sense education reforms, the 3.2 million-member NEA is the biggest, baddest bully in the playground. Sadly, students who want to learn and teachers who want to teach suffer most from the union’s misplaced policies and politics.

When parents and kids shop together for school clothes, supplies and extra-curricular needs, they enjoy a bevy of choices in stores and manufacturers. That means that they can shop around for the right products at the best prices. Makers of shoddy goods and retailers with lousy service will be forced to improve or lose business to better product providers. That’s how competition keeps quality and prices in line with customers’ needs and expectations.

But kids who go off to school with good, inexpensive clothes and supplies may receive education that’s just the opposite — overpriced and underperforming. That’s because the National Education Association fights every effort to let that same accountability and competition improve the product its teachers work hard to provide — the education of public-school children.

The NEA’s politicized leadership is fond of claiming that its efforts are in the best interests of students, but this is far from the case. Nowhere is this more clear than in its relentless mission to sabotage the accountability for results in the No Child Left Behind Act. While many groups have advocated ways to improve or change the law, NEA leadership has systematically worked to torpedo its reliance on academic standards and testing. Instead it proposes a meaningless jumble of apples-to-oranges comparisons and “portfolio assessments” that would make it nearly impossible to evaluate the progress a school or its teachers are making in teaching our children.

The NEA’s leadership also stands in firm opposition to any plan to shift its teachers to performance-based pay determined by the achievement of their students. Blocking efforts to compensate good teachers more than bad ones, the union insists on determining pay raises strictly by seniority. It rejects paying teachers based on their area of expertise — thereby maintaining America’s shortage of good math and science teachers. And it stops retirees or others who want to contribute expertise from volunteering as teachers.

The NEA consistently opposes giving parents and students freedom of choice among public schools — so kids in districts with poorly performing schools can’t seek better education in nearby neighborhoods.

On the other hand, the union protects teachers who clearly threaten students’ best chances for a quality education. The tenure system makes it difficult to fire bad teachers; it can cost taxpayers nearly $200,000 to discharge a poorly performing educator.

The NEA shows no reservations about taking teachers’ union dues and spending them to spread a radical political agenda. Annual NEA dues can reach as high as $500. A little of it goes toward core union activities, like collective bargaining for contracts that keep members from having to attend after-school meetings or teach another’s class in an emergency. Some goes toward the hefty paychecks of NEA staffers, thousands of whom rake in six-figure annual salaries, far more than the teachers who pay them.

And a lot — as much as half by some estimates — goes toward politicking. The NEA doesn’t restrict itself to lobbying on issues that directly affect education, such as the No Child Left Behind Act. It doesn’t even restrict itself to weighing in on issues that indirectly affect education, such as tax reform, which it sees as a threat to its own cash flow. The union lobbies on a host of unrelated issues, such as statehood for the District of Columbia, even though many of its members don’t want it to.

Fortunately, teachers do have some recourse. In right-to-work states, they don’t have to pay union dues at all. And in others, while they can be required to pay dues for core union activities, they cannot be forced to pay for politicking, public relations, or other non-essential union activities.

The NEA has done a solid job of stacking the deck against students, parents, and teachers who want good schools. But that can change, if everyone interested in quality education stands up — and stops turning money over — to the NEAborhood bully.

Many of Carbone's points about the NEA are not news to Anchor Rising readers as they were discussed in an earlier post here.

Information or Poor Bargaining Practice?

The local affiliate of NEARI has filed a complaint against Chariho Regional School Committee member William Felkner with the state Labor Relations Board for "purposely attempted to communicate directly with bargaining unit members represented by the union” by posting information on a blog.

Mr. Felkner further describes the complaint:

NEA negotiator Pete Gingas filed a complaint with the Labor Relations Board last week. His claim is that I have “purposely attempted to communicate directly with” union members and that I am attempting to “discourage union membership” and these actions are “tantamount to a refusal to bargain with the certified representative of the union.”

So - information is antithetical to union membership?

William Felkner and NEARI Executive Director Robert Walsh will appear on tonight's Lively Experiment.

Smithfield: Democracy Denied by Thirty Six Minutes

In a special election set for November 13, Smithfield voters will have the opportunity to answer the question:

"Should Stephen G. Tocco be recalled and removed from the office of Town Councilman for the Town of Smithfield under the Recall Provision as set forth in Article IX of the Charter of the Town of Smithfield?"

Over 3,000 Smithfield residents signed the petition, which set in motion the effort to remove Smithfield Town Council President Stephen G.Tocco. But if Smithfield votes Councilman Tocco out of office on November 13, the choosing of his replacement has been taken out of the voters' hands and placed within the exclusive purview of the Smithfield Town Council.

In a serious blow to the democratic (small "d") process, the Smithfield Town Clerk and Chairman of the Board of Canvassers missed a critical filing deadline with the Secretary of State by thirty six minutes — or possibly by just six minutes:

[Town Clerk Diane] Ady said later that someone at Town Hall had called [Secretary of State Ralph] Mollis's office to ask when the office closed. The answer was 4:30 p.m., she recounted. She and the canvassers assumed that the deadline was 4:30, but it actually was 4 p.m.

With this missed deadline, the recall election will take place less than a year prior to the next election. Smithfield's Town Charter dictates, then, that the selection of the replacement councilor falls to the Town Council and that he or she must be of the same party affiliation (Democrat, in this case) as the recalled councilor.

To review. Smithfield officials fail beforehand to correctly ascertain the deadline for the required certification and signatures to reach the Secretary of State. No valid reason has been offered afterwards for the missed deadline. And most telling, on the fateful day of September 14, the Chair of the Smithfield Board of Canvassers, Pasquel Matteo, did not sign the requisite document until 4:10 p.m., leaving only nineteen minutes for the trip from Smithfield to the Office of Secretary of State in Providence. (During rush hour.)

How very Rhode Island that a "miscalculation" should default to the detriment of Smithfield voters.

(The interesting case for Councilman Tocco's recall is here.)

Dems Showing Prudence?

If there's a Democrat elected President in 2008, will there be troops in Iraq in 2013?

"I think it's hard to project four years from now," said Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois in the opening moments of a campaign debate in the nation's first primary state.

"It is very difficult to know what we're going to be inheriting," added Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

"I cannot make that commitment," said former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina.

Oh, so you mean you'll gauge the situation at that time, examine the facts at hand, utilize your best judgment and then determine what is the most prudent path to follow?

Huh.

I guess your perspective can change when you might actually have to make the tough decisions instead of just second-guess them.

Kennedy and Langevin Vote to Commend Petraeus and Condemn MoveOn

Rhode Island Congressmen Patrick Kennedy and James Langevin both voted yesterday in favor of attaching a resolution to this year's defense appropriations bill commending Iraq War Commanding General David Petraeus and condemning MoveOn.org's paid New York Times advertisement questioning his patriotism…

Congress makes the following findings:

(1) General David H. Petraeus was confirmed by a unanimous vote of 8l-0 in the Senate on January 26, 2007, to be the Commander of the Multi-National Forces--Iraq;

(2) General David H. Petraeus assumed command of the Multi-National Forces--Iraq on February 10, 2007;

(3) General David H. Petraeus previously served in Operation Iraqi Freedom as the Commander of the Multi-National Security Transition Command--Iraq, as the Commander of the NATO Training Mission--Iraq, and as Commander of the 101st Airborne Division (Air--Assault) during the first year of combat operations in Iraq;

(4) General David H. Petraeus has received numerous awards and distinctions during his career, including the Defense Distinguished Service Medal, two awards of the Distinguished Service Medal, two awards of the Defense Superior Service Medal, four awards of the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star Medal for valor, the State Department Superior Honor Award, the NATO Meritorious Service Medal, and the Gold Award of the Iraqi Order of the Date Palm; and

(5) The leadership of the majority party in both the House of Representatives and the Senate implored the American people and Members of Congress early in January 2007 to listen to the generals on the ground.

(b) It is the Sense of the Congress that the House of Representatives--

(1) recognizes the service of General David H. Petraeus, as well as all other members of the Armed Forces serving in good standing, in the defense of the United States and the personal sacrifices made by General Petraeus and his family, and other members of the Armed Forces and their families, to serve with distinction and honor;

(2) commits to judge the merits of the sworn testimony of General David H. Petraeus without prejudice or personal bias, including refraining from unwarranted personal attacks;

(3) condemns in the strongest possible terms the personal attacks made by the advocacy group MoveOn.org impugning the integrity and professionalism of General David H.Petraeus;

(4) honors all members of the Armed Forces and civilian personnel serving in harm's way, as well as their families; and

(5) pledges to debate any supplemental funding request or any policy decisions regarding the war in Iraq with the solemn respect and the commitment to intellectual integrity that the sacrifices of these members of the Armed Forces and civilian personnel deserve.

The resolution passed the House by a vote of 341-79.

Senators Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse voted against a similar measure in the Senate last week.

Providence Firefighters' Union Attempts to Shut Down a Statewide Disaster Drill

If this is typical of the attitude that Providence Firefighters' Union President Paul Doughty brings when he answers a call, then he needs to quit his job and get into a new line of work. From Amanda Milkovits in today's Projo…

A major statewide terrorism drill meant to train firefighters, police officers and medical crews to save lives after a chemical disaster could be severely curtailed because the Providence firefighters union plans to picket.

The labor action, which the union president downplays as an “informational demonstration” for disability benefits, is stopping dozens of firefighters from other municipalities from participating in Sunday’s drill.

This is the latest in a protracted contract battle between the Providence firefighters and the city. When asked how he could justify disrupting a complicated multi-agency drill, union president Paul A. Doughty said: “How can we take care of you if you won’t take care of us?”

Know that the average citizen takes the idea of firefighter training more seriously than the union President does…

Doughty was dismissive about the drill. “This is more for strategic issues than tactical issues,” he said. “Getting into the [hazardous-materials] suits, sampling the air, it’s stuff we’ve done before.”

The purpose of this picketing obviously isn't to rally public support, as Mr. Doughty is achieving the nearly impossible here: making Providence Mayor David Cicilline look like the sympathetic figure to almost everyone, even to the many people not generally impressed with his style of management. So if the purpose of crippling the terrorism drill isn't to scare the public -- "you don't take care of us, then we don't take care of you, and maybe some real bad disasters happen" -- then what is it?

The Lecture of a Lifetime - Really

The bloggers and commentators of Anchor Rising frequently debate many issues on this blog, issues which seem so interesting and important at the moment.

And then you come across something like this story (available for a fee), A Beloved Professor Delivers The Lecture of a Lifetime, which puts everything else in perspective.

Here are excerpts from the article:

Randy Pausch, a Carnegie Mellon University computer-science professor, was about to give a lecture Tuesday afternoon, but before he said a word, he received a standing ovation from 400 students and colleagues.

He motioned to them to sit down. "Make me earn it," he said.

They had come to see him give what was billed as his "last lecture." This is a common title for talks on college campuses today. Schools such as Stanford and the University of Alabama have mounted "Last Lecture Series," in which top professors are asked to think deeply about what matters to them and to give hypothetical final talks. For the audience, the question to be mulled is this: What wisdom would we impart to the world if we knew it was our last chance?

It can be an intriguing hour...

At Carnegie Mellon, however, Dr. Pausch's speech was more than just an academic exercise. The 46-year-old father of three has pancreatic cancer and expects to live for just a few months. His lecture, using images on a giant screen, turned out to be a rollicking and riveting journey through the lessons of his life.

He began by showing his CT scans, revealing 10 tumors on his liver. But after that, he talked about living. If anyone expected him to be morose, he said, "I'm sorry to disappoint you." He then dropped to the floor and did one-handed pushups.

Clicking through photos of himself as a boy, he talked about his childhood dreams: to win giant stuffed animals at carnivals, to walk in zero gravity, to design Disney rides, to write a World Book entry. By adulthood, he had achieved each goal. As proof, he had students carry out all the huge stuffed animals he'd won in his life, which he gave to audience members. After all, he doesn't need them anymore.

He paid tribute to his techie background. "I've experienced a deathbed conversion," he said, smiling. "I just bought a Macintosh." Flashing his rejection letters on the screen, he talked about setbacks in his career, repeating: "Brick walls are there for a reason. They let us prove how badly we want things." He encouraged us to be patient with others. "Wait long enough, and people will surprise and impress you." After showing photos of his childhood bedroom, decorated with mathematical notations he'd drawn on the walls, he said: "If your kids want to paint their bedrooms, as a favor to me, let 'em do it."

While displaying photos of his bosses and students over the years, he said that helping others fulfill their dreams is even more fun than achieving your own. He talked of requiring his students to create videogames without sex and violence. "You'd be surprised how many 19-year-old boys run out of ideas when you take those possibilities away," he said, but they all rose to the challenge.

He also saluted his parents, who let him make his childhood bedroom his domain, even if his wall etchings hurt the home's resale value. He knew his mom was proud of him when he got his Ph.D, he said, despite how she'd introduce him: "This is my son. He's a doctor, but not the kind who helps people."

He then spoke about his legacy. Considered one of the nation's foremost teachers of videogame and virtual-reality technology, he helped develop "Alice," a Carnegie Mellon software project that allows people to easily create 3-D animations. It had one million downloads in the past year, and usage is expected to soar.

"Like Moses, I get to see the Promised Land, but I don't get to step foot in it," Dr. Pausch said. "That's OK. I will live on in Alice."

Many people have given last speeches without realizing it. The day before he was killed, Martin Luther King Jr. spoke prophetically: "Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place." He talked of how he had seen the Promised Land, even though "I may not get there with you."

Dr. Pausch's lecture, in the same way, became a call to his colleagues and students to go on without him and do great things. But he was also addressing those closer to his heart.

Near the end of his talk, he had a cake brought out for his wife, whose birthday was the day before. As she cried and they embraced on stage, the audience sang "Happy Birthday," many wiping away their own tears.

Dr. Pausch's speech was taped so his children, ages 5, 2 and 1, can watch it when they're older. His last words in his last lecture were simple: "This was for my kids." Then those of us in the audience rose for one last standing ovation.

Pausch, a Brown University alumnus, talked about his childhood dreams, about enabling the dreams of others, and lessons learned. Some of my favorites:

• Brick walls are there for a reason. They let us prove how badly we want things. Brick walls let us show our dedication.
• Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.
• You've got to get the fundamentals down because otherwise the fancy stuff isn't going to work.
• Never lose your childhood wonder.
• Decide if you are a Tigger or an Eeyore.
• Loyalty is a 2-way street.
• I'll take an earnest person over a hip person every day because hip is short-term, earnest is long-term.
• Most of what we learn, we learn indirectly (or, using the football analogy, by "head fake")

He quoted a former assistant coach's words to him at the end of a football practice during his childhood:

Coach Graham rode you pretty hard, didn't he? That's a good thing. When you're screwing up and nobody's saying anything to you any more, that means they gave up.

His final words:

But did you figure out the head fake? It's not about how to achieve your dreams. It's about how to lead your life. If you lead your life the right way, the Karma will take care of itself. The dreams will come to you. Have you figured out the second head fake? This talk is not for you, it's for my kids.

Here is the video of his lecture and related tributes from others. It is worth spending the 100 minutes to see it all.

ADDENDUM

Two short video excerpts of Pausch just before his death and just after his death.

NEA "Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 5

Still nothing from the NEA so the "pay cut" analysis hostage day count continues. Day 5 is now history.

We eagerly await a response! The offer to post it here on Anchor Rising remains open.

Here is our analysis showing there is NO "pay cut." It even comes with spreadsheets and documented assumptions for public scrutiny!

Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim about East Greenwich teachers taking a "pay cut" is false. It is put-up-or-shut-up time.

Until we see a quantitative financial analysis response from the NEA, we will continue with daily blog posts noting that their "pay cut" analysis is being held hostage at NEARI against the wishes of East Greenwich taxpaying residents.

When in Doubt, Pull Back the Curtain

Watch as some MSNBC guy named David Schuster (perhaps a misspelling of "shyster") ambushes U.S. Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn (R, Tennessee) with a request that she name the last person in her district killed in Iraq. I find the following to be the despicable aspect of his barrage, because it traps the interviewee with the usual and understandable practices related to being interviewed:

But you weren't appreciative enough to know the name of this young man — he was eighteen years old — who was killed, and yet, you can say chapter and verse about what is going on with the New York Times and MoveOn.org.

Short of walking out with a statement about journalistic hacks, Ms. Blackburn should have replied in this fashion:

Well, Davey, your producers invited me on this show specifically to discuss MoveOn.org's "General Betray Us" ad, and so I thought I'd do your viewers — as few as they might be — the favor of knowing a little bit about the topic. I suppose that, if I were the host, I would find it quite easy to look down at my notepad and produce a name that you might have forgotten in the course of a job that sends hundreds of names through your head each day.

Of course, that's why I prefer a medium that allows me editorial honing.

ADDENDUM:

Apparently, Schuster couldn't even manage to get his ambush correct — the name on his notepad belonged to somebody outside of Blackburn's district.

American Solutions Day in Rhode Island

Newt Gingrich's American Solutions for Winning the Future organization will be holding a number of events in Rhode Island this Thursday and Saturday. Here's the welcoming statement from the organization's website…

We recently launched American Solutions for Winning the Future, a unique non-partisan organization designed to rise above traditional gridlocked partisanship, to provide real, significant solutions to the most important issues facing our country.

The breakthrough impact of this organization is driven by its powerful approach:

• Broad scale engagement of elected officials and candidates of both parties at all levels of government, interested citizens, private sectors leaders, reporters, scholars and students.
• Development of big, real, breakthrough solutions to the most important issues facing this country - education, energy, more effective homeland and national security, a new model of retirement savings, a renewed sense of American civilization and citizenship, creating efficient, information age government and more.
• A process to educate, ignite collaboration and implement these solutions across all levels of government with widespread support from citizens.

The events will be nationally-networked, with participants at the local sites linked to a series of speakers discussing topics ranging from "Green Conservatism & Biodiversity" to how "Defending America Requires Fixing our Intelligence System" (presented by a former CIA director) to "Rediscovering God in America". A full list of the topics is available here.

The Thursday event will include a webcast by former Speaker Gingrich and will be hosted locally by former RI Congressional Candidate Jon Scott, who has never failed to give an engaging presentation any time I've seen him appear before an audience…

The particulars on the Saturday workshops are...
The events are free and open to the public, though the organizers request that people planning to attend register in advance via the American Solutions website.

Edward Achorn on Governor Carcieri's Popularity Plummet

Edward Achorn took his shot in yesterday's Projo at explaining Governor's Donald Carcieri's major drop in approval rating, from 59% at the start of the year to 44% now, according to Brown University Professor Darrell West's latest polling…

The Republican governor’s leadership, unfortunately, has been AWOL this year. He started off 2007 with an absurdly rosy State of the State address, and then submitted a budget that used one-time fixes and projected enormous out-year deficits — thus surrendering the moral high ground he might have occupied over the Democrat-run General Assembly.

When he finally talked about trimming his executive-branch workforce — seemingly, in a fit of pique when the Assembly promulgated a budget that failed to solve the long-term deficit problem — he did so without any apparent idea of the details: who would be cut, and why. Months later, he is reportedly still trying to figure out how to trim the state workforce.

That’s an important first step, of course, but it inevitably raises a question: If there were so many positions the state did not need, why did Mr. Carcieri wait until five years into his governorship — with massive deficits staring him in the face — to economize that way?

I suspect there are a substantial number of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents in the state who agree with much of this.

What Profiteth a Community

It may be that the education discussion needs a broader context, because there's a substantial way in which Thomas's argument is beside the point:

As to the point I was actually raising, yes, it matters what pocket the money comes from. Andrew's comment raises exactly this issue. My view is that basing education funding on property taxes makes the amount of funding available depend on the property values in the community. I don't think the funding for my child's education (or yours) should depend so much on which town their parents live in. If that means that our wealthier communities subsidize our less wealthy communities, I don't have a problem with that. (And yes, I do live in Providence).

As for what those other communities would "get back in return", I'd like to suggest that a well-educated work-force in Providence, Woonsockett, etc. would benefit the entire state. RI is much too small to think parochially about this. The future of our cities is the future of the state.

What good is our investment in schools when the business and government structure is such that educated young folks looking for opportunities have to go elsewhere? It profits us much less if our education funding translates merely into fewer people receiving public assistance, because fewer and fewer people are paying the bills.

Frankly, my priorities are ensuring that I can keep my own children out of poverty, managing to keep my home, and making it at least possible that my children, when educated, won't have to go great distances in order to make a living some day. I know it's habitual in Rhode Island to think of public policy as a compulsive shopper with a new credit card thinks of the mall, but we need realistic budgeting before we figure out how to maximize the returns on our public investments.

Another Bigger Picture Thought Related to Mr. Costa

A short while ago, I objected to Rhode Island Republican Party Chairman Gio Cicione's red-meat throwing, and I think the Democrat status of Tiverton Town Councilman Hannibal Costa gives an example of the danger inherent in a party chairman's drifting away from tempered party building.

If the RIGOP could get its act together and come up with a winning platform that places certain Rhode Island–specific irreducible positions — such as those related to taxes and unfunded mandates, both of which I've heard Mr. Costa mention — while allowing internal debate on other matters, such as contentious social issues, it could pursue a goal of finding and converting like-minded Democrats. I have no idea whether Hannibal has any interest in higher offices, but it strikes me as unlikely that the state party would let him move too much farther up the chain. And that might open the way for the Republicans to recruit new candidates from among the Democrats' lower-level incumbents.

Those conversions can never happen if potential convertees recoil at the activities and rhetoric of the official Rhode Island Republican Party itself, as opposed to the activities and rhetoric of fire-breathing proxies.

The Non-Partisan Route to Homopartisanism

For some reason, it didn't register when last I filled out a Tiverton ballot (for the first time) that most of the town's key offices are "non-partisan." That doesn't necessarily mean that the representatives aren't affiliated with a party — either officially or ideologically. It just means that voters and taxpayers have to take a very keen interest in the partisan breakdown in order to figure it out.

I became interested when I discovered that my potential hero on the Tiverton Town Council, Hannibal Costa, is in fact a Democrat. After some online research of prior listings, political donations, and news articles, which I hope to supplement with a more thorough investigation in the future, I've put together the following overview of some key bodies/offices:

• Town Council:
• Louise Durfee (president): Democrat
• Joanne Arruda: Democrat
• Donald Bollin: Democrat
• Hannibal Costa: Democrat
• Paul Carroll: Democrat
• John Edwards: [don't know]
• Brian Medeiros: [don't know]
• Town Administrator:
  • Glenn Steckmann: [don' know]
• School Committee:
• Denise deMedeiros (chairwoman): Independent
• Michael Burk (vice-chairman): Democrat [not confirmed, but confident]
• Sally Black: Democrat
• Jan Bergandy: [don't know]
• Leonard Wright: Democrat (Democratic Committee Vice Chair)

The two "don't knows" on the town council could go either way, as could the town administrator. The two "don't knows" on the school committee, I'd be comfortable placing tentatively in the Democrat column on the basis of their both being professors, as I understand. The point is that this "non-partisanship" seems peculiarly likely to result in an overwhelming number of Democrats.

If we put aside the lefty quip that Democrats support the policies that most people want, and if we acknowledge, but move on from, the observation that there are almost three times as many registered Democrats as registered Republicans in Tiverton (although unaffiliated voters make up 55% of the electorate), there's a ready explanation for this blind lopsidedness: Given an apathetic citizenry, town positions are won mainly on the strength of name recognition, and even if candidates are not advertised as belonging to a particular party, those party organizations can still help (and pay) to build just that. Moreover, on a list of mainly unknowns, this large advantage to the state's vastly dominant party is exacerbated by the fact that citizens can't cast their votes based on the likelihood that party affiliation means a given candidate is closer to their views.

I don't know how many towns in Rhode Island are similar to Tiverton in this proud, but counterproductive, insistence on erasing partisan labels. It would seem a natural issue over which the state GOP could make some hay, while simultaneously expanding awareness that the monolithic party system is corrosive.

NEA "Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 4

Still nothing from the NEA so the "pay cut" analysis hostage day count continues. Day 4 is now history.

We eagerly await a response! The offer to post it here on Anchor Rising remains open.

Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim about East Greenwich teachers taking a "pay cut" is false. It is put-up-or-shut-up time.

Until we see a quantitative financial analysis response from the NEA, we will continue with daily blog posts noting that their "pay cut" analysis is being held hostage at NEARI against the wishes of East Greenwich taxpaying residents.

Justin Q. Public, Unwanted

Apparently — as the janitor informed me when I hopped out of the minivan with bloggerbag (aka a canvas briefcase) in hand — the union and the Tiverton school committee have decided to take eleven days off. So, no school committee meeting tonight.

The way things operate 'round here, it's as if the interested citizen is meant to learn to decipher, over the course of a few months, some hidden message in the town's meeting schedule saying, "Participation not encouraged."

I'm sure that town officials of various stripes have sat through their share of meetings with no public participation and have therefore decided not to waste their time meeting for the benefit of empty rooms. But the flip side of that decision is that the public has ever less reason to attend.

Couldn't the school committee have announced (and publicized) an opportunity for interested citizens to comment on the contract negotiations? It might be that the first effort at that sort of a meeting would feel like time wasted, but if such opportunities were expected, they would be better attended.

In the meantime, I guess I'll chalk it up to a victory for the union — albeit a minor one, as modesty requires me to admit — that there will be no first-hand observations of hostile behavior posted on Anchor Rising this evening. (Of course, a backfire could be seen in the fact that I now have more time tonight to ponder broader matters and to do some organizational-type thinking.)

A Nutritionist in Every Classroom?

Last week, the Warwick School Department sent our kids home with an opt-out letter from the city-wide Body Mass Index (BMI) measurement of all students. Of course, the actual "opt-out" portion was only mentioned after a longer legitimization of why the program was being implemented (PDF). The letter included dire warnings of the spread of childhood obesity and was followed by an explanation of how our school department was helping to combat the epidemic by attempting to measure the BMI of all Warwick students. It all sounded good on the face of it.

My wife and I discussed the BMI measurement program. We recognized that there may be an overall benefit of having our healthy kids added to the statistical baseline for Rhode Island students. We even briefly played "what if" over whether or not our kids would "suffer" long-term emotional scarring when all of their friends got their BMI and they didn't (heh). In the end, we opted-out. But the BMI is just one component of the "Healthy Schools Initiative" that is being implemented in Warwick. Again, while it all sounds like a good idea, things are getting a little out of hand. Some kids have actually had their lunch boxes searched for contraband by the in-school Food Police.

[Eileen] Brown said...“The teachers sent home [another] letter saying that only healthy snacks would be permitted as of Sept. 17,” she said. “They’re taking what the child eats out of the parents’ hands.”

Eileen said she does her best to send her kids to school with healthy snacks and food that is good for them, but she said she has a problem when teachers start dictating what her children can and can’t eat.

“There’s a possibility of kids not being allowed to eat a snack if the teacher deems it unhealthy,” she said. “They’re dictating what the kids should eat, but that should be a parent’s decision.”

Eileen said she sent one of her daughters to school with a Quaker oatmeal fruit bar, but the girl was told it contained too much sugar and her teacher took it away from her.

Eileen said she looked up nutrition facts for the oatmeal bar and compared them to other fruit snacks, like an apple or grapes and found that the oatmeal bar has less sugar and is healthier than either the apple or grapes.

“Teaching healthy choices and teaching the food pyramid is a good idea, but I don’t agree with kids being told they can’t eat a snack,” she said.

Since when did we ask our teachers to be nutritionists? I've heard them say they do enough already (and they do). Why are we asking them to take time (and, implicitly, money) away from doing the core mission of our schools: EDUCATION.

Now, I understand that healthy eating habits may fall within some broad definition of education, but isn't it up to the parents to decide their child's nutritional needs? But, of course, the school system bureaucrats don't think that enough parents are up to the task of raising healthy kids on their own. They know best. Even better than your child's pediatrician, as a matter of fact.

The Wellness school paradigm is affecting other areas, too. The Sunday ProJo ran a NY Times piece about the "cupcake wars."

...cupcakes have also recently been marched to the front lines of the fat wars, banned from a growing number of classroom birthday parties because of their sugar, fat and “empty calories,” a poster food of the child obesity crisis. This was clear when children returned to school this month to a tightening of regulations, federal and state, on what can be served up between the bells.

And it has led some to wonder whether emotional value, on occasion, might legitimately outweigh nutritional value.
...

When included on lists of treats that parents are discouraged or forbidden to send to school — and when those policies are, say, put to a vote at the P.T.A. — “cupcakes are deal breakers,” Professor Nestle said. “It sounds like a joke, but it’s a very serious problem on a number of levels. You have to control it.”

As the article implies, cupcakes and other no-no's are integral parts of more than just in-class birthday parties (which are really just snack-time with treats provided by the celebrant's Mom). What would a PTO bake sale be with out things that are, um, baked? The reality is that the PTO (or "A") holds many fund-raisers that have a "sugar component" to help generate revenue for everything from playground equipment to class trips. (Of course, they wouldn't have to do so much fund-raising if the school budget had a little more flexibility). Take away these fund-raising staples, and it gets harder to raise money. It's easier to sell cookies than candles, after all. Ever heard of a Veggie Sale (Carrot Cake and Banana Bread don't count, do they)?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating for school improvements built on the tummies of our kids, but this all-encompassing program seems like another bureaucratic over-reach. Look, no one can argue against limiting the sugar and fat intake of our children, but an all-out ban leaves a sour taste in my mouth (couldn't resist). Besides, it could lead to an unanticipated kickback. (Imagine that, a government program that doesn't take unintended consequences into consideration).

Let's say the programs are effective and kids eat healthy for the 6-7 hours at school. What about the rest of the day? I'm sure that some kids and parents will alter their lifestyles and become healthier eaters, but I'll also bet that just as many--if not more--will just put-off the "junk food" gorging until after-school (never mind what can happen over the summer). Heck, some parents may even fall into the trap of thinking that, because little Johnny eats healthy all day at school, he can have chips and a soda because he ate healthy all day.

And this all doesn't even take into account the make-up of the average school lunch (PDF). I wonder who'll be inspecting them? Mmmm, Cheeseburgers, Pizza, Chicken Fingers (Deep Fried), BBQ Ribs, Hot Dogs, Tacos, etc. Oh, sure, there's some veggies, too. But who are we kidding? Are the lunch room monitors going to ensure that every kid eats his veggies? Doubt it.

I bet Mom can pack a lunch that is quite a bit healthier than that, which will contain food that she knows her kids will eat. If they don't, she'll find something that they will. And the school department won't even have to tell her to do it. That's the way it should be.

Providence's Pro-Dictator City Councilman (or Someone Using His Name)

If I were living in Providence's 9th Ward, I'd be seriously concerned that I might be represented by a City Councilman who believes that a government that kills 100,000 of its own people in a time of "peace" is acceptable (kind of worries you about what his ideas for cost-control on health care might be, doesn't it?).

These are direct quotes posted in the comments section of RI Future from "Miguel Luna"(*) …

Let's see Saddam Hussein kill 100,000 people. (Depend what newspaper you are reading). US 700,000 people and 4 million displaced from their home in Iraq.

Saddam>Bush, Bush>Saddam, I guess Saddam was a baby devil compare with daddy.

Actually, John Burns of the New York Times has put the casualty figure closer to 200,000, which doesn't include casualty figures from either the Iran-Iraq war, or the invasion of Kuwait.

Which is largely the point.

The difference between supporters of American action in Iraq from the quietists who believe the world should ignore atrocities committed by governments like Saddam Husein's is that supporters of intervention do not accept large scale, state-sponsored violence as the normal state of affairs. They view the turmoil occurring in Iraq then and now as a problem that needs to be fixed, as something that must actively be brought to end.

On the other hand, based on his comment, it's fair to say that "Miguel Luna" believes that governments that mass murder their citizens during times of "peace" year after year are acceptable. They should be allowed to continue mass murder indefinitely, as long as it doesn't spill too obviously across their borders and disturb the immediate comfort of people in other parts of the world.

Here's John Burns, same article as previously cited, on Saddam's solution to the problem of prison overcrowding, while Iraq was supposedly at "peace"...

In 1999, a complaint about prison overcrowding led to an instruction from the Iraqi leader for a "prison cleansing" drive. This resulted, according to human rights groups, in hundreds, and possibly thousands, of executions.

Using a satanic arithmetic, prison governors worked out how many prisoners would have to be hanged to bring the numbers down to stipulated levels, even taking into account the time remaining in the inmates' sentences. As 20 and 30 prisoners at a time were executed at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere, warders trailed through cities like Baghdad, "selling" exemption from execution to shocked families, according to people in Iraq who said they had spoken to relatives of those involved. Bribes of money, furniture, cars and even property titles brought only temporary stays.

I dare "Miguel Luna" to say that systematic mass executions like these are going on either in the United States now, or in Iraq under the post Saddam government. And I'd like to know what "Miguel Luna" thinks should be done to stop governments that engage in practices like this. Or does he not think that it matters, as long as it doesn't affect him personally?

(*) I'm assuming the proprietors at RI Future would not let an anonymous commenter publish remarks using a local public figure's name not his or her own.

The Human Race: Safe for the Next 62,000,000 Minus 12,900 Years?

You've probably heard the theory that an asteroid impact caused the extinction of the dinosaurs tens of millions years ago, but did you know that a similar impact may have caused the extinction of the woolly mammoths, just 12,900 years ago? According to Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper, a Brown University geologist is a leading researcher into this event…

Researchers studying a dark layer of dirt at 10 sites around North America say they have found evidence that an asteroid or a comet may have killed the woolly mammoths, giant sloths, camels and other huge creatures that once roamed the continent.

The international team of researchers looked under what is known as "black mat" sediment, which dates back to 12,900 years ago. It coincides with a period of abrupt global cooling known as the "Big Freeze," or the Younger Dryas....

"We don't have a smoking gun for our theory, but we sure have a lot of shell casings," said Peter Schultz, a planetary geologist at Brown University in Rhode Island.

"Taken together, the markers found in the samples offer intriguing evidence that North America had a major impact event about 12,900 years ago."

This news actually makes me feel a little better about the immediate future of humanity.

Scientific evidence has been found in the fossil record indicating a cycle of major worldwide extinction events occurring about every 62 million years or so. Here's a description of the theory from National Geographic…

Robert Rohde and Richard Muller are vexed. For the past 542 million years the number of animal species living in the world's oceans has risen and fallen in a repeating pattern, and the scientists haven't the foggiest idea why....

The pattern includes a rise and fall of marine animal diversity every 62 million years and a weaker cycle of rising and falling marine diversity, which repeats every 140 million years. The researchers think that expanding and retreating glaciers may explain the 140-million-year cycle, but they are stumped over what drives the 62-million-year cycle.

The declines in the 62-million-year cycle correspond with some of the best known mass extinctions on Earth.

Among them are the die-off caused by the asteroid or comet widely believed to have doomed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago and the "Great Dying" of 250 million years ago. During the Great Dying, some unknown cause wiped out most life on Earth.

The extinction of dinosaurs has generally been taken to have been the last event in the 62-million year cycle, meaning another catastrophic extinction may be overdue and ready to begin any day now. Unless, of course, the "scheduled" extinction event (assuming the theories to be true) already happened, 12,900 years ago.

Biologists have generally proposed various one-off explanations, e.g. the rise of humanity, for the set of extinctions that claimed the woolly mammoth. If, however, the extinctions 12,900 years ago were part of the 62-million year cycle that's connected to various astronomical and climatic factors, we may be safe going forward from today for at least the next 61.99 million years!

UPDATED: Excuse me, but this is NOT how to win friends & influence people in East Greenwich

Are East Greenwich teachers being asked to take "pay cuts" by the School Committee? The NEA says yes but cannot and will not prove it. What follows below is an analysis which shows the "pay cut" claim is a lie and that can only mean the NEA is intentionally misleading East Greenwich residents.

Background

In five previous and core blog posts, I have made my case about the various economic issues in the East Greenwich teachers' union contract negotiations - including debunking the NEA's quite public claim about "pay cuts" for teachers. You can find links to all five at the bottom of this post.

In aggregate, they represent a highly visible, public set of multiple analyses ready for anybody to critique. However, nobody at the NEA has offered any tangible criticisms of the analyses that withstand even just elementary scrutiny. The analyses were developed with publicly-available information provided to me by both school department and town officials. More on that below.

I have offered multiple times to post the NEA's own analysis on Anchor Rising and let town residents compare the two. Let the two analyses withstand simultaneous public scrutiny and may the most accurate and precise analysis carry the day! I have even said I will publicly apologize if my analysis is proven inaccurate or wrong. Nonetheless, the NEA refuses to engage in a rational public discussion and offer its analysis to prove its "pay cut" claim. What are they afraid of?

In the end, this comes down to economic tradeoffs. How do we live within the budgets of the working families and retirees of East Greenwich while offering a reasonable total compensation package to the town's teachers? The NEA's actions thus far have shown how it doesn't care about the family budgets of town residents and it is not interested in negotiating a reasonable package for teachers.

Salary Increases

So let's review some of the economics: For starters and to refresh your memory, look at this salary-only Excel spreadsheet for East Greenwich teachers with Masters (about 60% of the teachers in town). Perhaps the NEA can tell the residents of East Greenwich how one $1,675 salary increase for step 10 and other salary increases ranging between $4,080-7,224 for job steps 1-9 represent a "pay cut" for 2007-08. For the less analytically inclined, this analysis is actually far easier to grasp than a first glance might make you think:

• The far left columns present job steps 1-10 and their salaries from the last contract. No judgment required there, only enough skill to copy ten salary numbers off one of the exhibit pages to that old contract.
• Then the latest proposal by the East Greenwich School Committee included a 2.4% salary increase. So the 2007-08 numbers for job steps 1-10 are determined by the simple arithmetic of multiplying 2006-07 contractual numbers for each of the 10 steps by 1.024.
• Then recall that each job step 1-9 teacher moves 1 step higher in 2007-08, except for each job step 10 teacher who stays as a 10.

That's it! No judgment calls required anywhere. No higher mathematics necessary either. Just all basic and verifiable facts. And there simply is NO "pay cut" anywhere to be found.

Net Changes in Total Cash Compensation

This is a new section as of September 24. It presents a more complete financial model showing net changes in total cash compensation for teachers in all 10 job steps.

To be complete though requires going beyond just salary and that means the next question which must be asked is: What happens to net changes in total cash compensation for teachers when the School Committee's latest offer of 12%, 15% and 18% co-pays are introduced from 2007-08 through 2009-10, up from the current 5% (job steps 1-3) and 10% (job steps 4-10)? Still NO "pay cuts."

Here are the data which support that claim:

This updated section of the post contains a new and second Excel spreadsheet which presents projected changes in net cash compensation for all 10 job steps for teachers with Master's degrees based on the latest offer. Previously posted analyses on Anchor Rising showed only steps 5 and 10 as examples.

Not surprisingly, there are NO "pay cuts" anywhere to be found - even after deducting the incremental after-tax expense of a higher health insurance premium co-pay. (Bob Walsh of the NEA argued previously on Anchor Rising that there were "pay cuts" if the analysis was performed on the original School Committee offer. To address his concern, I ran the same analysis as here with those revised numbers and showed that his claim was false. It is documented in this earlier post.)

The bottom line is this: Even AFTER including the negative cash impact of higher co-pays as proposed by the School Committee beginning in 2007-08, Table VIII in the spreadsheet presents the net salary increases - in $ and % - as realized by teachers over the 3 years of a proposed contract, assuming the latest School Committee offer:

• Job step 1 with family health coverage: $3,395-3,755/year or 7.5-8.1%/year increases.
• Job step 1 with single health coverage: $3,823-4,065/year or 8.1-9.1%/year increases.
• Job step 2 with family health coverage: $3,506-3,824/year or 7.1-7.8%/year increases.
• Job step 2 with single health coverage: $3,934-4,134/year or 7.7-8.7%/year increases.
• Job step 3 with family health coverage: $3,580-3,885/year or 6.8-7.4%/year increases.
• Job step 3 with single health coverage: $4,008-4,195/year or 7.4-8.3%/year increases.
• Job step 4 with family health coverage: $3,659-3,952/year or 6.5-7.1%/year increases.
• Job step 4 with single health coverage: $4,088-4,262/year or 7.1-7.9%/year increases.
• Job step 5 with family health coverage: $3,939-4,190/year or 6.3-7.6%/year increases.
• Job step 5 with single health coverage: $4,203-4,340/year or 6.8-7.9%/year increases.
• Job step 6 with family health coverage: $4,003-5,465/year or 6.4-8.0%/year increases.
• Job step 6 with single health coverage: $4,267-5,775/year or 6.8-8.4%/year increases.
• Job step 7 with family health coverage: $4,341-6,750/year or 7.1-9.1%/year increases.
• Job step 7 with single health coverage: $4,491-7,060/year or 7.3-9.5%/year increases.
• Job step 8 with family health coverage: $954-6,682/year or 1.3-9.2%/year increases.
• Job step 8 with single health coverage: $1,264-6,947/year or 1.7-9.5%/year increases.
• Job step 9 with family health coverage: $954-6,998/year or 1.3-9.8%/year increases.
• Job step 9 with single health coverage: $1,264-7,148/year or 1.7-10.0%/year increases.
• Job step 10 with family health coverage: $954-1,449/year or 1.3-2.0%/year increases.
• Job step 10 with single health coverage: $1,264-1,599/year or 1.7-2.2%/year increases.

So take a deep breath after reviewing these numbers and ask yourself: How could the NEA tell the residents of East Greenwich that the School Committee is trying to force teachers to take "pay cuts?" It is a grossly dishonest claim and the NEA should be ashamed of themselves.

A few observations: There are some very hefty salary increases in those numbers. They help to clarify why some of us believe strongly that the School Committee should be making no offers with co-pay percentages below 20% in any of the three years. Even with that higher co-pay assumption, re-running the model shows there are simply NO "pay cuts." The magnitude of these salary increases also points out why there are some fundamental structural problems with the existing job step format on which salary schedules are based.

This second spreadsheet is an indepth analysis and will take careful reading. But, with some concentration, it is possible to follow the logic in it as I have tried to explicitly identify all major assumptions and data sources on a step-by-step basis. After which, I believe people can only conclude both that there are no "pay cuts" and that there are too many rich salary increases spread across these job steps.

(Thanks again to the East Greenwich School Department which provided me with publicly-available information upon my request.)

The NEA Engages in Personal Name-Calling Instead of an Open Public Debate Based on Facts

Meanwhile, nobody who says there are "pay cuts" is capable or willing to offer the residents of East Greenwich any analytical proof of such alleged cuts. They just declare it is so and, presumably, expect the residents of East Greenwich to click their heels and say "Of course, master, whatever you say." Sorry, NEA, but this is 2007 and you are insulting the intelligence and decency of town residents.

Into that milieu, the following exchange occurred between a teacher named Ann - whose husband she discloses later is an East Greenwich teacher - and me in the Comments section of this prior post. Note how throughout the exchange she simply refuses to be factual or respond to facts. This is my whole point - either the data support the "pay cut" claim or they do not. I have put forth an explicit analysis for public review while the NEA has not and continues to refuse to do so. What are they afraid of? Instead they resort to name-calling in an effort to make it personal instead of factual. And then, in a truly Orwelllian twist, they try to turn hard-hitting fact-based answers into illegitimate responses:

Ann:

Donald, Your figures are wrong, in fact they're off by hundreds of dollars. But, I am going to assume you were mistaken, not that you are a liar. I don't know where you got them or why you didn't confirm them. Wait, yes I do. You enjoy trashing teachers too much to care if you're accurate or not. An angry zealot with a little information and/or MISinformation is dangerous and sad. It only creates an avenue for these individuals to spew more venemous statements about your teachers. The teachers are not lying. They know how much they pay for insurance. If you confirmed your numbers you would see that it is indeed a paycut. Now, do teachers realize that times are tough? Of course they do, they're tax payers too. But you can't reach an agreement if one side only offers a paycut to some of its employees. Would you agree to that???? Teachers are very willing to get creative and structure a contract that's fair to everyone. But I'm sure you don't (or aren't willing) to believe that because you seem to be one dimensional on this issue. You're too busy name calling, making accusations, and going out of your way to villify teachers. They're actually very good people you know. They deserve better treatment than this (and I'm not referring to salary). Your remarks are rather typical of a junior high gossip fest. Step back and take a breath please. Maybe you'll gain some understanding of both sides of the issue if you do. In fact, usually people go out of their way to understand both sides of an issue so they don't appear to be ignorant.

Don:

My, oh my. I am afraid you are the one who comes across as the angry zealot here. The kindest thing that can be said about your invective is that its logic is specious and and its tone is demagogic.

As a result, my blunt challenge to you is this: I put all of my analyses in full public view, even the supporting spreadsheets. I offer links to many 3rd-party documents to support other claims. Nobody to-date has offered any tangible proof that there are any errors in any of the work. (For goodness sake, nobody has even offered a tangible counter-proposal of any kind!) So demand that your NEA union reps do exactly the same as what I have done - Demand that they conduct a similar analysis, provide 3rd party sources to justify other claims they make, and then put it all out in full public view for the same level of scrutiny.

So far all they have done is what you have done: Whine endlessly in public about pay cuts and offer NO proof. That is demagoguery, plain and simple. Prove it or shut up!

Heck, I will even post their analysis on Anchor Rising if you send it to me.

I am not afraid of any such debate. But I think they are. And here is why:

Dare them to prove it to you because I predict that they can't prove it - without errors. Why? Because what you probably don't know is that when your union reps were challenged in the negotiations to show the School Committee members where there were pay cuts, I am told that the union reps admitted there were no pay cuts. Hmmm. Are you sure your NEA leaders are telling you the truth?

Think about that: The NEA union reps won't show any proof of pay cuts in public and they can't show any proof in private.

Unlike your reps, I have been tracking these issues since 2000 when I first joined the East Greenwich School Committee. In this most recent effort, I have taken data off salary schedules from legally executed contracts - and posted the schedules for public review. I have gotten official town and school summary budget information in FTM documents from the Town Manager's office - and posted the documents for public review. I talked directly to the Town Finance Director to confirm the contract terms mentioned for town employees covered by an NEA contract - and posted the information for public review. I met twice with the School District's Director of Administration to review current budget and historical school spending data for salaries, health benefits and pension costs - and posted the information for public review. All my statements about salaries, healthcare, and pensions come directly off documents generated by the school department in response to my requests for information that is available to concerned taxpayer citizens. Where it was necessary to conduct an analysis of raw data provided to me, I subsequently asked certain school officials to critique my work - before I posted it for public review on Anchor Rising. All of that makes for some junior high gossip fest! And, with all that information, go reread your specious claims that you don't know where I got the figures and I did not confirm them because I don't care if I am accurate or not. During 7 years of making public statements, nobody at the NEA has ever proven me wrong on any substantive analytics. Period.

And spare me the nonsense talk about "trashing" and "vilifying" teachers. I don't but you are too angry to notice. I do distinguish between teachers and the NEA. I readily - and happily - admit to trashing the NEA and their union hacks who brainlessly repeat the NEA's misleading and outright false claims. Good grief, the Soviet model is a proven failure; why is there any desire to replicate old-time Kremlin disinformation practices here at NEARI!?!

I conclude with a challenge to the teachers: Throw off the yoke of NEA servitude and declare yourselves true professionals. Decertify the NEA in East Greenwich and I bet all sorts of creative things could start to get done on both educational policies and compensation practices. Let's create an educational revolution that lets principals and teachers really run their schools like they know how to do. Let's find ways to reward great teachers without any upside caps on what they can earn financially or what they can do in their classrooms. Let's get rid of the weak teachers and bring in more strong ones. Let's figure out how to become a model school district for American education.

Ann:

My,oh my. More misinformation that you wish to hang your hat on. If you're not sitting in negotiations I wouldn't be so quick to comment on them, just as I won't. But I do pay a percentage of my insurance premium and I know that your numbers are incorrect. Unfortunately, you repeatedly take SOME information and spin it to your own personal satisfaction. You are now comparing the NEA to the Soviet Union? And calling teachers liars? Have you ever stopped to think that maybe you are the one being fed false information? I'm trying to maintain a positive attitude with all of this negativity surrounding the teaching profession. This kind of conversation makes that almost impossible and goes nowhere. Appreciation is shown in the form of a fair salary in other fields. Stock options, bonuses, etc. also come into play. Teachers are not part of that kind of a system, and don't expect to be. But we would like a fair and reasonable salary based on the average around our state-nothing more. The NEA happens to be the only group that supports this idea. Maybe if you came around and supported us we wouldn't need the NEA. Just a joke to lighten things up-don't worry. I won't hang my hat on that idea. It's hard to be happy and positive with this kind of negativity in the air so I'm done conversing for now. I'm off to my students and plan on having a wonderful day with them!

Don

Of course, the numbers are not going to tie to what is in Ann's paycheck - because she is still paying 5% or 10% co-pays from the last union contract and getting her 2006-07 salary.

The false "pay cut" claim has nothing to do with what is in her current paycheck and it is a scary thought that anyone would think so.

It has everything to do with PROSPECTIVE & INCREMENTAL pay dynamics when two likely events occur:

• Base Salary Increase: A base salary increase in 2007-08 results from an increase to the 10 steps in the salary schedule, which I have assumed to be 2.4%. As shown in the spreadsheet in this post, that 2.4% translates into 8.1%-11.2% pay increases for job steps 1-9 - or $4,080-7,224 annual salary increases. It is a 2.4% or $1,675 annual salary increase for job step 10.

• After-Tax Cost of Higher Co-Pay: The salary increase is offset by the incremental after-tax cost of implementing a higher co-pay, which I have assumed to be 20%, which yields an estimated incremental after-tax cost in 2007-08 of $550-989 per teacher.

Neither of these two events has happened yet. Which means you have to do some analytics. And, I reiterate again: No matter how you slice the numbers, there is no "pay cut."

If some teachers are that unclear about how to measure the alleged "pay cut," then it is not at all surprising that they reach the wrong conclusion. The starting point for the teachers should be a straightforward one: Demand that the NEA prove quantitatively to them where there is a "pay cut" in the future. Make the NEA earn its dues money! Before offering baseless criticisms of other people's work, get your own house in order.

Which means, the rest of us are still waiting...

For someone on the NEA's side to put the same kind of tangible analytical information like I have put into the public domain for scrutiny by all.

Still waiting...

I will even post it on Anchor Rising, if you send it to me. Let's have a real and public debate.

Still waiting...

Until you do, whining loudly about unproven "pay cuts" only decreases your credibility by the day.

Show us...if you can...

Happy to debate substantive issues in a meaningful way...

Completely unwilling to listen to whining without any analytical backup...

Show us...

Oh, it's not done! Keep reading in the Extended Entry below.

Ann:

Donald, Again you're wrong. You assume that one can't calculate numbers because they don't agree with you. I am figuring the cost of the contribution accurately. It's a very simple equation actually...IF you have the correct figures to begin with.

Now, you consistently call teachers "whiners" when they state their view, opinion, or even the mere facts of a situation. Are we not aloud to speak our views in your world Donald? And did you really call Tom a Dunce???? This is the very problem with trying to have a discussion with someone like you. And don't you think you're whining??? So no, I won't continue to engage you so you can keep whining and twisting information to sensationalize this situation any more. I'm quite confident in myself, my numbers, & my collegues. I don't need to prove anything to you. It's not worth the effort. It's really quite sad that this is the only thing going on in your life.

But then again maybe you're right. In fact, if you think being a teacher is such a great deal why don't you enroll in school and become one? Surely one such as yourself could never pass up such a financially rewarding profession.

See you in the classroom...

We're waiting...

Still waiting...

To Michele, You're right on that issue and everyone involved agrees. Health insurance to those that receive the buyback would cost any school system much more. But don't take my word for it. Apparently "The Donald" is the only one with the right answers!

Don:

Geez, this debate is like dealing with the emotional and intellectual sophistication of a petulant toddler.

You say: "Again you're wrong...I am figuring the cost of the contribution accurately. It's a very simple equation actually...IF you have the correct figures to begin with."

I respond: Okay, I repeat, prove it. Don't just stomp your foot and say the words. Instead prove it with real and verifiable numbers that tie to contractual salary data and actual health insurance premium costs, etc. Just like my analysis did. It is not lost on readers that you are vehemently protesting that my numbers are wrong while simultaneously failing to identify exactly how my analysis is incorrect.

You say: "You assume that one can't calculate numbers because they don't agree with you."

I respond: Really, where did I say that? Nope, what I actually said was send me your financial analysis showing there really is a "pay cut" and I will post it on Anchor Rising for full public scrutiny. Right next to my analysis. And may the most rigorous and precise analysis carry the day!

You say: "Now, you consistently call teachers "whiners" when they state their view, opinion, or even the mere facts of a situation. Are we not aloud to speak our views in your world Donald?

I respond: No I don't call teachers whiners. I do call union hacks - some of whom are teachers - whiners when they both cannot and will not substantiate their "pay cut" claim with publicly visible analytics to justify their argument. And, for goodness sake, nobody is trying to squelch your free speech. In fact, I am rather delighted that you are posting these comments - without supporting documentation - because they make your side look really evasive to the public and that is destroying your credibility with them.

You say: "This is the very problem with trying to have a discussion with someone like you. And don't you think you're whining??? So no, I won't continue to engage you so you can keep whining and twisting information to sensationalize this situation any more. I'm quite confident in myself, my numbers, & my collegues. I don't need to prove anything to you. It's not worth the effort..."

I respond: Okay, now we are in full petulant toddler mode - You can't say exactly how my publicly-visible analysis is wrong, you won't offer any explicit analysis of your own as a counter-point, but you are confident you are right and with that declaration, you are storming off to your room. Oh, that is a sophisticated move certain to persuade the taxpayers of East Greenwich! And you think this is helping your cause? You completely miss the point if you think you have to prove anything to me. No, you have to make your case to the town residents and, trust me, you are making a case alright. Just not the one you think you are making.

You say: "See you in the classroom...We're waiting...Still waiting..."

I respond: Instead of offering reasoned financial analyses to show a "pay cut," you resort to word games. Not even imaginative ones at that since they only mimic mine.

To all readers:

What you have here in the exchanges between Ann and me is the essence of the NEA's public relations strategy - before it ran amok. We all know the importance of teachers. So the NEA puts teachers out as the first line for public viewing while they do the gutter fighting over outrageous and unaffordable contract terms behind closed doors. And then, this year, the NEA took it a step further and put out the "pay cut" story to garner further sympathy for teachers. And, in the old days, it all would have succeeded.

But not anymore. What is not lost on readers is that Ann and the rest of her NEA sycophants still have not produced the first quantitative financial analysis to prove there is a "pay cut." But they want the taxpayers of East Greenwich to believe them without providing any supporting arguments as proof - and believing them means caving into the NEA's one-sided contract demands. Those days are over.

Meanwhile, nobody at the NEA has explicitly documented and proven any logic errors in what I have posted publicly. All while their own analysis remains hidden from public view, assuming it exists in the first place.

Some of us are not afraid of a public debate. I am confident in the quality of my analysis. That said, I am not afraid of being proven inaccurate or even wrong. I repeat my offer to post competing analyses from the NEA - if and when I get them.

It gets down to some basic ethics of how we all approach important public policy issues. Thomas raised an earlier issue about long-term trends in salary versus healthcare premium costs. Fair question, so I wrote the EG school department and asked if there was any available information which I could post. If they can find it and get it to me, I will share it on Anchor Rising. Michelle asked another question earlier about buyback dollars. Well before Ann's latest diatribe over Michelle's question, I had already written the school department again to ask for thoughts and data on that point.

Which all brings us back to my fundamental point: If we are going to do right by our children as well as the teachers and taxpayers, we have to understand the financial and educational issues in greater detail than usually happens. Careful analyses are a necessary first step so there is meaningful information on which to base a public debate about what is the best course of action.

I believe I have proven how the "pay cut" argument is false. And, as a result, I think East Greenwich residents have learned a lot about the NEA's intentions since they discovered how willing the NEA is to pitch a false story to manipulate the residents - and keep pitching it after it has been discredited.

Ann:

Donald, Again...you're wrong. Instead of listening to the message and considering it you continue to whine and name call. I guess it's "shame on anyone that doesn't agree with you" in your world. It's really getting rather funny to listen to you. However, there is a point where one has to stop putting themselves in the position of letting an individual (that is incabable of "considering" their point of view) attack them continuously. That is why no one will give you numbers. You accept what you want and toss the rest. We discuss the numbers with those individuals that are in the position of negotiating the contract. That's what a bargaining unit does.

So have fun name calling, whining, and spewing your nonsense. I have more important things to do. I know the school day is over, but I have papers to correct, plans to get ready, parents to contact, grades to record, a parent volunteer schedule to prepare, forms to fill out,portfolios to organize, a curriculum guide to read through, materials to prepare, open house packets to create, rubrics to create,and meetings to prepare for next week. Am I whining? No, I love my job. But I do realize you have no knowledge of what it takes to be a teacher. I'm just stating the facts.

What are YOU doing this weekend?

Wow! I rest my case. I could not have scripted this debate better even if I spent days creating Ann's words out of thin air.

Excuse me, but this is NOT how to win friends and influence the fine residents of East Greenwich.

Here are the 5 prior blog posts which provide the key analyses of contract terms and related issues:

Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals
The NEA in East Greenwich: Reflections On The Week That Was
Quantifying the Trend Which Led to the 3050 Tax Cap Law
UPDATED: The Entitlement Mentality of Certain Union Teachers & Their Leaders
East Greenwich Pendulum Viewpoint: Clarifying the Teachers' Union Contract Debate With Facts

Another Notable Moment

Tiverton Town Councilor Brian Medeiros just proposed — and the council approved unanimously — a statement of support for the school committee's "efforts to contain costs" within the boundaries set by the property tax cap with respect to the teachers' union contract. Although the movement is largely symbolic, it's very encouraging to see the council express trust in a school committee that has been standing firm.

It was also notable that School Committee Member Sally Black took the podium to add to the record a recognition that all of the town's spending derives from a single "pie," and that as public officials deal with each item, they should (paraphrasing: "at home under their comforters with a glass of wine") consider the police officers and public works employees out there performing their necessary duties for the town.

A Reliable "Opposed"

This meeting is definitely stretching out, but I'm glad that I've remained because I've witnessed a notable moment. To paraphrase Councilor Hannibal Costa (who has previously railed against unfunded mandates from the state), on a discussion about advertising to fill administrative jobs:

If you look around the town, you'll see that we have a lot of properties for sale. We have reached the point that any further taxes will force people to leave. We're not talking elderly people, here. With each new tax and assessment people are deciding that it's just not worth it to stay.

I've had a very difficult time figuring out councilors' party affiliations, but I hope that Mr. Costa is Republican, and if he is, let me offer a keep-'im-in-mind to the state party.

NEA "Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 3

Still nothing from the NEA so the "pay cut" analysis hostage day count continues. Day 3 is now history.

We eagerly await a response! The offer to post it here on Anchor Rising remains open.

Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim about East Greenwich teachers taking a "pay cut" is false. It is put-up-or-shut-up time.

Until we see a quantitative financial analysis response from the NEA, we will continue with daily blog posts noting that their "pay cut" analysis is being held hostage at NEARI against the wishes of East Greenwich taxpaying residents.

Let's Keep Everything Important Under Wraps

If I had the authority — as an audience member — I'd move to end executive sessions at these town council meetings.

The council is running through a list of appointments and pretty much rubber stamping applicants (who are far outnumbered by openings, it seems), and the discussion over a town planning–related position became somewhat contentious. The planning committee did not recommend the person who was supposed to transition into it. The guy who is supposed to be transitioning out of it into a more important position has (as I understand) been too busy to do so thoroughly (or something). As soon as the relevant parties from the audience began to approach the microphone, Council President Louise Durfee suggested that "if the discussion is going to get to this level" it ought to be moved into an executive session.

Am I exhibiting my naivété in finding it disconcerting that all important discussions seem to happen behind closed doors?

Prioritizing Priorities

It's so much easier to be active in the summer.

How am I supposed to keep up with Prison Break and Heroes if I intend to attend Tiverton Town Council meetings? Maybe it would be different if I could afford a TiVo machine, but such tools are out of my range of affordability.

But there's a thought... inasmuch as participation is a necessity for having a say in our government and inasmuch as certain television shows are clearly addictive to people with certain "natural" — perhaps genetic — brain operations, an argument could be made that the federal government ought to ensure a TiVo in every home.

Think I'll call my congressman! (He's into that sort of thing.)

R.I.P. Rep. Paul Crowley

Representative Paul Crowley, D, Newport, has passed away after a battle with cancer. The Governor has ordered that the Rhode Island State flag be flown at half staff. ProJo has more (Matt does, too). :

Veteran Newport lawmaker Paul W. Crowley, a champion for schoolchildren and the city where he was raised, died this morning after a battle with cancer, according to Larry Berman, a spokesman for Speaker William J. Murphy. Crowley was 57.

Crowley’s distinguished public-service record began early, when he was a student at the University of Rhode Island, and ended with his 27-year tenure as a top legislator in the House of Representatives. He was the longest-serving Democrat in the House.

Crowley became the point man on education issues as the legislature took on an increasingly active role in financing — and shaping — the state’s public schools. He championed charter schools, school accountability, improved vocational education and increased aid to poorer school districts years before other politicians caught on.

As Crowley said during his last campaign for the House, in the fall of 2006: “I’ve been the education guy.”

Indeed he was the education guy. I agreed with his stance on several education issues--for instance, charter schools and education reform--but sometimes I disliked his tone even when we did agree. However, I never doubted his passion nor his knowledge concerning the education hurdles facing the state. But that's just politics. Rep. Crowley was a man who served his community and state the best he could. My thoughts and prayers to his family. RIP.

Of Federal Judges and Federal Candidates

1. According to Charles Bakst in Sunday's Projo, Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian is more interested in running for House or Senate at a future undisclosed date than he is in running for governor in 2010…

[Lincoln Chafee] says he’d welcome a gubernatorial bid by Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian, a close ally. Avedisian, who says he has no plans to leave the party, says he’s focused now on a 2008 reelection. While not ruling out a try for governor later, he’s more interested in the House or Senate.

2. The Political Scene column from today's Projo takes it as a given that Robert Flanders is out of the running for the vacant seat on the First Circuit Court of Appeals, and adds another name to the previously floated name of Robert Corrente…

Political Scene has heard that the White House might be getting close to nominating people for those vacancies, which were created when former Chief U.S. District Judge Ernest C. Torres and former Circuit Judge Bruce M. Selya left full-time service and assumed senior status about 10 months ago.

Those seen as front-runners for the 1st Circuit seat include U.S. Attorney Robert Clark Corrente and District Court Judge William E. Smith. Those seen as front-runners for the District Court judgeship include Corrente and U.S. Magistrate Judge Lincoln D. Almond, son of former Republican Gov. Lincoln C. Almond.

However, as some of us have feared, Senate Democrats, via Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, are indicating that they may not approve any new judicial appointments made by the Bush administration…

Whitehouse, a former U.S. Attorney and Rhode Island attorney general, spoke at the Roger Williams University School of Law last week, and afterward he was asked if the Bush administration had reached the point at which it’s too late to make those appointments.

“I think we’ve reached it, particularly based on the process we’ve gone through so far,” Whitehouse replied. “There has been zero meaningful discussion between the White House and the Senate on these appointments.”

Judge Selya is not impressed by Senator Whitehouse's characteristic hyper-partisanship, when the subject is judicial appointments…

When reached on Friday, Selya said, “I’m really very disappointed in the senator’s remarks. This is not a political game. The courts and the country and the state need these judges, and the question ought to be not who makes these nominations but the quality of the nominees.”

Selya, who was appointed by former President Ronald Reagan, said, “If this president or any future president nominates a first-class person, then that man or woman deserves to be considered on the merits and not held up because someone is waiting for some kind of political accommodation to be made.”

It looks as if a fitting slogan, on many levels, for Senator Whitehouse's next re-election campaign will be "Qualifications no! Partisanship yes!".

The Reductiveness of Science

A July 30th L.A. Times piece that held the dominant spot in this Sunday's Providence Journal Lifebeat section is a fine specimen of science's reductive power in the hand of a secularist:

The forces of attraction are in many ways mysterious, but scientists know certain things. Studies have shown that women prefer men with symmetrical faces and that men like a certain waist-to-hip ratio in their mates. One study even found that women, when they sniffed men's T-shirts, were attracted to certain kinds of body odors.

That initial spark can flash and fade. Or it can become a flame and then a fire, a rush of exhilaration, yearning, hunger and sense of complete union that scientists know as passionate love.

Key to this state of seeing a person as a soul mate instead of a one-night stand is the limbic system, nestled deep within the brain between the neocortex (the region responsible for reason and intellect) and the reptilian brain (responsible for primitive instincts). Altered levels of dopamine, norepinephrine and serotonin -- neurotransmitters also associated with arousal -- wield their influence.

But passionate love is something far stronger than that first sizzle of chemistry. "It's a drive to win life's greatest prize, the right mating partner," Fisher says. It is also, she adds, an addiction.

People in the early throes of passionate love, she says, can think of little else. They describe sleeplessness, loss of appetite, feelings of euphoria, and they're willing to take exceptional risks for the loved one.

Brain areas governing reward, craving, obsession, recklessness and habit all play their part in the trickery.

Love, you see, in all of its stages is traceable through various chemical changes and is, ostensibly, the predictable consequence of a collection of complex factors, from appearance to personal history to the circumstances under which a couple meets. Writer Susan Brink refers to it as a "trick" multiple times. One wonders what scientists could have discovered that would make Brink think love sincere or "real."

It's only natural to feel as if some of the magic has disappeared from something when it has become understood. Natural, but incorrect and deleterious. The emotion is just as real whether or not we know what the brain is doing to create it, just as understanding the physics of a sunrise makes it no less magnificent.

The trickery comes in when mankind presumes to manipulate that which has been defined, and it is the reduction of life's magic to mere mechanics that begets the moral error that manipulation is acceptable. Consider:

Experiments in other mammals add to the human chemical findings. Female prairie voles, for example, develop a distinct preference for a specific male after mating, and the preference is associated with a 50% increase in dopamine in the nucleus accumbens.

But when the monogamous vole is injected with a dopamine antagonist, blocking the activity of the chemical, she'll readily dump her partner for another.

The imaginable applications of a love antidote, or a love enhancer, range from the cute to the tyrannical. Looking at the love of your life and pondering the chemical "trick" of your emotions is socially corrosive, but it's nowhere near as frightening as considering the use toward which such chemical tricks would have been put by 1984's Big Brother.

"Pay Cut" Analysis Hostage Day Count: Day 2

The NEA's very public claim that the East Greenwich School Committee's contract proposals would result in "pay cuts" for teachers has been discredited in this post and several earlier posts mentioned at the beginning of that referenced post.

Along the way, many commentators on this blog and I have all challenged the NEA to put up quantitative proof to their "pay cut" claim or shut up.

I have also offered to post their analysis on this blog site for public scrutiny - just like I have already offered my own analysis for similar public review.

This new post is written in response to commentator John, who wrote:

Now, back on planet earth, as we come to the end of another chapter of "RI public sector union negotiations -- better than the Sopranos", can we start the hostage count for how many days will go by before [Pat] Crowley [of the NEA] puts any comparative quantitative analysis up on this blog?

We eagerly await a response! Prove us wrong and we will admit to it. Or 'fess up that your claim is false.

Until we get a response from the NEA, we will continue with a daily update on the "pay cut" analysis hostage count.

We Can Only Do What We Can Do

In a comment to the previous post, WillP asks why we haven't mentioned this:

Tiverton police officers are looking forward to their paychecks that will contain 14 months of retroactive salary increases.

Fourteen months' worth of retroactive health-care co-share increases, however, will reduce that amount.

The 26 members of the International Brotherhood of Police Officers, Local 406, last Thursday re-ratified a new three-year contract that gives them salary increases totaling 10 percent and increased health-insurance co-shares. The union vote did not include a side agreement that would have allowed more people to apply for the job of police chief. ...

The contract calls for police who have either a family or single health-care plan to pay $800 per year, or double the $400 they have been paying. In year three of the contract, the cost for the employee will increase to $900 annually. Plan changes that increase the amount of co-payments for office visits, emergency visits and prescription drugs helped reduce overall costs to the town, Steckman said.

The town's contribution for a family plan is $1,069 a month. The new plan will cost the town $1,056 a month. The cost to the town for a single plan is $422 a month. Under the new plan, it will be $417.

There are two reasons that I haven't mentioned this story. The primary reason is that I just didn't see it. I haven't the time to add The Newport Daily News to my daily dead-tree skims, and having long ago found the periodical's Web site next to useless, I lapsed from the practice of checking it regularly for news. It bears mentioning, here, that we're just folks who keep this site up in our spare time, of which Rhode Island has been working hard to ensure that I have a decreasing supply.

The second reason is obviously made moot by the first, but it's worth noting: I've only recently forced myself to take an interest in the local government, here in Tiverton, so even if I'd caught this story on the 12th, I wouldn't have had much background for any statements. Part of what makes the teachers' union's negotiation so egregious is that it had the audacity to up its percentage demands in a context of extreme fiscal restraints, as well as the way in which the percentage increases compound with the step increases. I already knew some of the tricks hidden in the numbers.

I've less historical foundation for assessing police contracts, both for comparison with previous contracts and for understanding how the remuneration adds up. I certainly intend to remedy this gap in my knowledge, but until such time as Anchor Rising can dispel my need to work as a carpenter on Saturdays, that remedy will have to be pursued in due course.

The Evidence of Affordability

WillP left a curious comment to my "Just a Quick Shake of the Head" post:

On what basis do you assume that this is an "unaffordable contract?" Do you have access to details of the current contract negotiations or budget data that the rest of us residents and parents don't have? Again, you are assuming one side is telling the truth and the other isn't, which is my dilemma. Based on my experience with this school committee and Superintendent over the last four years, reliablity and integrity aren't high on the list of their positive traits. So finding myself in a quandary, if you have info I don't have, please share.

Sure thing: The General Assembly flat funded schools. At the time of the strike (at least), the union was asking for larger raises than they'd gotten in the previous contract. I simply cannot afford for the cost of living in Tiverton to go up any more. Unaffordable.

From the perspective that WillP takes, affordability is apparently an actual dollar amount that the school committee and administration can conceivably produce to increase teachers' remuneration. Certain caveats may or may not be involved: affordable if money is taken from other segments of the school's budget; affordable if the town allocates a greater percentage of revenue to the schools; affordable if the town finds some way to draw more money from citizens' pockets.

Of course, if one stands among a group that prioritizes the drawing of every possible penny out of a public body — and the willingness to strike as a negotiating tactic suggests that as a priority — anything is affordable. If one stands among families that can barely afford to keep their houses, nothing is.

Update: Menard's Canard Exposed; Alaska's Chilly Reaction

It's a darn good thing Woonsocket's Mayor Susan Menard keeps records. That was the only way she was able to determine that the source of the purloined speech she gave at the Woonsocket High School graduation in June was the City of Woonsocket's controversial former Director of Human Services, John Dionne. The whole incident might otherwise have remained a major mystery.

Meanwhile, the unattributed author of her speech, Alaska's Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell, was able to view the Mayor's "instant replay" of his speech before it had been removed from YouTube. The Valley Breeze reports that he called it shocking:

In a highly critical statement Tuesday, he said the Woonsocket mayor failed to take responsibility for stealing a speech he gave a month earlier at a graduation in Anchorage, Alaska.

"Besides the outright plagiarism, I was concerned about the mayor's unwillingness to take responsibility and apologize for her actions and those of her speech-writer," said Parnell.

As to Mayor Menard herself, Turn to 10's Bill Rappleye reports that

Menard wouldn't go on camera but told NBC 10 by phone that she doesn't write her own speeches and considered the accusation politically motivated and trivial.

Menard also told NBC 10 that she doesn't even remember the contents of the speech.

Turn to 10 reminds us, however, that

... plagiarism can derail a politician.

In 1988, Joe Biden pulled out of the presidential race when it was revealed he borrowed from a speech from a British politician.

Just a Quick Shake of the Head

Reading Pat Crowley's reaction in the comments section of my previous post, I find myself shaking my head at the inability of a certain type to comprehend that some people take an honest interest in the world around them and pursue and present knowledge with the intention of finding the truth.

I meant it when I said that everybody involved in the latest round of the Tiverton teacher contract spat may be better informed than me, and I mean it when I say that I'm interested in the counterarguments to that which I've found. I've no direct personal investment in this fight — except, of course, as a taxpayer and a parent in Tiverton — and I'm not colluding with anybody to affect negotiations.

I'm not even especially invested in my argument. If it turns out that Pat is correct on the law (which would seem to require that subsequent case law had gutted the legislated language, although I could be wrong about that, too), I'll admit it and move on to argue that the law is perverse and that Mr. Rearick was right to challenge it.

Rearick Leads the Way (And Doesn't the Projo Have Access to Google?)

Hot on the heels of the Tiverton teachers' union's unanimous vote to follow a moderated work-to-rule practice as a negotiating tactic, Schools Superintendent William Rearick has done the minimum that most bosses would do were employees to openly skip work for an expressly inappropriate reason:

The teachers’ union is balking at Schools Supt. William J. Rearick’s decision not to pay teachers for what he calls “the illegal job action” they took when they held a one-day strike on Sept. 4.

Reporter Meaghan Wims goes on to relay some automated ballerina spin from the NEA's Patrick Crowley:

In a letter Monday to Rearick, Patrick Crowley, assistant executive director of the National Education Association of Rhode Island, said the teachers are protected under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, which requires salaried employees be paid a "predetermined amount" that is "not subject to reduction because of variations in the quantity or quality of the work performed."

Crowley said that Rearick’s decision could be interpreted to mean that the employees are now considered nonsalaried workers eligible for overtime pay.

If that's not Rearick's intention, Crowley writes, "it occurs to me that the withholding of pay is a willful violation under the federal statute and may subject the violator to criminal sanctions." The School Department, Crowley writes, could face up to $10,000 in fines for withholding teachers' pay.

"Please clarify your understanding of the exemption status for the workers in the NEA bargaining unit in order for the members to adequately calculate the overtime pay owed to them in time for the next pay roll period," Crowley writes. "If, however, the refusal to pay the teachers their agreed upon salary was inadvertent, we will work with you to remedy the situation as expeditiously as possible."

Leaving open the very real possibility that everybody else is better informed than I am, after a quick Google search of Crowley's legal quotation, it appears that he has been very selective in his review of the law (emphasis added):

a) An employee will be considered to be paid "on a salary basis'" within the meaning of the regulations if under his employment agreement he regularly receives each pay period on a weekly, or less frequent basis, a predetermined amount constituting all or part of his compensation, which amount is not subject to reduction because of variations in the quality or quantity of the work performed. Subject to the exceptions provided below, the employee must receive his full salary for any week in which he performs any work without regard to the number of days or hours worked. This policy is also subject to the general rule that an employee need not be paid for any workweek in which he performs no work.

(1) An employee will not be considered to be ``on a salary basis'' if deductions from his predetermined compensation are made for absences occasioned by the employer or by the operating requirements of the business. Accordingly, if the employee is ready, willing, and able to work, deductions may not be made for time when work is not available.

(2) Deductions may be made, however, when the employee absents himself from work for a day or more for personal reasons, other than sickness or accident. Thus, if an employee is absent for a day or longer to handle personal affairs, his salaried status will not be affected if deductions are made from his salary for such absences.

I'd argue that seeking to bully the school administration into assenting to an unaffordable contract should count as a "personal reason."

Donnis Previews Talk with Governor Carcieri

The Providence Phoenix's Ian Donnis previews an interview with Governor Carcieri over at N4N:

Carcieri remained characteristically upbeat during a taping this morning of WPRI/WNAC TV's Newsmakers, but his ability to deliver remains open to question. When I asked why Rhode Island has been relegated to playing defense on the casino issue, the governor answered mainly by calling gambling a short-sighted form of economic development for Massachusetts and other states in the region.

Asked how Rhode Island will recover from the revenue hit if Massachusetts goes forward with casinos, Carcieri said the state needs to pursue other forms of economic development, and he was upbeat in describing various non-budget-related economic indicators. Yet Amgen -- one of the companies to which he pointed -- is cutting jobs, and it seems that we frequently hear about other job losses in Rhode Island, like this.

Carcieri has described his intention to go forward with cuts in the state workforce. Asked how he will overcome General Assembly opposition, he said he will talk with the legislature.

It seems Rhode Island has gotten into a pattern of relying on a few large employers to carry the economic load. When they pull up their stakes and leave, the overall economy takes a hit. Or maybe this is more of a perception thing. Thus, when Amgen or Textron cut jobs, the impression is we're in dire straits. (Of course, the impression is pretty accurate). We need more small- and (especially) medium businesses to put down roots here. It can't be done over night, especially in a state with a reputation such as ours, but more employers help to soften the blow when one or two shut their doors and take off.

That's why it's been so exasperating to watch all of the wasted effort expended chasing the "magic bullet" of gambling. Let me ask you this: if we had voted in a West Warwick Casino, what would have stopped Mass. Governor Duval from "only" going for two casinos in Massachusetts? Wouldn't two Massachusetts casinos still have negatively impacted the projected revenue of a RI casino, just as they will probably do to Twin River and Newport?

Like Governor Carcieri says, casinos are short term solutions and putting too many eggs in the gambling basket isn't a wise financial "strategy." Like any other business, they are subject to the business cycle or external events. The thing with casinos is that they are an entertainment/service entity. They don't produce anything (but "fun"!). Like any other entertainment venue, their business can be negatively influenced when there's a "new game in town." And it can happen pretty fast. Remember what the casinos did to the "Big Tent"? Throw in the fact that RI state government relies so much on their gambling take, and we end up like--well--like we are now: lost revenue and no solution.

We require a long term plan, which means enticing more business to the state. Especially those that actually make stuff. But I don't think the method that has been tried recently will work. Crafting specific, sweetheart deals seem to only work so long as they are in place. Once they expire, off go those who took advantage of them. Instead, we need to follow a holistic plan. The entire business climate needs to change to first attract, and then maintain, new employers. Targeted business tax credits aren't enough. What needs to be done is to lower the tax burden across the board and reduce the red-tape and regulatory roadblocks. This can be done without sacrificing safety or environmental or other quality of life concerns.

Other states have done it, we can too. We just need the collective will to do so. I think it's there, but it needs to be cultivated. God knows, we've got plenty of fertilizer!

Laffey's FEC Fine: Less than nefarious, more like a mistake

The headline says "Laffey agrees to pay FEC $25,000 fine", the details indicate something less nefarious than implied:

...the FEC, in a Sept. 6 conciliation agreement made public yesterday, said it had “found reason to believe” that Laffey’s Senate campaign committee and his treasurer, Richard J. Sullivan, violated federal campaign law by “failing to identify the conduit of certain contributions” in his publicly filed fundraising reports.

According to the agreement, Laffey’s Senate campaign committee received $366,378 in earmarked contributions from the Club for Growth, run by former U.S. Rep Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

The way it worked: the group — which favors cutting government spending, death tax repeal, school choice and “Social Security reform with personal retirement accounts”— would solicit contributions for Laffey from among its own supporters, then bundle and ship the earmarked checks to the Laffey campaign.

While Laffey...named the individual contributors in his filings, the FEC noted that, as charged, his disclosure reports did not identify the Citizens Club for Growth as the conduit for the money, as required by federal campaign law.

After receiving notice of the complaint, the FEC said, Laffey amended his 2005 year-end and 2006 April quarterly reports to reflect the Club for Growth’s role in raising the money. Had he not gone the step further and agreed to pay the $25,000 fine, an FEC spokesman said the agency could have filed suit against him seeking much heftier fines, including theoretically an amount equal to the $366,378 at issue.

***
Laffey did not respond to inquiries, but his onetime college roommate and campaign adviser — Albany, N.Y.-lawyer Thomas Marcelle — responded on his behalf. Marcelle said the Laffey campaign sought advice from a lawyer recommended by his consultant Jon Lerner at Red Sea LLC, who said the law was “ambiguous,” but “the current practice was not to indicate” which among the many groups raising money for candidates had been the conduit for earmarked donations of this kind. He said he could name “Senators on the Judiciary Committee” who have escaped penalty for doing the same thing.

But he said the “the cost to litigate it was significantly higher than the $25,000,” so “the economics dictated” a settlement even though “when you see people from Wyoming [contributing], it’s pretty clear that was earmarked through the Club for Growth.”

I'm not making excuses for the Laffey campaign--and maybe they're just spinning away--but I'm not sure they would gain much from not saying who bundled their money for them. I mean, it's not like The Club for Growth are a bunch of swindlers or anything.

{H/T to commenter "Thomas" for reminding me of this story}.

Finish This Sentence: When The Going Gets Tough, the Rockefeller Republicans…

Thursday's Warwick Beacon carried its report, written by Russell J. Moore, on former U.S. Senator/former Warwick Mayor Lincoln Chafee's disaffiliation from the Republican party. (Moore mentions Anchor Rising's early coverage of this story; we appreciate the hat-tip).

However, the item in the article that really caught my eye was current Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian's answer to the question of whether he would consider switching away from the Republican party…

Avedisian, a fellow Rockefeller Republican, said he personally wouldn’t leave the Republican Party as long as he is in his current term.

That's a little less than telling the rank-and-file that "I'm in this with you all the way", isn't it?

Torn Between Conservatism and Fandom

The crotchety conservative purist in me recognizes how much more exciting the current Major League Baseball pennant race would most likely be this year under the old two-division system. This is what the standings might look like this morning, in the old American League East, where only one of the following three teams could secure a playoff spot…

The Sox fan in me says thank God for the wild card.

The Morning After

Thanks to everybody who came out last night. I'm always nervous to communicate with folks in a medium that I can't edit, but it was certainly fun.

We'll be planning more events in the future, and if you have any ideas, we'd love to hear them.

Shame on You, Sen. Reed

Yesterday the Senate passed a resolution condemning the disgraceful "General Betray-Us" ad in the NY Times sponsored by the despicable Moveon.org. The resolution reads:

To express the sense of the Senate that General David H. Petraeus, Commanding General, Multi-National Force-Iraq, deserves the full support of the Senate and strongly condemn personal attacks on the honor and integrity of General Petraeus and all members of the United States Armed Forces.

The resolution passed 72-25. The "no" votes were all Democrats, including both Reed and Whitehouse. I expected as much from Whitehouse, a lightweight on military and defense affairs if there ever was one. But why in the world would a West Point graduate like Reed who touts his military service take the side of an odious nest of vipers like Moveon.org over his fellow soldiers? Jim Webb may oppose the war but he had the decency to vote in favor of the condemnation of Moveon.org. But Jim Webb is an honorable man. Would that Reed had an ounce of Jim's spine. Reed on the other hand puts me in mind of Churchill's "Boneless Wonder."

The US taxpayers wasted a great deal of money on Reed's West Point education. They ought to demand a refund. Say, I have an idea. Why doesn't Moveon.org reimburse the American taxpayers for that education? After all, if Moveon.org is going to buy a US Senator it should be expected to pay full price.

Am I angry? You bet I am. Reed has dishonored himself and his state. Shame on you, Senator Reed. What a disgrace!

Just to Clarify

It's the TGI Friday's on the corner of Bald Hill Road and 117, not (as I'm told there is one) the location by the airport.i

Harvard University Doesn't Quite Understand the Concept of a Free Market

According to the Harvard Crimson, the definition of "intellectual property" is running amok at Harvard University (h/t Instapundit)…

Jarret A. Zafran ’09 said he was asked to leave the [Harvard Coop] after writing down the prices of six books required for a junior Social Studies tutorial he hopes to take.

“I’m a junior and every semester I do the same thing. I go and look up the author and the cost and order the ones that are cheaper online and then go back to the Coop to get the rest,” Zafran said….

Coop President Jerry P. Murphy ’73 said that while there is no Coop policy against individual students copying down book information, “we discourage people who are taking down a lot of notes.”

The apparent new policy could be a response to efforts by Crimsonreading.org—an online database that allows students to find the books they need for each course at discounted prices from several online booksellers—from writing down the ISBN identification numbers for books at the Coop and then using that information for their Web site.

Murphy said the Coop considers that information the Coop’s intellectual property.

Obviously, the only rational response to this is to send New England Patriots Head Coach Bill Belichick to the Coop, with a camera he can use to make videotapes of book prices to be broken down and analyzed later (but not during that particular shopping trip).

Re: Update: The Death of Edimar de Araujo

And the winner of this year's Alinsky award for staying on-message, no matter what facts, common sense and common decency all indicate, is Ali Noorani, the executive director of the Massachusetts Immigrant & Refugee Advocacy Coalition. Mr. Noorani receives this award for his quote appearing in Amanda Milkovits' and Karen Lee Ziner's story in today's Projo, following yesterday's revelation that the death of Edimar de Araujo was caused by a combination of cocaine and anti-anxiety medication...

"At the end of the day, a person died because they were an undocumented immigrant,” he said yesterday.

“How much money, time and emotional drama would have been saved if we had a functioning immigration system?” he said.

How exactly does Mr. Noorani believe that the combination of chemicals in Mr. Araujo's system at the time of his death related to his immigration status?

Last Reminder

Tonight's the night of our first-ever informal Anchor Rising gathering. Warwick TGI Friday's bar area. 7:00 p.m.

Even if you can do no more than stop in for a beer and a hello, we'd love to see you there. Or if you'd like to spend three hours working through RI's political corruption or the difficulties of providing universal healthcare, there's a good chance that at least one of us will be in the mood.

East Greenwich Pendulum Viewpoint: Clarifying the Teachers' Union Contract Debate With Facts

Today's East Greenwich Pendulum town newspaper contains a Viewpoint editorial in which I wrote these words:

The NEA teachers’ union strike and their contract demands are not about doing right by our children or about education. They are about maximizing adult entitlements where the NEA is willing to use our children as pawns to get more money.

And their claim about unacceptable working conditions does not stand up to scrutiny.

THE CONTEXT

From the outset, be clear about the context for this debate: It has nothing to do with a lack of desire to treat teachers well. Out of the 50 states, Rhode Island’s spending per pupil is the 9th highest and teachers’ salaries are the 8th highest - with East Greenwich paying above the RI average. We are generous and willingly so.

The resistance is to union contracts that continue an expensive entitlement ride which the state and individual communities can no longer afford. Union contracts directly impact over 80% of the school budget. In the last 10 years, the school budget has increased 87% while the town budget has increased 36%. That differential is why taxes have gone up relentlessly and a tax cap bill became state law.

The average East Greenwich teacher received nearly $62,000 in cash compensation last year. According to Claritas, the median income for East Greenwich residents is about $83,000, with 46% making less than $75,000. In other words, there is not that much difference between the cash compensation received by teachers and many taxpayers. Which makes the overriding question: Why should the teachers’ compensation package differ materially from those who pay for their compensation?

SALARY COMPENSATION ISSUES

School and teachers' union officials are all guilty of misleading the public about the real salary increases going to teachers under contracts around the state. Handing out 9-12%/year salary increases for 9 of the 10 job steps has been the practice in town going back to the 1990’s. We can't afford it anymore. The salary step schedule needs to be radically restructured in these negotiations.

The resistance is also to giving the same 9-12% annual salary increases to the worst teachers when we would gladly give high salary increases to the great teachers. But the NEA won't give principals the freedom to make such judgment calls.

There is an important nuance:

Roughly 60% of the East Greenwich teachers are at the top step 10 and their increases have been 3.25-3.8% over the last 3 years. As part of the step schedule restructuring, the top step needs to be adjusted so these teachers get an appropriate increase moving forward. But the pragmatic issue the NEA won't address is that future increases above 2% for these teachers – which many of us support – will require non-step 10 teachers to give up their 9-12%/year increases.

What part of 3-12%/year salary increases creates unacceptable working conditions? Or even an average of 3-4%, like the private sector?

LIES ABOUT PAY CUTS FOR TEACHERS

One of the most offensive statements by the NEA is that teachers would take a pay cut under the School Committee proposals. Simply and demonstrably false.

Example: Nearly 60% of teachers have a Master’s degree. I took the 2006-07 salary Master’s schedule from the last contract and increased each step by 2.4% to get a new 2007-08 salary schedule. Recall that each job step 1-9 teacher moves up 1 step each year while job step 10 teachers stay at 10. Job steps 1-9 would receive $4,080-7,224 (equal to 8.1%-11.2%) salary increases next year while job step 10 would receive a $1,675 or 2.4% salary increase.

The Excel spreadsheet documenting these pay increases is here. [NOTE: The Pendulum was not able to run this spreadsheet. Please take a look at it as it shreds the "pay cut" argument with verifiable numbers.]

Offsetting those pay increases is the after-tax incremental cost to teachers, under their Section 125 plan, for going to a 20% co-pay: $550/year for single coverage and $989/year for family coverage.

[Addendum, not in Pendulum editorial: Note in this additional spreadsheet how the annual after-tax cost to teachers of maintaining a 20% co-pay declines substantially in years 2 and 3 to incremental after-tax costs of $73-210/year. This is because the teachers would go from 5%/10% to 20% in year 1 and that change includes both the co-pay % increase and the annual increase in healthcare insurance premium costs. In the latter 2 years, the teachers only pay their pro-rata share of the annual cost increase of the premiums since they remain at a 20% co-pay in each subsequent year.]

Some pay cut. Remember this lie the next time the NEA says something publicly.

HEALTH INSURANCE CO-PAYMENTS

Teachers at job steps 1-3 have only a 5% co-pay. Teachers at steps 4-10 only pay 10%.

The East Greenwich town employees under an NEA contract pay 20%. What should teachers be treated differently?

I don’t know a single person in the private sector who pays less than 20%.

How does a 20% co-pay create unacceptable working conditions?

HEALTH INSURANCE CASH BUYBACK

East Greenwich teachers receive a cash bonus of $5,000/year when they do not use the health insurance plan provided by the district. 68 of the 235 teachers in the district receive this additional cash payment. The $5,000 bonus is among the highest in the state.

East Greenwich town employees under an NEA contract receive only a $1,000 cash payment. Why should teachers be treated differently?

I don't know a single person in the private sector who receives any cash buyback payments.

How do changes to that payment level create unacceptable working conditions?

PENSIONS

We will save the pension debate for another day. Just know that pension costs in the school budget went up 11% in 2006-07 and are going up 12% in 2007-08. The fact that nearly every public sector pension plan is under-funded doesn't deter the unions from resisting further reforms.

THE CHALLENGE MOVING FORWARD

While lying to the public about pay cuts to teachers and accusing the School Committee of negotiating in bad faith, the teachers’ union relentlessly demands only status-quo contract terms: (i) health insurance co-payment percentages at or below the current 5-10%; (ii) no change in the $5,000/year cash bonus for not using the district’s insurance programs; (iii) 9-12%/year salary increases for job steps 1-9; and, (iv) at least 3%/year increases for job step 10.

These demands, as in past negotiations, have resulted in school spending – and taxes – rising faster than the increases in the incomes of the working families and retirees in town who pay for the teachers’ compensation out of their incomes. This longstanding practice reduces the standard of living of the residents. They cannot afford for the school department to continue these reckless spending habits from the past and the recent tax cap state legislation now requires these bad habits be ceased.

Bluntly, none of the School Committee’s contract proposals has been sufficient to stay under the 5.25% spending increase allowed under the tax cap.

Everyone needs to start over with new proposals and get real.

That said, the School Committee is faced with the following choice, just like every family who has to live within its means: Either teachers’ salary and benefit costs are going to be reined in or educational programs and teachers’ jobs will have to be cut.

The School Committee strongly prefers the former alternative, which will allow the district to maintain academic and extra-curricular programs as well as teachers’ jobs that make a difference to our children’s education. The union negotiating position advocates the latter position, which only serves to provide ever greater adult entitlements, even at the expense of what benefits our children and at the potential cost of their member’s individual jobs.

It is possible to support teachers but not support their union’s extortion-like demands. I hope you will speak up against union demands which reduce your standard of living while not helping our children.

Contract terms like the rest of us, the people who pay for their salaries and benefits. It is all we ask.

I just received this email from an East Greenwich resident:

The article will have perfect timing. The tax bills came out yesterday and I nearly choked--it was reality time. Last night I went to an Open House at one of the schools and a teacher said to the parents: "I know this is hard for you but a 20% decrease in pay for a step 1 teacher isn't fair." I couldn't believe it---I am so happy you did that article.

As I said, clarifying the teachers' union contract debate with FACTS.

ADDENDUM:

In response to questions from Thomas in the Comments section, here is some further information worthy of more visibility. The information is based on data provided directly to me by the East Greenwich School Department:

1. The median 2007-2008 East Greenwich teacher total cash compensation is between $69,000-70,000, which is higher than the average total cash compensation of $61,748. (There are 23 teachers earning between $69,000-70,000 and I didn't try to figure out the precise answer.)

   Here are some other data points for teacher total cash compensation for 2007-2008 -

   • Over $80,000 - 6 teachers
   • $75,000-80,000 - 20 teachers
   • $70,000-74,999 - 73 teachers
   • $65,000-69,999 - 34 teachers

   So 133 of the 235 teachers in East Greenwich have a total cash compensation in excess of $65,000.

2. The average total cash compensation for teachers of $61,748 includes base salary ($58,674) plus other cash ($3,074).

   The "other" categories is primarily the cash bonus for not using the health insurance plan (29% of teachers get this bonus).

   It also includes department chair, coaching, advising, etc. fees. More about this in the Addendum to this post.

3. Of course, the median household income for East Greenwich residents ($82,629) is higher than the median individual East Greenwich teacher (call it $69,500). The Addendum to the earlier post highlighted immediately above also provides independent 3rd-party data on the incomes of East Greenwich residents, including this summary description:
   • Median household annual income: $82,629, with 46% of the households earning less than $75,000.
   • 77% of households have incomes below $150,000.
   • 4% of household have incomes over $500,000.
   • Average household income: $122,723.

   Note that the $82,629 is East Greenwich HOUSEHOLD data for residents which includes all incomes earned in that house - and that will be more than 1 person in many cases. The $69,500 teacher salary is for the individual only and does not equal their median household income.

   So you are not comparing apples-to-apples and the 32% differential between the two numbers that you raise is therefore irrelevant. I also discuss this point further in the same Addendum referenced above. Here is an excerpt, modified to reflect median income and not average income data:

   ...we also know that 29% (68 out of 231 FTE's) of teachers take the cash bonus for not using the district's health insurance plan so those teachers are clearly living in a household where another member works - and provides both a second income and health insurance. Furthermore, we know another 47% (110 out of 231 FTE's) of teachers utilize the family health insurance plan where it is safe to assume some are the sole breadwinners and others are not but still provide the health insurance for the family. Therefore, we can conclude that more than 29% and less than 76% of teachers in East Greenwich have working spouses/significant others where there are 2 incomes in the household.

   If we were to assume another working adult in the family earned another $60,000/year for 29-76% of the teachers, then the median household income for East Greenwich teachers would range between $86,900-115,100/year.

   If the other working adult in the family earned $90,000/year, then the median household income for East Greenwich teachers would range between $95,600-137,900/year.

   Note that all four projected numbers for East Greenwich teacher median household incomes - $86,900, $95,600, $115,100, and $137,900 - are HIGHER than the median household income of East Greenwich residents.

   Which means the economic lifestyles of East Greenwich teacher households are quite similar to (or even better than) the median of all East Greenwich households - my point all along. And, since East Greenwich is one of the wealthier communities in Rhode Island, that suggests that teacher households may be as well off or more well off than the median household in the state.

   That is a rather startling conclusion, isn't it?

   And that tells you what a good job the NEA has done in its public relations efforts.

   Putting that conclusion aside, my reason for making the point in the first place was because the NEA persists in saying that there are: (i) loads of "rich people" in EG making over $500,000/year; (ii) these people aren't paying enough in taxes already; and, (iii) they need to be soaked for more taxes.

   My response is straightforward: Their comments have been shown to be lies using third-party data in the earlier post.

   And, even if they were true, so what? And why should it matter? RI already has the 7th highest taxes of the 50 states in the USA and we already pay our teachers the 8th highest out of the 50 states - and East Greenwich above the RI average. Is the NEA suggesting all East Greenwich residents are not taxed enough?

   Besides, even suppose every East Greenwich teacher had NO working spouse and their income was equal to their household income: If we are going to get into the pay comparison you are seeking, then we have to introduce the number of work days/year - something that doesn't make your argument any stronger.

   E.g., Teachers work roughly 180 days/year. People in the private sector work roughly 240 days/year (52 weeks minus two weeks for holidays and two weeks for vacation).

   Suppose - quite incorrectly - that the median household salary for an East Greenwich teacher was only their income of $69,500/180 days = $386/day.

   Median household salary in East Greenwich of $82,629/240 days = $344/day.

   So even when making the utterly false assumption about household versus individual incomes, those day-pay numbers don't look favorable for teachers - and we have not touched the other relevant consideration: the relative differences in the length of the work days between the two.

   Any way you slice the data, it is reasonable to conclude that East Greenwich teacher households are doing just fine in general and also when compared specifically to East Greenwich residents.

   The NEA story line of "poor teachers" versus "rich East Greenwich residents" just does not hold water.

4. You miss my point here: Taxes have been going up faster than the incomes of the residents of EG because of the terms of the NEA contract. That is an economically unsustainable proposition. The days of being able to afford that trend are gone.

5. Yes, the school budget increased 87% over the last 10 years while the town budget only increased 36%. Don't have the data on how much of that 87% was driven by salary increases versus health insurance cost increases. But the health insurance cost data is unlikely to materially change the conclusion of this post because even today the insurance costs are still "just" 20% of the median teacher salary. The math won't make the point I think you are trying to make - it is the teachers' salaries which have been the primary driver in increased school budgets. I remember salaries alone going up about 7%/year during the years when I served on the School Committee.

   That said, based on data recently provided to me by the East Greenwich school department, here is the total 2007-08 compensation cost paid by taxpayers to support the "average" East Greenwich teacher:

   • Salary: $58,672
   • Other cash: $3,074 (2006-07 data only available at this time of year)
   • Health insurance, net of co-pay: $9,160
   • Pension costs: $7,263
   • Total compensation: $78,169

Update: The Death of Edimar de Araujo

Dr. Thomas P. Gilson, Rhode Island's Chief Medical Examiner, has just issued a press release as to the cause of Mr. Araujo's death:

"The cause of death for Edimar Alves De Araujo, a 34-year-old male from Milford, MA, who expired in Providence, RI, on August 7, 2007, after Federal Immigration agents took him into custody, has been determined to be acute intoxication due to the combined effects of cocaine and hydroxyzine (a medication used for the treatment of anxiety and emesis) with chronic seizure disorder as another significant condition contributing to death."

At the time of Mr. Araujo's tragic death, Ali Noorani, Executive Director of the Massachusetts Immigrant & Refugee Advocacy Coalition, stated, “I think everybody is waiting to see how this tragedy really occurred”. With the Medical Examiner's report, more of the picture has been filled in.

It is difficult to get away from the point Carroll Andrew Morse made in his original Anchor Rising post:

"From what we know, anyone with Mr. Araujo's medical condition -- citizen or non-citizen -- could have suffered the same unfotunate fate, if discovered to be the subject of an outstanding warrant following a traffic stop."

A Land Bereft of Models

I didn't realize that it was so hard to find models and/or fireman and policeman hats:

The sculptor who made the 9/11 memorial that became the center of attention after Mayor Charles Lombardi buffed out the likenesses of two former public safety officials from the granite surface spoke out yesterday, saying that while he understands the mayor's motivation he does not think it ethical to alter an artist's work after it has been dedicated. ...

"It didn't matter to me whose face I used," [Anthony Longo] said. "It was a composite, and to me any random face would do."

But Longo said finding someone to pose turned out to be harder than he expected. "I tried to get my nephew who is a police officer in Johnston, but he wasn't available. As time grew short I was getting desperate."

He said he was explaining his problem to an acquaintance at a restaurant when someone said he should try getting the chief, because "he should have a fireman's hat."

Longo said that when he was explaining his problem to Bursie, who also serves as the town's director of special projects, he asked him in desperation, "'Frank, do you have a policeman’s hat? Can I use you?' Frank said he guessed he could pose."

Knowing artists and having done artistic-type stuff myself, I've found a surprisingly common feeling that commissioned work is the property of the commissioner, with nothing unethical about changes. Mr. Longo might have me, though, when he notes that "what he did was not unlike what Michelangelo did when he used faces of local Roman citizens to create the images in the Sistine chapel." Apparently, there were no local citizens available for Longo's use, so he had to resort to public officials.

Happens all the time. At least Longo now knows that one often gets into trouble by listening to that sneaky "someone" guy.

ProJo Will Print Baloney After All

Apparently some of the baloney that blogs put out is good enough for the ProJo to pick up.

And unattributed at that.

On Saturday, Andrew broke the story that former Senator Chafee had finally left the GOP. So did RI Report's Tom Shevlin, who has some "original thoughts" on the way it was reported by ProJo (h/t Ian):

Sunday morning, the vast majority of Rhode Islanders awoke with the impression that somehow the Providence Journal had by chance asked Chafee if he had left the GOP. The Journal’s opening paragraph read as follows:

“Lincoln D. Chafee, who lost his Senate seat in the wave of anti-Republican sentiment in last November's election, said that he has left the party.”

It goes on “Chafee said he disaffiliated from the party ‘in June or July,’ making him an unaffiliated voter. He did so quietly, and until Sunday, he said, ‘No one's asked me about it.’ He said he made the move because ‘I want my affiliation to accurately reflect my status.’”

So did the Journal just decide to ask him about it? Why ever would they do that?

What the Journal failed to mention, but which I reported on Saturday along with AnchorRising, is that Chafee’s disaffiliation was discovered by an eagle-eyed RIGOP activist who had specific questions regarding Chafee’s registration status.

In fact, there was no need to speak to Chafee except to gather his personal reaction to what was as clear as black and white. Confirmation of the initial assertion was easily obtained through public access to the voter roll available online through the Secretary of State’s website.

No, there was no press release from Senator Chafee; no press conference or unsolicited phone call to the Journal newsroom. Chafee had kept his disaffiliation quiet for several months before the news broke, and without the diligence of one nosy party activist, the Journal and the rest of us probably still wouldn’t know about it.

Now, I’m under no illusions. I realize that the meager readership of the Rhode Island blogosphere pales in comparison to that of the Providence Journal and makes bloggers for the most part bit players in the news cycle....But if the Journal chose not to cite these bit players in their “original” reporting, then perhaps they shouldn’t have used reaction to Chafee’s disaffiliation for the basis of their follow-up story on Monday. Especially if those reactions were taken from a blog which carried the real story the day before the Journal’s own report ran.

UPDATED: The Entitlement Mentality of Certain Union Teachers & Their Leaders

I got a phone call today which passed along the following story:

When the Judge recently heard the case involving the illegal East Greenwich teachers' union strike, a teacher went up to a parent at the courthouse and said "Thank you for your support."

To which the parent replied: "I am supporting my child's education and I want you to get back to work."

And the teacher replied: "The town of East Greenwich has a lot of money. You have enough money to pay us more. You are hiding it all."

Aren't these union hacks brilliant?

Reminds me of the same entitlement nonsense talk said by the NEA back in 2005. Here is what NEA reps Roger Ferland and Jane Argenteri were quoted as saying about East Greenwich residents in a May 26, 2005 article entitled "Work-to-rule affecting EG school children" in the East Greenwich Pendulum newspaper (page 1, continuing onto page 6; hard-copy only available but referenced in this 2005 post):

1. "The teachers had to do [contract compliance] to show parents how much extra teachers really do."
2. "[Work-to-rule] simply means we won't do anything extra."
3. [Tutoring (i.e., any form of academic assistance) before or after school] is not part of their job description."
4. "Teachers have been doing more than what's required for no money in the past."
5. "...a majority of East Greenwich residents can afford to hire tutors for their children but have been receiving these services free from public school teachers for years."
6. "More than 50% of East Greenwich residents have a very high income, $500,000 or over."
7. "In the private sector no one works overtime without getting paid. And if they're off the clock at 5 p.m., you can bet they're out the door at 5."
8. "...contract compliance is not hurting the children. Not going on a field trip isn't hurting a child."

Separately, I am told that certain union negotiators believe that, should the 3050 tax cap be eliminated or neutered, they expect all the "extra" monies to flow directly into higher teachers' salaries and benefits - thereby ensuring taxes continue to go up faster than the increases in taxpayer incomes.

These people are smoking some serious mind-altering substances if they think that will ever happen. After all, the East Greenwich Town Council cut the school budget in each of the least two years - even before 3050 took effect.

Must be nice to live in the Entitlement Fantasy World.

Or, as Lawrence Reed of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy said in an October 2001 speech to the Economic Club of Detroit entitled Seven Principles of Sound Public Policy:

Economist Milton Friedman elaborated on this some time ago when he pointed out that there are only four ways to spend money. When you spend your own money on yourself, you make occasional mistakes, but they’re few and far between. The connection between the one who is earning the money, the one who is spending it and the one who is reaping the final benefit is pretty strong, direct and immediate.

When you use your money to buy someone else a gift, you have some incentive to get your money’s worth, but you might not end up getting something the intended recipient really needs or values.

When you use somebody else’s money to buy something for yourself, such as lunch on an expense account, you have some incentive to get the right thing but little reason to economize.

Finally, when you spend other people’s money to buy something for someone else, the connection between the earner, the spender and the recipient is the most remote — and the potential for mischief and waste is the greatest. Think about it — somebody spending somebody else’s money on yet somebody else. That’s what government does all the time.

But this principle is not just a commentary about government. I recall a time, back in the 1990s, when the Mackinac Center took a close look at the Michigan Education Association’s self-serving statement that it would oppose any competitive contracting of any school support service (like busing, food or custodial) by any school district anytime, anywhere. We discovered that at the MEA’s own posh, sprawling East Lansing headquarters, the union did not have its own full-time, unionized workforce of janitors and food service workers. It was contracting out all of its cafeteria, custodial, security and mailing duties to private companies, and three out of four of them were nonunion!

So the MEA — the state’s largest union of cooks, janitors, bus drivers and teachers — was doing one thing with its own money and calling for something very different with regard to the public’s tax money. Nobody — repeat, nobody — spends someone else’s money as carefully as he spends his own.

A truly cavalier attitude by the unions about their right to tap the hard-earned pay of working families and retirees in Rhode Island. Enough to make you really upset, isn't it?

ADDENDUM, further updated on September 19:

I look forward to addressing some of the comments made below in a new blog post!

In the meantime, this post caused an East Greenwich school official to contact me and say that Jane Argenteri is making the same comment in this year's negotiations about all the $500,000+ incomes in East Greenwich. This class warfare talk does get a bit old, especially when it - again - has no basis in fact. Sigh.

I recently held a second meeting with Maryanne Crawford, the Director of Administration for the East Greenwich School District. During that meeting, I learned the following:

• The average base salary cash compensation for East Greenwich teachers in 2007-08 is $58,674.
• The average of all other cash compensation for teachers in 2006-07 was $3,074. Nearly all of this is the impact of the $5,000 cash bonus for not using the health insurance plan. Other sources of cash payments come from serving as: (i) an advisor; (ii) a coach; (iii) a curriculum leader; (iv) a department chair; (v) a committee member; and, (vi) summer work.
• Therefore, the average total cash compensation paid to East Greenwich teachers is approximately $62,000.

From an earlier post, we also know that 29% (68 out of 231) of teachers take the cash bonus for not using the district's health insurance plan so those teachers are clearly living in a household where another member works - and provides both a second income and health insurance. Furthermore, we know another 47% (110 out of 231) of teachers utilize the family health insurance plan where it is safe to assume some are the sole breadwinners and others are not but still provide the health insurance for the family. Therefore, we can conclude that more than 29% and less than 76% of teachers in East Greenwich have working spouses/significant others where there are 2 incomes in the household.

If we were to assume another working adult in the family earned another $60,000/year for 29-76% of the teachers, then the average household income for East Greenwich teachers would range between $77,000-106,000/year. If the other working adult in the family earned $90,000/year, then the average household income for East Greenwich teachers would range between $86,000-128,000/year.

According to the US census in 2000, the median household income in East Greenwich was $70,063 - as of 2000 but expressed in 1999 dollars.

In addition, I received some further information about the incomes of East Greenwich residents. A firm named Claritas, a company that tracks and projects demographic information. This person who contacted me works with them and contracted them to run projected 2006 data on the town.

The uploaded PDF report shows the following projections for the town of East Greenwich in 2006:

• Median household annual income: $82,629, with 46% of the households earning less than $75,000.
• 77% of households have incomes below $150,000.
• 4% of household have incomes over $500,000.
• Average household income: $122,723.

Besides it being clear - again - that Argenteri doesn't know what she is talking about, my simple takeway is this: 46% of East Greenwich households earn less than $75,000/year and the average household income is $122,723. Teachers in East Greenwich make an average of about $62,000/year and - since somewhere between 29-76% of them have second incomes in their household - could realize average household incomes between $77,000-128,000/year.

So why should the taxpayers - many of whom live the same economic lifestyle as the teachers - have to fund entitlements which are greater than what they receive in their own paychecks? Should these same taxpayers, who are already taxed more than 80% of America, be required to suffer a further reduction in their standard of living?

And, even if you are unsympathetic to the plight of East Greenwich residents, do not forget that the NEA will take the terms of an eventual East Greenwich settlement to other less well-off towns around the state and demand that they accept similar contractual obligations.

Remember: Anchor Rising broke the news first about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and remains THE place to go for information on the teachers' strike and contract issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to all Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion
Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts (The reports linked to in this post make an important contribution to understanding how teachers' union contracts are about adult entitlements, not the education of our children.)
Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day (This is a particularly important post for understanding the NEA's political agenda and financial resources.)
Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday (Anchor Rising was the first to report that teachers were going to strike.)
More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute in East Greenwich.)
The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update
Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"
The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama
News Flash: Judge Orders East Greenwich Teachers Back to Work on Friday, September 7
Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals (This is an important post to read as it torpedoes another critical lie by the NEA.)
The NEA in East Greenwich: Reflections On The Week That Was (This post includes some important comments on the issues underlying the debate about the unresolved statewide education funding formula issue.)
The Two Alternatives Before Us: Educational Programs & Teacher Jobs OR Excessive Adult Entitlements (This post describes what will be the eventual tradeoffs.)
East Greenwich Teachers' Union Contract Negotiations Update
Quantifying the Trend Which Led to the 3050 Tax Cap Law (This post shows how much faster the school budget went up versus the town budget.)

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities
(These three posts immediately above in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)
This Is the Way the System Works, the System Works, the System Works
A Mere Suggestion for the Teachers' Unions
Tiverton School Committee Shuffles Its Offer
Hold on, hold on. Keep the money coming!
These Are Professionals?
Other Public Education News
The Teachers' Unions' Lack of Moral Character

Aarrgghh!

Just a reminder that today is "Talk LIke a Pirate" day. I model myself on Steve the Pirate from my favorite movie, Dodgeball.

Gay Marriage Fails in Maryland

Dale Carpenter writes (h/t):

By 4-3, Maryland's high court today rejected a claim for same-sex marriage under the state constitution. The opinion is more than 100 pages long and is studded with more citations to cases, law reviews and books (including, notably, William Eskridge's Gaylaw), and sociological and scientific studies, than any case yet on the issue.

***

SSM has lost in every state high court to consider the issue since the stunning success in Goodridge in Massachusetts in 2003. SSM legal advocates lost outright in Washington state and New York in 2006. New Jersey's high court also rejected an SSM claim in 2006, though it did order the recognition of civil unions and left open the possibility of a future pro-SSM ruling. A case is still pending in California's supreme court.

When you consider that SSM legal advocates have carefully chosen the most sympathetic venues since Goodridge, this record of losses is especially significant. It means that strong anti-SSM precedents are being created in the friendliest states, making pro-SSM rulings in other states even more unlikely in the near future. Once California is decided, the initial phase of post-Goodridge litigation will have pretty much run its course. That was the phase that was supposed to start an avalanche of pro-SSM judicial rulings that would quickly lead to gay marriage around the country. It didn't happen. Other cases are pending in states like Iowa, and there's nothing to stop gay couples from filing anywhere else, but the odds are now longer. If SSM is to advance much in the near future, it will probably have to come legislatively.

Carpenter also explains that:

The Maryland court rejected the argument that the ban on gay marriages is a form of sex discrimination...

It rejected the argument that sexual orientation discrimination should be subjected to heightened scrutiny, citing gays' legislative success in the state as evidence the group is not "politically powerless" and thus needs no unusual judicial protection from the majority.

It added that there is not yet a sufficient scientific consensus on whether sexual orientation is "immutable."

The court also decided that there is no fundamental right to marry another person of the same sex.

Finally, the court concluded that the limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples is rational because it furthers (however imperfectly) the state's legitimate interest in encouraging procreation. If the correct level of scrutiny is the traditional rational-basis test, this conclusion is hard to dispute.

10:00 AM | Comments (14) | TrackBack (0)

Totten in Anbar

Michael J. Totten has done incredible work reporting from Iraq. I highly recommend his latest, Anbar Awakens Part II: Hell is Over. There's so much in his story, but I was particularly moved by this passage:

The Iraqis of Anbar Province turned against Al Qaeda and sided with the Americans in large part because Al Qaeda proved to be far more vicious than advertised. But it’s also because sustained contact with the American military – even in an explosively violent combat zone –convinced these Iraqis that Americans are very different people from what they had been led to believe. They finally figured out that the Americans truly want to help and are not there to oppress them or steal from them. And the Americans slowly learned how Iraqi culture works and how to blend in rather than barge in.

“We hand out care packages from the U.S. to Iraqis now that the area has been cleared of terrorists,” one Marine told me. “When we tell them that some of these packages aren’t from the military or the government, that they were donated by average American citizens in places like Kansas, people choke up and sometimes even cry. They just can’t comprehend it. It is so different from the lies they were told about us and how we’re supposed to be evil.”

Is there any doubt that our American military is filled with the best our nation has to offer?

TGIF on Thursday

Just a reminder: tomorrow night at 7:00 at TGI Friday's is Anchor Rising's first attempt at an informal gathering of writers and readers. I'll have Anchor Rising baseball caps for the first five people to ask me for one.

Hope to see you there.

An Informed Patriotism Grounded in Thoughtfulness, Knowledge & Discussions Around the Dinner Table

An excerpt from Ronald Reagan's Farewell Address:

...Finally, there is a great tradition of warnings in presidential farewells, and I've got one that's been on my mind for some time. But oddly enough it starts with one of the things I'm proudest of in the past eight years: the resurgence of national pride that I called the new patriotism. This national feeling is good, but it won't count for much, and it won't last unless it's grounded in thoughtfulness and knowledge.

An informed patriotism is what we want. And are we doing a good enough job teaching our children what America is and what she represents in the long history of the world? Those of us who are over 35 or so years of age grew up in a different America. We were taught, very directly, what it means to be an American. And we absorbed, almost in the air, a love of country and an appreciation of its institutions. If you didn't get these things from your family, you got them from the neighborhood, from the father down the street who fought in Korea or the family who lost someone at Anzio. Or you could get a sense of patriotism from school. And if all else failed, you could get a sense of patriotism from popular culture. The movies celebrated democratic values and implicitly reinforced the idea that America was special. TV was like that, too, through the mid-'60s.

But now, we're about to enter the '90s, and some things have changed. Younger parents aren't sure that an unambivalent appreciation of America is the right thing to teach modern children. And as for those who create the popular culture, well-grounded patriotism is no longer the style. Our spirit is back, but we haven't reinstitutionalized it. We've got to do a better job of getting across that America is freedom--freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of enterprise. And freedom is special and rare. It's fragile; it needs protection.

So, we've got to teach history based not on what's in fashion but what's important: Why the Pilgrims came here, who Jimmy Doolittle was, and what those 30 seconds over Tokyo meant. You know, four years ago on the 40th anniversary of D-Day, I read a letter from a young woman writing of her late father, who'd fought on Omaha Beach. Her name was Lisa Zanatta Henn, and she said, "We will always remember, we will never forget what the boys of Normandy did." Well, let's help her keep her word. If we forget what we did, we won't know who we are. I'm warning of an eradication of the American memory that could result, ultimately, in an erosion of the American spirit. Let's start with some basics: more attention to American history and a greater emphasis on civic ritual. And let me offer lesson No. 1 about America: All great change in America begins at the dinner table. So, tomorrow night in the kitchen I hope the talking begins. And children, if your parents haven't been teaching you what it means to be an American, let 'em know and nail 'em on it. That would be a very American thing to do.

And that's about all I have to say tonight. Except for one thng. The past few days when I've been at that window upstairs, I've thought a bit of the "shining city upon a hill." The phrase comes from John Winthrop, who wrote it to describe the America he imagined. What he imagined was important because he was an early Pilgrim, an early freedom man. He journeyed here on what today we'd call a little wooden boat; and like the other Pilgrims, he was looking for a home that would be free.

I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it and see it still.

And how stands the city on this winter night? More prosperous, more secure, and happier than it was eight years ago. But more than that; after 200 years, two centuries, she still stands strong and true on the granite ridge, and her glow has held steady no matter what storm. And she's still a beacon, still a magnet for all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, toward home...

Let's not just mark time. Let's make a difference and make the city stronger.

A Rhode Island No-Brainer

In what sort of environment could anyone possibly find it acceptable to place the faces of two local (and living!) officials on a monument to others who died heroically in a distant city?

A decision by Mayor Charles Lombardi to remove the likenesses of two of the town’s former public safety officials from the town’s 9/11 Memorial has drawn outcries from several members of the Town Council, who want the mayor to restore the engravings at his own expense.

The 7-foot-high monument in Evans Field was installed and dedicated two years ago by the town’s then-mayor, A. Ralph Mollis, who is now the secretary of state. Until a week or so ago, the granite slab included, among other things, the likenesses of then-Fire Chief Stephen Catanzaro and Frank Bursie, who was serving under Mollis as a police commissioner.

Call the two men "models" if you like, but the New Yorkers who told Mayor Lombardi that "so many people died [that] it would be wrong to have them represented by two individuals" would be right to suggest that the necessity for models ought to have alerted those involved in the project that even giving faces to the representations — let alone faces of acting officials — might be inappropriate.

Qualifying the Cynical Literary Kneejerkism of the Blogger

A note from Patrick Murray expressing dissatisfaction with my post about the first two parts of John Mulligan's Providence Journal series about him led me to take another look at what I'd written. My title was certainly too strong; the use of the word "sinister" was too suggestive of conscious action. My knee-jerk reaction was unfair to Mulligan and to Murray, and for that I apologize, but I continue to think that the first piece — which, appearing on Sunday, is likely to be the most read of the five — did not help matters.

Look, how a writer begins a story sets the context for what follows. If, for example, a story about a wounded Marine begins with his continued belief in the war (which may or may not be the case, here), or a touching vignette of the improved lives of the Iraqi people, or a scene related to the "great job offer from a big national construction company" that Murray is "on the verge of accepting," according to the teaser for part five, that would frame the injury and recovery differently than Mulligan's choice of opening scene: the attack that resulted in Murray's lost leg.

Of course, it's a matter of opinion whether Mulligan chose the correct tack — and for all I know, he consulted Murray about it beforehand. At a time when our nation is suffering internal battles about whether it is worth the cost to stay in Iraq, however, it is my opinion that a different approach would have served the United States of America, its military forces, and perhaps Patrick Murray, himself, better.

These posts are just my thoughts, expressed in a rapid and somewhat informal medium, on a piece of writing and its political background. I did not intend "to drag Pat's name through the mud," as a commenter inexplicably accused me of attempting. Perhaps being a writer and editor gives me an unusual approach to narrative-style news stories that doesn't translate well to those who are not so inclined. I most definitely did not wish to insult one of Rhode Island's heroes, and I apologize to him and to anybody who might have had a similar reaction.

Re: A Misplaced Focus

Justin's post about the contaminated land in Tiverton provokes a comparison to the major complication of nuclear energy — the issue of long-term storage of spent nuclear materials — and the advisability of augmenting our generation of nuclear energy which would, naturally, increase the amount of highly toxic waste product to be dealt with.

After the initial cooling off period, high-level radioactive waste requires isolation of 10,000 years . It is safe to assume that geologic and volcanic activity — or the low probability thereof — were a consideration in the choosing of Yucca Mountain .

It's not that ten thousand years is a long time, which of course it is. It's that one thousand years is a long time. However stable the storage location seems now, we cannot leave signs that say, "Nuclear waste buried here. Stay away." And if, heaven forbid, the water table shifts, people's water supply, and then the people themselves, could get contaminated.

Yes, 20% of our energy presently is nuclear generated. To turn to it in earnest seems almost a guarantee that two, three, seven thousand years from now, there will be many more victims like the 250 in Tiverton, except that the price they will pay will not be economic.

Southern New England, Land of the Resort Casino

The pressure that Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick's three-casino proposal puts on Rhode Island raises in the imagination a map of the United States with a cluster of red dots representing six casinos squeezed into the tiny area covered by Southern New England. Is that the reality to which we all wish to awake when the money-drunk desperation for state revenue subsides?

I have no moral objection to gambling, but the pending rush on casinos, as if they represent some sort of miracle stock in which to invest, reeks of greed from top to bottom — from the state government that refuses to cut spending significantly to the companies that seek to profit from the cheaply produced entertainment of an illusion of easy riches to the people who direct their own resources from more productive ends toward that illusion. Even if we make the questionable assumption that legalized and industrialized gambling will not come with the seedy chains of its outside-the-law ancestry, a system built on greed will inevitably engulf the entire society in its corruption.

Don't believe me? Then put down the mental map and imagine the result when Big Casino, Big Labor, Big Welfare, and Big Government Democrats turn their murky green gaze in unison toward their mutual prey. It will be far too late for that prey by the time those powerful entities realize, in their greed, that there is not enough of the dying breed to go around.

A Misplaced Focus

The case of the contaminated soil a Tiverton neighborhood just down the hill from me is beginning to exemplify everything that is wrong with our current mix of government ubiquity and the cultural knee-jerk reaction to litigate:

Fiscal woes notwithstanding, the DEM went into the red in the fiscal year that ended in June to pay a Washington law firm nearly $1.1 million to buttress its own five lawyers as it tries to force the Texas-based utility Southern Union to clean up the soil.

Five years after the toxic wastes were discovered and two years after the DEM first called on Southern Union for remediation plans, there is no end in sight to a highly contentious legal battle.

Roger Williams University Law Professor Jared Goldstein has suggested that we might as well make those expenses permanent and "hire eight or nine staff lawyers at $100,000 a year" plus "supporting staff." DEM Director Michael Sullivan complains that the ability of the energy company to simply outspend Rhode Island in the courthouse is "fundamentally unfair to the citizens of the entire state."

I'd suggest that what's fundamentally unfair is a system that gets mired in expensive legally wrangling with the goal of assigning blame and finding somebody else to pay for the horrible remnants of our ignorant past. The article contains hints that there could be another approach:

Southern Union initially cooperated with the DEM in conducting two site investigations of the contaminated area.

But since residents filed a civil suit seeking unspecified damages in 2005, Southern Union has insisted it is not responsible and claims the DEM’s own regulations do not require Southern Union to submit remediation plans.

The parallels between homeowners who unknowingly bought contaminated land and a distant company that unknowingly bought another business with a contaminated history suggest, to me, that a culture that encouraged shared efforts toward remediation of mutual misfortune would be to everybody's benefit. The search for big pockets seems to come around somehow to costing everybody else money.

What's in Your Interest?

The New York Times smells self interest in industries' recent support for federal regulations. A variety of factors are in play, but one quoted source for the story voices the overall gut reaction of public advocates:

"I am worried about industry lobbyists bearing gifts," said Edmund Mierzwinski, consumer program director at the U.S. Public Interest Research Group in Washington. "I don't trust them. Their ultimate goal is regulation that protects them, not the public."

That strategy isn't a new contrivance, as illustrated by an historical note from Milton and Rose Friedman's Free to Choose:

As the campaign against the railroads mounted, some farsighted railroad men recognized that they could turn it to their advantage, that they could use the federal government to enforce their price-fixing and market-sharing agreements and to protect themselves from state and local governments. They joined the reformers in supporting government regulation. The outcome was the establishment of the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1887.

It took about a decade to get the commission in full operation. By that time the reformers had moved on to their next crusade. The railroads were only one of their concerns. They had achieved their objective, and they had no overpowering interest to lead them to do more than cast an occasional glance at what the ICC was doing. For the railroad men the situation was entirely different. The railroads were their business, their overriding concern. They were prepared to spend twenty-four hours a day on it. And who else had the expertise to staff and run the ICC? They soon learned how to use the commission to their own advantage.

These examples come to mind because David Palmisciano, a member of the Special House Commission to Examine the Issue of Licensing Builders and Contractors and president of Carpenters Local Union 94 today insisted, in a letter to the Providence Journal responding to my piece on increased regulation of building contractors in Rhode Island, that the public must be protected from "unscrupulous contractors." Why unscrupulous practices can't simply carry civil or criminal penalties as an after-the-fact disincentive, Palmisciano doesn't explain. Instead, he writes:

Requiring contractors to have some basic qualifications and training is certainly no hurdle — a good contractor should be interested in furthering their knowledge of the trade. As this is no more than is required of the nurses and doctors who work to ensure the public health in our hospitals, it is certainly not an unreasonable requirement for those building the hospitals.

Personally, I'm very interested in expanding my knowledge of my trade of carpentry. (That is, after all, my main route toward increased pay.) I'm just not persuaded that my limited time and resources are better spent on official "continuing education" than on, oh I don't know, plying my trade. And as far as I can see, no educational regime is required before becoming a contractor. No doubt the unions and other established players would salivate over the possibility of forcing all potential competition to go through a certain number of years of training, but those who currently look to construction as a reasonably well-paying alternative to poverty might find the investment impossible, or the narrowed entryway to the career impassible. Moreover, the housing market would surely suffer — and consumers would surely balk — if all carpenters were as well remunerated for their investment in training as nurses and doctors.

I've a feeling, however, that, rhetoric notwithstanding, the consumer is not top of mind for the regulators. Writes Mr. Palmisciano:

... the commission sought to create a level playing field for legitimate contractors to compete. Currently, both union and reputable non-union contractors are facing a dilemma. Unscrupulous contractors who skimp on basics such as carrying workers’ compensation insurance or illegally misclassifying employees as independent contractors gain an incredibly unfair advantage over contractors who follow the rules.

My op-ed called the sponsor of the relevant legislation, Charlene Lima, "the champion of the established player," and apparently Mr. Palmisciano agrees. "Leveling the playing field" means increasing the cost of construction to working Rhode Islanders and raising barriers against competition to the benefit of just those players.

There are all sorts of ways to be unscrupulous Mr. Union President, and some of them involve selling protection to the public for work that will gradually become too expensive for more and more families performed by workers who are more and more smug in their incumbency.

A Structural Scapegoat

Julia Steiny's column yesterday on Rhode Island's poor treatment of its school principals is worth a read:

In Massachusetts, principals can hire new faculty and make many of their own decisions. The Massachusetts 1993 Education Reform Act shifted much authority to the principals, with the understanding that they would delegate and share that authority with their staff. The quality of that state’s public education is now considered the best in the nation; empowering their school leaders certainly helped get them there.

In Rhode Island, the principal has the same mammoth responsibilities, but only nominal authority. Instead of allowing the principal and her staff to use their brains to solve problems, policymakers have prefabricated many school-level decisions and embedded them in labor/management contracts, state laws, Regents regulations and district policies. Principals don’t make decisions so much as interpret and implement the decisions made for them. The compliance-driven nature of their jobs crushes creative problem-solving.

Of course, school principals in all states, including Massachusetts, are overregulated to some degree. But Rhode Island principals are among the most heavily micromanaged, which is to say, they are asked to do their jobs with one hand tied behind their backs.

September 17, 1862: The Bloodiest Day in American History

September 17, 1862 remains the bloodiest day in American history. On that day near Sharpsburg, Maryland, the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia and the Union Army of the Potomac suffered combined casualties of nearly 26,000, including nearly 5500 dead. Although tactically a draw, the fact that Robert E. Lee had been turned back after a string of victories beginning in the spring permitted Lincoln to issue the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, which changed the character of the war. I wrote a piece on Antietam as part of my series on the Civil War for the Ashbrook Cetner in Ashland, Ohio. It is here.

Quantifying the Trend Which Led to the 3050 Tax Cap Law

Why did the Rhode Island Senate Bill 3050 tax cap bill become the law of the land?

Because of this unsustainable economic trend:

...These [union] demands, as in past negotiations, have resulted in school spending - and therefore taxes - rising faster than the increases in the incomes of the working families and retirees who reside in East Greenwich and pay for the teachers' salaries and benefits out of their incomes. This longstanding practice reduces the standard of living of the residents. As such, they cannot afford for the school department to continue these reckless spending habits from the past and the recent state legislation now requires us to cease these bad habits.

The School Committee is faced with the following choice, just like every family who has to live within its means: Either teachers' salary and benefit costs are going to be reined in or educational programs and teachers' jobs will have to be cut. We cannot afford to continue the gravy train ride of past years...

Recalling that teacher salary and benefits comprise just over 80% of the total school budget, here are some hard cold facts for East Greenwich which quantify the problem with the economics of today's teachers' union contracts:

From the June 11, 1997 Financial Town Meeting (PDF document) regarding the FY1997-1998 budget:

• The town operating budget was $8,814, 281.
• The school operating budget was $16,490,358.
• The total operating budget was $25,304,639.

Fast forward to ten years later: From the June 12, 2007 Financial Town Meeting (PDF document) regarding the FY2007-2008 budget:

• The town operating budget is $11,954,197.
• The school operating budget is $30,889,947.
• The total operating budget is $42,844,144.

In other words, over the last ten years:

• The town operating budget increased 35.6% or 3.1%/year.
• The school operating budget increased 87.3% or 6.5%/year.
• The total town and school operating budget increased 69.3% or 5.4%/year.
• The school budget went from being 65% of the total operating budget to 72% of the total operating budget.

These numbers show how the school budget has resulted in living beyond the means of taxpayers, the working families and retirees of East Greenwich. Driven by outrageous and unaffordable teachers' union contract terms demanded by the unions and enabled by spineless politicians and bureaucrats.

And that is why 3050 became law in the state.

Ask your town officials to do the same analysis for your community.

Sunday's First Page, Above the Fold, Part III: Imagine There's No Heaven

The last item slipped onto the Sunday Providence Journal's front page above the fold is the most inexplicable. Taken from the Washington Post, about atheists in England, the relevance of the article's placement seems mainly to be that it allows the Projo to burnish its image among Rhode Island fellow travelers who accuse the paper of being "too conservative" by introducing them to "a thoughtful man with graying hair and clear blue eyes" who provides the story's lede:

In the United States and Europe, atheists react against a resurgence of Muslim and Christian extremism.

Flocking to "surprise bestsellers," such as a book written by rabid anti-religious atheist Richard Dawkins, such folks as Graham Wright see religion as a spectrum "from Muslim extremists blowing themselves up in God's name to Christians condemning gays, contraception and stem-cell research."

"There is a feeling that religion is being forced on an unwilling public, and now people are beginning to speak out against what they see as rising Islamic and Christian militancy," [Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society of Britain] said.

As if in an effort to prove Wright's notion that religion has become "a negative influence in... the world," Sunday's Projo is peppered with stories highlighting the negative about religion and religious organizations, all plucked from non-Projo sources. There's the accelerating schism of the Anglican church over some branches handling of homosexuals on page A5. There's the story of elderly, disabled nuns who've lost their convent because the Archdiocese of Los Angeles has abuse settlements to pay on the front page of the Sunday Extra section. There's the non-commentary-page opinion piece claiming that "While American soldiers fight to establish a secular democracy abroad, many Americans want to create a Christian nation at home." And there's the story about the boys who are being driven out of a Utah polygamous sect to decrease the competition among males.

These are newsworthy items, all, but the unprompted collection of them into one paper with no clear local reason for interest suggests an extremism of the sort that Graham Wright voices when he says, "I truly loathe any sight or sound of religion."

"Shame!"

Mark Steyn solves the problem of our lack of general consensus about what to shout at speakers who deserve remonstration:

This year I marked the anniversary of September 11th by driving through Massachusetts. It wasn't exactly planned that way, just the way things panned out. So, heading toward Boston, I tuned to Bay State radio colossus Howie Carr and heard him reading out portions from the official address to the 9/11 commemoration ceremony by Deval Patrick, who is apparently the governor of Massachusetts. 9/11, said Governor Patrick, "was a mean and nasty and bitter attack on the United States."

"Mean and nasty"? He sounds like an over-sensitive waiter complaining that John Kerry's sent back the aubergine coulis again. But evidently that's what passes for tough talk in Massachusetts these days — the shot heard around the world and so forth. Anyway, Governor Patrick didn't want to leave the crowd with all that macho cowboy rhetoric ringing in their ears, so he moved on to the nub of his speech: 9/11, he continued, "was also a failure of human beings to understand each other, to learn to love each other."

I was laughing so much I lost control of the wheel and the guy in the next lane had to swerve rather dramatically. He flipped me the Universal Symbol of Human Understanding. I certainly understood him, though I'm not sure I could learn to love him. Anyway I drove on to Boston and pondered the governor's remarks. He had made them, after all, before an audience of 9/11 families: Six years ago, two of the four planes took off from Logan Airport, and so citizens of Massachusetts ranked very high among the toll of victims. Whether or not any of the family members present last Tuesday were offended by Governor Patrick, no-one cried "Shame!" or walked out on the ceremony. Americans are generally respectful of their political eminences, no matter how little they deserve it.

Let's all agree on "Shame!" as the voice from the crowd when the crowd is too polite (or deluded) to take the microphone away.

Sunday's First Page, Above the Fold, Part II: A Media Surge Against the Military

There's something sinister about the timing of the Providence Journal's five-part series about Corporal Patrick Murray. A production this large was most definitely a long time in the making, but issuing part one this week makes it resonate as a response to General Petraeus, and its execution reinforces the impression.

Murray certainly deserves to have his story told in his home state's one major newspaper, but John Mulligan's telling overlays a subjective authorial eye. A notably different storyline could have acknowledged progress with the war; it could have highlighted noble and heroic motivations for entering it as a Marine. Instead, it opens with the dramatic day, over a year ago, that Murray was injured, with the first line, "Even the wisecracking Patrick D. Murray was grim with anger and grief as his platoon strapped on armor and helmets to go back out on night patrol." Either way, it would inevitably be a description of the cost of war, but in Mulligan's hands, it's a cost without a benefit.

Readers might wonder what would lead a young college student to put himself in harm's way. They might wonder whether he is disillusioned, affirmed in his stirring patriotism, or not quite sure whether his injury ought to bear on his larger thoughts about America and the war in Iraq, and the larger war against terrorism. What readers get is this:

The journey began at the dinner table of the Murray's raised ranch on Haverhill Street one night in March 2003, when their middle child dropped his bombshell.

"Well, Mom, I went up to Boston today to enlist in the Marines," Patrick said, as casually as "pass the potatoes."

"You did what?" his mother exploded.

"Well," Patrick ventured, "Big Joe was at Brown and he enlisted in the Marines."

Not the wisest comeback from her University of Rhode Island scholar, thought Suzanne Murray, a seventh-grade English teacher in Cranston. The United States is about to invade Iraq, and Patrick brings up his grandfather's war. Good Lord, doesn’t he remember that Big Joe was almost killed in Korea?

Suzanne began to cry. She wanted to fight this decision, but deep inside she knew it was what Patrick wanted to do. Family tradition was part of it. Patrick's other grandfather had spent World War II in the Navy. Suzanne's mom and dad, Joe and Sally Motherway, had both been Marines. Two of Suzanne's eight brothers and sisters were career military officers. One of her younger cousins was headed for Iraq.

Then there was Patrick's nature. The Murrays' only son had taken the Sept. 11 attacks to heart. Suzanne and David Murray had been so proud to see this boy — a young man now, she had to keep reminding herself — channel his anger into action, fixing up care packages to ship to the workers at Ground Zero. And now, four of Patrick's closest friends were preparing to fight in Iraq.

It took some days, but Patrick's mother reconciled herself to his decision. "I had to support him," she said, "but it was the hardest thing in the world."

In other words, we get an interpretation of Patrick's motivation from the mother who consulted a lawyer about enabling him to break his contract with the Marines.

The nature of events makes part 2 a little better. Despite a few paragraphs that make it sound as if the enemy held all of the cards, Mulligan does describe a military victory for the Marines. He then goes on to include this very interesting case study in politics' effect on distant American warriors:

LATE IN JULY, a distant political decision plunged Fallujah into its worst violence since the 2004 battle that dispersed the jihadists and destroyed large expanses of the city. In a goodwill gesture widely portrayed as reparation for the abuse of detainees by American soldiers, the U.S. and Iraqi leadership ordered the release of more than 1,000 men from Abu Ghraib prison. It was the first installment in shutting down the prison by summer’s end.

"Seven hundred of the prisoners came back to Fallujah in one fell swoop," said Francis J. "Bing" West, a military analyst and author from Newport who was in Fallujah that summer.

The very next weekend "the place just went crazy," Murray said. It started that Friday, the Muslim holy day. Now "the level of violence just skyrocketed," Murray said — against Iraqi civilians and police as well as the Marines. Rampant violence continued for the remaining weeks of 1/25's deployment, and beyond.

"Now every single day, with like a combat patrol, you were expecting something," Murray said. "We were sure going to get shot at today. Or our friends were going to get blown up. Or there was going to be a sniper out there. Or an IED."

Perhaps I've grown too cynical, but it strikes me as likely that Mulligan had a quote or two from his subjects voicing their opinions of that "goodwill gesture widely portrayed as reparation," and that he would have included them had they fit the storyline better. We'll see how the series evolves. In the meantime, if anybody out there has a way of getting in touch with Corporal Murray, I'm sure I'm not alone in my interest in thoughts of his that might not have made it into the story.

Sunday's First Page, Above the Fold, Part I: Chafee Quits the Party!

In a piece that was apparently written yesterday, the Providence Journal's Bruce Landis explains that Lincoln Chafee didn't leave the Republican Party, the Republican Party left him:

Lincoln D. Chafee, who lost his Senate seat in the wave of anti-Republican sentiment in last November's election, said yesterday that he has left the party.

Chafee said he disaffiliated with the party he had helped lead, and his father had led before him, because the national Republican Party has gone too far away from his stance on too many critical issues, from war to economics to the environment.

"It's not my party any more," he said.

Chafee's departure is another step in the waning of the strain of moderate Republicanism that was once a winning political philosophy from Rhode Island and Connecticut to the Canadian border. For the first time since the Civil War, the six New England states combined now have only one Republican U.S. House member, Connecticut’s Christopher Shays.

At least Linc's finally made an honest man of himself, even if he did take a buggy's worth of national party money in an attempt to hold on to power:

Ironically, after all of Chafee’s opposition to the Republican policies he disagreed with, the party helped him survive a primary challenge from the right, from former Cranston Mayor Stephen P. Laffey. National Republican leaders supported Chafee, having concluded that even though Chafee had voted against many of President Bush’s initiatives, including authorizing the Iraq war, he was the only Republican who could win in Rhode Island.

Kerr Must Be in the Index...

Bob Kerr somehow got his hands on a copy of Rescuing Providence blogger (and regular AR commenter) Michael Morse's forthcoming book of that name, and he really thinks you should read it:

Morse has been an emergency medical technician (EMT) and firefighter in Providence for 16 years. He is one of those people, like most who work at firehouses, who are hooked on the job. Despite the falling-down fatigue that comes with call after call, he would have it no other way.

He has been a writer for a lot of years too. It is tough to say just when that part of him kicked in. He remembers his days at Bishop Hendricken High School, where he did not light up the honor roll. But he got that B in English once. There were some early indications that he could do things with the language.

And he has. He’s written a book, and it’s so damn good that I can’t stand this guy. I mean, just where does he get off climbing out of a rescue wagon and writing with this kind of feeling and pace and vivid recollection?

Oh to be so good that Kerr can't stand you! I guess we mere citizens will have to wait until October 1st to stoke similar resentment of Mr. Morse.

Where Did the Good Times Go?

That question usually implies that the good times have disappeared, but if by "good times" one means "strong economic growth," Greg Kaza would argue that the good times have gone to the Red states:

Political pundits identify 18 bona-fide Blue states, which backed Democrats Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004, and 29 clear-cut Red states, which supported Republican President George W. Bush both times out. Blue states are said to be "liberal," and Red states "conservative." But there might be another reason to term certain states "blue": weak employment growth in a period of expansion.

Total Blue-state employment growth has been only 3.3 percent during the current expansion, which began in November 2001, compared with the U.S. rate of 5.5 percent. Meanwhile, total Red-state employment growth has been 7.5 percent, more than double that of the Blue states.

It seems to me that Blue state provincialists have two directions in which to head, if they wish to improve their economic lot in comparison with those on the other side of the primary-color aisle: begin to let go of some of the cherished, but faulty, economic ideas and policy approaches that overwhelm their natural advantages, or attempt to force competing states to play by the same burdensome rules. Somehow, I don't suspect we'll be left in suspense as to their choice.

Poor Diagnoses, or Munchausen by Proxy?

Rhode Island Kids Count's Jill Beckwith is correct that Rhode Island is "heading in the wrong direction" when it comes to healthcare. According to Projo Medical Writer Felice Freyer, fewer Rhode Island workers have healthcare coverage, a higher percentage of children are without it, and yet:

Rhode Island spends a higher proportion of its economy and its state budget on health care than the rest of New England and the nation.

Why, then, do three of the four recommendations that Freyer reports from "a first-of-its-kind report" by the state's health insurance commissioner, Christopher Koller, call for increased public aid, with the fourth suggesting that the state "require employers to offer health insurance and individuals to buy it"? Either the problem is being misdiagnosed, or the care-for-you community in the public sphere has a social manifestation of Munchausen by proxy (the disease that led that mother in The Sixth Sense to spoon Pine-Sole into her daughter's soup).

Don't misunderstand: requiring people to buy their own health insurance is a key component of the solution that I've increasingly been favoring, but in typical Rhode Island fashion, it looks as if the powers that be are fixin' to get it all wrong. Expanding the number of people who can claim publicly funded insurance while leaning on companies and slightly wealthier individuals (such as those at three times the poverty level), and while taking no steps to decrease regulations or draw additional insurers to our local market, will only reinforce the trends that are killing the state.

If, for instance, RI Senate Majority Leader Teresa Paiva Weed should decide to act on her observation that (in Freyer's words) "it may be difficult to regulate large employers because many are self-insured," large employers will have one more incentive leave, even as disproportionate handouts continue to spur the needy to come.

Lost & Then Found

From this morning's Mass, just because...

The hymn, Amazing Grace:

Amazing grace! (how sweet the sound) That sav’d a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, Was blind, but now I see.

’Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, And grace my fears reliev’d; How precious did that grace appear, The hour I first believ’d!

Thro’ many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come; ’Tis grace has brought me safe thus far, And grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promis’d good to me, His word my hope secures; He will my shield and portion be, As long as life endures.

Yes, when this flesh and heart shall fail, And mortal life shall cease; I shall possess, within the veil, A life of joy and peace.

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow, The sun forbear to shine; But God, who call’d me here below, Will be forever mine.

And this reading from Luke 15:1-11:

Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him. And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them. And he spake this parable unto them, saying, What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it? And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I have found my sheep which was lost. I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance. Either what woman having ten pieces of silver, if she lose one piece, doth not light a candle, and sweep the house, and seek diligently till she find it? And when she hath found it, she calleth her friends and her neighbours together, saying, Rejoice with me; for I have found the piece which I had lost. Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth.

And then this touching human story, (H/T Michelle Malkin), which contains this quote from Jeremiah 29:11:

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Plagiarism and Menard's Canard?

Woonsocket (along with Jamestown) will be holding an off-year election this November, to be preceded on October 9 by a primary for City Council and Mayor on October 9. This is undoubtedly the driving force behind the revelation that significant portions of the speech that incumbent Mayor Susan Menard gave in June at Woonsocket’s High School graduation ceremonies had been plagiarized from one given by Alaska’s Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell a month earlier.

In a wonderful bit of irony, the emphasis of the "joint" speech was character. The Valley Breeze’s Ethan Shorey points out that during the speech, the Mayor:

… had trouble with the word theologian, pronouncing it wrong. She also stumbled over several other words in the copied portion of her speech, skipping the word "leprous" when it came up in a stolen passage.

Her Honor denies that she is the author but also insists that she cannot recall who on her staff supplied the speech to her, leaving us in the dark at the moment as to the identity of the plagiarist.

Mayor Menard is seeking a seventh term. This is not the first time she has "appropriated" — would her PR flak prefer the term "borrowed"? — something that did not belong to her. During the 2005 campaign, she committed a major no-no by drafting both city equipment and the highly unapproved research services of Woonsocket’s Chief of Police in her bid for reelection.

Primary Misstep: How Laffey's Supporters Made the Worst Out of Whatever Influence Anchor Rising Enabled

I'll confess: I'm as curious as anybody about commentary related to myself and things in which I'm involved, which is why I found myself standing in the Middletown Barnes & Noble in my dirty carpentry garb a couple of hours ago flipping to the index of Steve Laffey's just-released book, Primary Mistake: How the Washington Republican Establishment Lost Everything in 2006 (and Sabotaged My Senatorial Campaign) (see ad at left). And sure enough, Anchor Rising appears several times. (Although none of the contributors are mentioned by name, some commenters are.)

The most extended mention (p. 117) raises some interesting questions, which I may ask (and answer, of course) at greater length, perhaps in a Projo column:

But in the Union's smallest state, where all politics is local, it's a slightly different story. To be sure, the blogs in Rhode Island played a major role in this campaign, just not the role they thought.

... Every once in a blue moon, one of these blogs posts a scoop, but the true role fo the Rhode Island blogs is to serve as an outlet for political aggression, especially in the winter months when the weather puts a damper on door-to-door campaigning.

But unlike knocking on doors, the blog wars between the Laffey and Chafee camps was not really about the votes. After all, it was a relatively small group of insiders and politicos who followed the daily posts and comments. No, blogging was a New Age form of psychological warfare and, as a fringe benefit, an immensely enjoyable form of entertainment. See, the key to winning the blog wars came down to two things: organization and a robust sense of humor. ...

As far as organization went, nothing topped our finely tuned blogging machine in the form of "blog alerts." Every time a post went up on one of the blogs relating to the race, a local Laffey lover took it upon himself to send an e-mail around to a group of trusted supporters with instructions to inundate the blogosphere with the Laffey message. Ranging from levels 1 through 5, a typical e-mail went like this: "Blog Alert Level 5: Chafee is voting against Alito. Go to town!" or "Blog Alert Level 5: On Anchor Rising, there is a post basically condemning the Chafee personal attack ads"...

Laffey goes on to describe the commenter nickname themes that many of you will recall not-so-fondly.

The alert system and the themes both point to the reason that I think the Laffey campaign's handling of blogs wound up hurting more than it helped. The stridency and general tone (which came across more as heavily insulting than light-hearted) turned some potentially avid supporters into, at best, reluctant supporters who could stand the other candidate even less, and anybody who had any leanings toward Chafee for reasons of comparable electability was magnificently confirmed in those leanings.

As I've said previously, I don't think Anchor Rising, or blogs generally, played a big role in the last election in this state. For his part, Laffey gives the impression that blogs' "major role" was mainly to enable his supporters to blow off steam. I can only hope, for multiple reasons, that his assessment is different next time around.

East Greenwich Teachers' Union Contract Negotiations Update

The East Greenwich School Committee met with the mediator and NEA union negotiators last night for over 7 hours. No progress occurred.

Here is the Word document-based press release they issued today.

This was the first time I have been disappointed in the public statements of the School Committee. If I was on the School Committee, here is what my press release would have said instead:

The School Committee and the teachers' union met with a mediator for over 7 hours last evening, September 14, 2007. No progress was made. In fact, the School Committee members sat for close to 3 hours waiting for a counter-proposal from the NEA. When the counter was finally received, there was essentially no change from their original proposal. Later in the session, the union negotiators refused to consider any cost-saving measures, such as a change in the healthcare provider.

This behavior is the norm for NEA negotiators as they try to induce citizen committee members to negotiate against themselves - and then allege bad faith negotiating practices when they do not do so.

Therefore, the teachers' union continues to demand status-quo contract terms: (i) health insurance co-payment percentages at or below the current 5%/10% levels; (ii) no change in the $5,000/year cash bonus for not using the district's insurance programs; (iii) 9-12%/year salary increases for job steps 1-9; and, (iv) at least 3%/year increases for job step 10. Pension benefits would also remain unchanged.

These demands, as in past negotiations, have resulted in school spending - and therefore taxes - rising faster than the increases in the incomes of the working families and retirees who reside in East Greenwich and pay for the teachers' salaries and benefits out of their incomes. This longstanding practice reduces the standard of living of the residents. As such, they cannot afford for the school department to continue these reckless spending habits from the past and the recent state legislation now requires us to cease these bad habits.

The School Committee is faced with the following choice, just like every family who has to live within its means: Either teachers' salary and benefit costs are going to be reined in or educational programs and teachers' jobs will have to be cut. We cannot afford to continue the gravy train ride of past years.

The School Committee strongly prefers the former alternative, which will allow the district to maintain academic and extra-curricular educational programs and teachers' jobs that make a difference to our children's education. The union negotiating position advocates the latter position, which only serves to provide ever greater adult entitlements, even at the expense of what benefits our children and at the potential cost of their own member's individual jobs.

A statewide educational funding formula will likely not solve this impasse. The NEA appears to believe that any increased state funding will automatically flow directly to maintaining the unaffordable large salary increases and outrageous benefits that exist today. That simply cannot happen any more and this School Committee will not agree to such a course of action.

The mediator did not schedule our next meeting until October 9th. It is also our understanding that the state union representative is out of town until that time.

The School Committee has received many inquiries from parents about teachers initiating "work-to-rule" actions, specifically some teachers are refusing to write recommendations for seniors applying to college. It is our understanding that the teachers' union has not called "work-to-rule" action. We expect all teachers to perform their duties as they have done in a non work-to-rule environment. If we find that any rogue teachers are acting in ways which are harmful to our children, swift disciplinary action will be taken with those individual teachers. We encourage any parent of a student who is negatively impacted by work-to-rule type actions to immediately bring the issue to the attention of the school principal, the Superintendent or a School Committee member.

One of the key takeaways here: The NEA's negotiating position means that they are willing to throw some of their own members under the bus and let them lose their jobs before they will bend on modifying contractually-defined adult entitlements.

Told you we would learn a lot about the priorities and values of the various stakeholders as these negotiations unfold. Yes, indeed.

Remember: Anchor Rising is THE place to go for information on the teachers' strike and contract issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to all Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion

Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts (The reports linked to in this post make an important contribution to understanding how teachers' union contracts are about adult entitlements, not the education of our children.)

Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day (This is a particularly important post for understanding the NEA's political agenda and financial resources.)

Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday

More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute in East Greenwich.)

The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update
Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"
The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama
News Flash: Judge Orders East Greenwich Teachers Back to Work on Friday, September 7

Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals (This is an important post to read as it torpedoes another critical lie by the NEA.)

The NEA in East Greenwich: Reflections On The Week That Was (This post includes some important comments on the issues underlying the debate about the unresolved statewide education funding formula issue.)

The Two Alternatives Before Us: Educational Programs & Teacher Jobs OR Excessive Adult Entitlements

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities

(These three posts immediately above in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)

This Is the Way the System Works, the System Works, the System Works
A Mere Suggestion for the Teachers' Unions
Tiverton School Committee Shuffles Its Offer
Hold on, hold on. Keep the money coming!
These Are Professionals?
Other Public Education News
The Teachers' Unions' Lack of Moral Character

Has Lincoln Chafee Left the Republican Party?

Two independent sources that I consider to be reliable have informed me that former United States Senator Lincoln Chafee has officially disaffiliated from the Republican party, according to voter registration records available from the Rhode Island Secretary of State's office.

That the records are available now indicates that the disaffiliation occurred several months earlier.

If this is true (and I have no reason to doubt my sources), it certainly is odd, given that the next major event where party affiliation matters will be the Presidential primary.

Let's throw a "developing" on the end of this one...

UPDATE:

Enterprising commenter "Brassband" has located an online record available from the Secretary of State's office indicating that former Senator Chafee will become unaffiliated, as of October 8…

LINCOLN D CHAFEE
Date of birth: 03/26/1953
Residence:
366 VICTORY HWY
EXETER, RI 02822

VOTER STATUS
* Current status: Active
* Eligibility date: 03/16/2006

PARTY INFORMATION
* Current party: Unaffiliated
* Effective date for voting as affiliated: 10/08/2007

Does this mean we need to stop referring to the Chafee wing of the Republican party?

The Teachers' Unions' Lack of Moral Character

In my most recent post, I wrote these words: "We will learn a lot in the coming weeks and months about the priorities and values of the various stakeholders, won't we?" Yes, indeed.

Reinforcing the point of that question, John McCain is quoted in an earlier post about war:

"Character," writes the younger [John] McCain, quoting the 19th century evangelist Dwight Moody, "is what you are in the dark," when nobody's looking and you silently make decisions about how you will act the next day.

The teachers' unions are conducting a war against our children, using them as pawns to blackmail School Committees and citizens into caving into their contractual demands for further adult entitlements. Their demands have nothing to do with education. The unions' actions are devoid of character and are morally offensive.

The actions by the West Warwick AFT union are the latest unprincipled actions and are described in this earlier post:

The School Committee has exercised its option to let its current teachers contract lapse after three years rather than four, a move that prompted the union to announce that its members would immediately start working to rule — doing only what is strictly required under the contract.

The contract with the West Warwick Teachers Alliance [an AFT teachers' union group] that took effect last Sept. 1 was a four-year agreement — providing annual raises of 3.9 percent — but it includes the proviso that either party could choose, before Sept. 1 of this year, to eliminate the fourth year (ending in 2010) and instead negotiate a fresh agreement.

The School Committee voted unanimously on Tuesday of last week to take that option, Chairman Daniel T. Burns Jr. said.

Given the district’s fiscal straits — it entered the current fiscal year with a budget $1.7 million out of balance — it "would have been fiscally irresponsible to let it go to the fourth year," Burns said on Tuesday. "I can’t promise you a rose garden if all I’ve got is weeds."

Yesterday, Donald E. Vanasse, president of the 340-member teachers union, announced its new stance.

"The long and the short of it is that, over time, teachers will not be performing duties that are not part of the school day," said Vanasse. "The teachers will do what they’ve been contracted to do. They’ll do their jobs and do them well. But they’re not going to do the extras that aren’t required but that they always do anyway."...

In July, the school board reconciled its budget, slashing after-school programs and middle school athletics, and laying off a number of teacher assistants. It also proposed cutting transportation spending, reducing the number of substitute teachers and reducing its special-education tuition budget, with the hope that the state Department of Children, Youth and Families cuts down on the number of placements it sends the town...

The next fiscal year is expected to be even harder. The state-imposed cap on tax-levy increases will tighten, leaving the town with even less money to provide to the district.

With those kinds of cuts, Burns said, it would have been unjustifiable to keep the current teachers contract in force for the full four years. Now, he said, the district can assess its finances when the time comes to decide what it can reasonably offer the teachers.

Burns said he has no qualms about the board’s vote because it was an option available to both parties.

"I don’t know why they’re upset," Burns said. "Their side could have chosen to opt out if it wasn’t to their benefit."

For now, the union will wait to see if the board will rescind its vote — an action that would allow the dynamic to return to normal, Vanasse said.

"The union door remains open, but someone has to walk through that door," Vanasse said.

And from a second ProJo article:

..."The teachers that serve the West Warwick Public Schools felt that their trust has been broken and that their professionalism is not recognized," Donald E. Vanasse, president of the West Warwick Teachers Alliance, said in the letter to board Chairman Daniel T. Burns Jr. "Your committee’s recent actions have left all teachers feeling that they have been devalued in the eyes of their own employer."...

A few days after the committee’s vote on the contract, the union announced its decision to work to rule. In his letter, Vanasse said: "It is unfortunate that these events have unfolded in this matter, but be assured that we, as an organization, will continue to value the process of good-faith negotiations.

"In that vein, we stand prepared to rebuild the relationship that previously existed between the West Warwick Teachers Alliance and the West Warwick School Committee once your body takes steps to reconcile the manner in which it has recently begun to conduct labor/management relations."

However, Burns said it is the union’s current posture that will make it difficult for the next contract negotiation session in a few years.

"The work-to-rule environment that the union leadership has instructed classroom teachers to practice is not sitting well with this School Committee," Burns said. "And it is the wrong move if the teachers are looking for a better contract in the future."

Schools Supt. Kenneth M. Sheehan said he’s baffled by the union’s actions. Sheehan, who once headed the teachers union in Seekonk, said he’s seen unions employ the "work to rule" strategy when teachers were working without a contract, but never when educators were in the midst of a "lucrative" agreement.

Some of the "unwritten rules" of the strategy, Sheehan said, include refusal to volunteer for nonpaid clubs or activities, participate in parent-teacher organization meetings, or sit on unpaid committees for the district. (The school open houses, which began in the district last week, are a part of the teachers contract, Sheehan said.) Those moves, he said, undoubtedly hurt the quality of education in town and, ultimately, shortchange students.

"I have difficulty in accepting [using] children or students as pawns when the fight is with the School Committee," Sheehan said. "It’s always a problem when you put kids in the middle."...

Think about this: Both sides had the contractual right to opt out of year 4, the school district is in deep financial trouble and had already cut programs, the school committee exercised its legal right to opt out, and the teachers' union went work-to-rule even as the remaining 3 years of the contract remain in force. And the union said that only outright capitulation by the school committee would undo the new dynamic, restore trust and show respect for teachers. And, of course, the children are the pawns who suffer along the way - because the union does not give a damn about them.

Forget the happy public relations talk. West Warwick is the latest real-world example which shows citizens what are the priorities and values of the teachers' unions.

And why do we let these unions retain monopoly control over our public education system?

Remember: Anchor Rising is THE place to go for information on the teachers' strike and contract issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to all Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion

Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts (The reports linked to in this post make an important contribution to understanding how teachers' union contracts are about adult entitlements, not the education of our children.)

Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day (This is a particularly important post for understanding the NEA's political agenda and financial resources.)

Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday

More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute in East Greenwich.)

The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update
Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"
The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama
News Flash: Judge Orders East Greenwich Teachers Back to Work on Friday, September 7

Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals (This is an important post to read as it torpedoes another critical lie by the NEA.)

The NEA in East Greenwich: Reflections On The Week That Was (This post includes some important comments on the issues underlying the debate about the unresolved statewide education funding formula issue.)

The Two Alternatives Before Us: Educational Programs & Teacher Jobs OR Excessive Adult Entitlements

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities

(These three posts immediately above in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)

This Is the Way the System Works, the System Works, the System Works
A Mere Suggestion for the Teachers' Unions
Tiverton School Committee Shuffles Its Offer
Hold on, hold on. Keep the money coming!
These Are Professionals?
Other Public Education News

The Propriety of Responding to the President

Feeding into the WPRO ad, "Where do bloggers go....", Dan Yorke brings up an interesting point. Why was there a need for a "Democrat response" to the Presidential speech on the status of the conflict in Iraq? Dan talked to Brown University's Darrell West about it, and they came to the following conclusions:

1) There was never any sort of "opposition party" response to a televised Presidential address until the 1980's (Ronald Reagan). Then, the argument was that the President could offer his side of a story without rebuttal. The networks acquiesced and began allowing a response to State of the Union addresses.

2) Over the years, and despite the removal of the so-called "Fairness Doctrine", the networks continued the practice.

3) Now, it seems they've expanded the practice such that any Presidential address is effectively rebutted by the opposition. Even a speech offering an update on progress made in a war. Anyone ever here about the time Wendell Wilkie aired a rebuttal to one of FDR's fireside chats? Didn't think so.

Yorke's point is that, since the networks are under no obligation to offer the rebuttal, they are being ideological activists by continuing to provide the opportunity. As such, the office of the President--regardless of whether a Democrat or Republican--is diminished. He can't even get 5 minutes of breathing room to offer his case without the other side being able to take partisan political shots. Incidentally, it looked like ABC, CBS and NBC aired the Democratic response, but FOX did not (though FOXNEWS did, I think). That should stoke some fires.

I suppose this is of a piece of the broader trend towards diminishing the office of the President or that how some of us realize there was a time when politics really did stop at the waters edge.

On a side note, the best analysis of Sen. Reed's retort comes from Kimberly Kagan:

Senator Jack Reed gave the Democratic response, and the contrast with Bush’s speech was striking to those who paid careful attention. Bush addressed the situation in Iraq with detail and nuance. He described varying situations on the ground in different, specific regions of the country, spoke of particular movements and individuals, and showed a grasp of the complexity and reality of the struggle. Reed spoke only in generalizations. He did not refer to any specific events, places, or individuals in Iraq. He spoke generally of a “Democratic plan” for withdrawal that sounded remarkably like the Baker-Hamilton plan, originally presented at the end of 2006 in a completely different operational context. The vagueness of his discussion of the situation and of his proposals contrasted starkly with the specificity even of Bush’s speech, to say nothing of the incredible complexity and detail evinced in the testimony of General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker. That contrast highlights once more what is really the key question of the upcoming political debate over Iraq: Whom do the American people want to run this war, Congress or the people who know something about it?

Finding Common Moral Ground

John Miller--in the recent National Review--calls attention to a set of moral initiatives and legislation that the moral and religious of left/right/center have been putting forward:

Halting the international and domestic trafficking and enslavement
of millions of girls, women, and children.

Promoting international religious freedom as a core element of U.S. human-rights policy.

Eliminating domestic prison rape and violence, which is the purpose of the Kennedy-Sessions Prison Rape Elimination Act.

Upgrading the inhumane conditions of Third World prisons.

Adopting a “Helsinki strategy” of advancing human rights as a key element in dealing with the government of North Korea.

Developing and sustaining the AIDS initiative originally proposed to the Bush administration by evangelical leaders.

Reducing the ability of oppressive regimes to monitor and censor Internet communications

Ensuring the peaceful promotion of democracy as a key theme in U.S. foreign policy.

Miller also observes that Evangelicals don't get any credit for getting the ball rolling in the first place:

Though evangelicals were mainly responsible for these campaigns, they have gained little political credit for them. The New York Times, the Washington Post, and the rest of the establishment media are happier writing about Christians’ besieging of abortion clinics than about their joining with feminists to halt sex trafficking. Sub specie aeternitatis, this is fine—the evangelicals can layup treasure in Heaven—but it’s a definite handicap when waging future campaigns. Many liberals would be astonished to discover that the Christian Right is campaigning to stop prison rape. Their mental image of evangelicals is one of people who favor the worst possible treatment of criminals. Fair coverage would introduce a valuable note of cognitive dissonance into the average liberal’s prejudice against evangelicals.

How much of this is a pipedream? Don't know. If you add abortion and gay marriage to the 8 items mentioned above, you'll find that liberals and evangelicals (and, by extension, conservatives) agree with each other 80% of the time--but spend 95% of their time arguing over the 2 items over which they disagree. Now, these are fundamental disagreements. But every once in a while it's good for everyone to take a step back and acknowledge that we all can agree on something!

Of course, an important caveat would be that, while we can agree on the goals outlined above, we don't always agree on the method use to attain those goals.....

You all better go sing Kumbya and have a group hug before I change my mind.

Final Takeaway from General Petraeus' Report

Despite some disagreement about the specific metrics cited, there really wasn't much disagreement on the basic accuracy General David Petraeus' report to Congress on post-surge conditions in Iraq. The important takeaways were…

1. The surge has worked to turn Sunni communities against al-Qaida in Iraq. It is unlikely that the Sunnis by themselves would have had the means or the confidence to made this stand in the absence of direct and intense American support.
2. The number of attacks nationwide is down from the peak reached at the beginning of this year, though still not below 2005 levels. The number of attacks in Baghdad, a focus area of the surge, is also down.
3. How this all translates into either disarming or integrating Shia militias in the Southern part of Iraq is unclear.

The counter-point coming from Petraeus' (sane) critics is that the progress is nice, but none of it matters if the national government can't get its act together, a reaction eerily reminiscent of Howard Dean's response of "well, I suppose it's a good thing" when informed that Saddam Husein had been captured.

But the idea that a top-down national government, whether led by Nouri al-Maliki or Ahmed Chalabi or Jabar Gaffney or anyone else, was going to become the prime mover for reform in Iraq was flawed from the outset, an expression of a mistaken belief that good governance springs from the ability of correct-thinking elites to tap a reserve of magic powers, beyond the reach of the regular people, that can be used to whip a society into shape. That idea is as wrong for Iraq as it is for any other place. Democratic governments take their powers from the regular people, from trust they invest in the government.

It is true that the current national government of Iraq hasn't done much earn the requisite trust, but especially after the experience of Saddam Husein, the people of Iraq were unlikely at the outset to give the benefit of the doubt to a remote national government. Instead, regular Iraqis, quite rationally, waited to see if the national government would help, hinder or be completely irrelevant to the local structures -- the functioning provincial governments in the Kurdish north, the tribal sheiks in the Sunni provinces, and the clerics and militias in the southern Shi'ite areas -- impacting their lives on a daily basis.

Whether you want to classify Iraq's national government as a hindrance or irrelevant with respect to building-up the local quality of life in Iraq so far, coalition forces are now belatedly creating conditions where regular Iraqis, especially in the Sunni provinces, are ready to take more responsibility than ever before for rebuilding and defending their localities. That emphasis on ground-up reconstruction at the local level should have been the emphasis from the start. To say that local successes don't matter -- that for some reason it is a absolute necessity that the national government must come first in all things -- is to say that the needs of regular people, and the branch of government that touches them most directly, matters less than the needs of the national-level political elite. I understand why the pols in Washington see the world in these terms, but not why most of the American people should accept them.

TGI Anchor Rising

Although unsure what to expect, we though it would make for an interesting evening to invite y'all to an informal get-together next Thursday night, September 20, at the bar area of the TGI Friday's in Warwick (by the Michael's craft store and across from the expensive-car sales plaza). Although we're prepared to enjoy yet another evening of each other's company, we'd very much enjoy the opportunity to spend an evening hardly talking to each other at all. (That might not have come out right...)

We'll be there around 7:00 p.m. and will not (we promise) bring our laptops. (Although digital cameras and stealth bloggerware are another matter.) I will have complimentary embroidered Anchor Rising baseball caps for the first five people to ask me for them.

Yet More News You Can Hsuse

According to the Associated Press, Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has moved from returning campaign contributions received directly from Norman Hsu ($23,000) to returning all contributions raised and/or bundled by Mr. Hsu (about $850,000). According to the Wall Street Journal, many other prominent Democrats have also announced that they will be returning any of their contributions associated with Mr Hsu…

More Democrats announced yesterday that they would dispose of funds that Mr. Hsu gave or raised, including Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York ($25,000), Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts ($35,000), Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu ($11,700), Montana Sen. Jon Tester ($4,750), Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill ($20,700) and Pennsylvania Rep. Joseph Sestak ($2,500). Others have given their money to charity, including Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, whose campaign received $2,000 in March from Mr. Hsu.

Do Senators Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse and Congressman Patrick Kennedy intend to take similar actions with regards to any of their contributions raised with the help of Mr. Hsu?

And does the RI State Democratic party have any plans to announce what it intends to do with the $11,000 it received directly from Mr. Hsu?

The Cranston City Republican Committee Invites You to Examine Mayor Michael Napolitano's Record

The Cranston Republican City Committee has put up a website questioning Mayor Michael Napolitano's commitment to promises he made during his campaign and since taking office.

This sequence of events listed compiled from the site is particularly illuminating…

• Mayor Napolitano's budget has raised local property taxes "by over 5%, nearly the maximum allowed by state law"...
• …while proposing " no additional aid to Cranston Schools"...
• …and underfunding the city pension plan by about $900,000...
• …but still appropriating $815,000 for artificial turf at Cranston Stadium.

How long do you think it will be before Mayor Napolitano blames the city's continuing pension problems on the property tax cap, instead of his own decisions?

Are There Really Too Many State Employees in Rhode Island?

The Providence Phoenix's Ian Donnis has found at least one reputable source saying that the number of state employees in Rhode Island is towards the lower end of the regional and national scales…

When viewed in proportion to our population, the number of state workers in Rhode Island is the smallest among the six New England states and just the 40th-largest in the country, according to US Bureau of Labor statistics used in an analysis compiled by Governing magazine.

In contrast to regional leader Vermont, which has 301 state employees per 10,000 residents, the magazine’s sourcebook found, Rhode Island has 164 state workers per 10,000 residents. The comparable numbers for the other states: Maine (221); Connecticut (196); New Hampshire (188); and Massachusetts (187)....

The number of authorized full-time equivalents in state government (which could be greater than the number of actual employees) is 15,987 for the current fiscal year, compared with 15,796 10 years ago, according to RIPEC’s Gary Sasse. The count of FTEs had been as high as 17,715 in 1992, he says, and as low as 16,910 in fiscal 2004.

Rather than the sheer number of workers, Sasse says, “the problem in Rhode Island is that we have high costs per employee.” He puts the typical cost of salary and benefits for a state employee in the area of $90,000, noting that the state’s total for this stuff has climbed over the last year by about 7.5 percent.

The complete list compiled by Governing is available here. All of kinds of other numbers of potential interest are available here.

The Two Alternatives Before Us: Educational Programs & Teacher Jobs OR Excessive Adult Entitlements

Valerie Forti, President of The Education Partnership, wrote these words yesterday in a ProJo editorial:

This year, the Rhode Island General Assembly sent a very clear message to school districts and to unions.

In level-funding state education aid, after passing a Senate bill last year that checks property-tax increases, legislators sent the message that school committees and unions should not expect to get more money if they cannot appropriately account for what they are spending. The legislature is (finally) noticing that, under the current approach, simply sending more money to the districts increases salaries and benefits — but does not necessarily benefit the children in our public schools, particularly in our urban school districts.

...it is encouraging that some school committees are resisting union pressure to simply give more and more to teachers in salaries and benefits while programs that directly benefit students — sports, arts, etc. — are being under funded or cut out altogether.

In several recent contract negotiations, unfortunately, school committees agreed to a quid pro quo for unions' paying part of their health and dental benefits. In a number of new contracts, any savings were completely offset by a shorter school year, special stipends and increased "buy-backs"...Instead of helping students, the money continues to go for excessive adult entitlements.

...Students are suffering because of over-generous contract obligations. The legislature has begun to understand that fact — and this year, did not see fit to send more money to schools to simply increase salaries and benefits...

The Education Partnership honors good teachers. We want good teachers to have good salaries, health and dental care and a retirement benefit. But what our school committees are currently negotiating into teacher contracts in Rhode Island is not sustainable, and vastly outstrips the resources that we have for our children, and should be devoting to them.

When are we going to start to talk about real reform to help support our students? For almost a year, The Education Partnership worked closely with the legislature, the Rhode Island Department of Education, and various advocacy groups (including teachers unions!) to help increase public understanding of why Rhode Island needs a permanent school-funding formula, and to help design the formula. (Only one other state, Pennsylvania, does not have a permanent funding formula.)

At the end of the legislative session, though, after it became clear the formula was being distorted to support bloated and unrealistic spending, The Education Partnership felt compelled to withdraw its support for the formula that was ultimately proposed. Thankfully, the legislature refrained from passing a school-funding formula and it level-funded school districts, sending a clear message that it's time for a change.

This state needs to think about real financial reform and ways that truly bring resources into school districts for students. For starters, when are we going to work on changing the pension system for teachers (and all municipal and state employees)? We should not be distracted by talk about consolidating school systems and redesigning the funding formula — which could cost enormous political capital while doing little to help students directly.

Let's talk about a real reform agenda and pass legislation that redirects education spending more toward students.

Require that every school district (as well as municipal and state) employee who is more than three years away from retirement to be part of a defined-contribution plan — and take that issue off of the negotiation table...

Additionally, we need one statewide health-care plan for all school district employees — taking that issue off the local negotiation table. Let's end sick-day abuse that is costing taxpayers so much. The state law should set a cap of 10 sick days for all school-district employees (how about adding municipal and state workers?) with assignment beyond that to Temporary Disability Insurance (TDI). There should be no more insurance buy-backs of any kind. The state should mandate teacher and principal evaluations in every district, every year, to measure outcomes and bring accountability to our school systems.

...This year's decisions indicate that our legislators now understand something: Rhode Island does not have adequate public-education performance, and increases in funding have been going to excessive adult entitlements, rather than toward improving student achievement.

The citizens of Rhode Island need to work now to send a message to the unions and the legislature. We need a strong new pension-reform plan that seriously gets to the heart of the problem, a statewide health-care plan, no more insurance buy-backs, 10 sick days and TDI, and a research-based evaluation system in every district.

What we are doing is not working for our children and is not sustainable. Unfortunately for our students and the taxpayers of Rhode Island, that is eminently clear.

This ProJo editorial has more on health insurance issues.

Forti's recommendations highlight one of the under-addressed issues in teachers' union contract negotiations: One side of the table has 7 unpaid, part-time citizen volunteers and the other side of the table has professional teachers' union negotiators plus some teachers who are union representatives. And all it takes is for the union to find one weak district and then those contract terms are pushed as the norm for subsequent negotiations elsewhere in the state.

Having the state legislature pass bills which would take some of the issues off the table at the local level would begin to level the negotiating playing field - and benefit our childrens' education.

The power of the tax cap legislation is that it is forcing more and more economic terms of teachers' union contracts into the public eye. Once public, things will never be the same.

Or, to put it in more tangible terms for East Greenwich, based on information in this post:

• 68 out of 231 teachers received a $5,000/year cash bonus last year for not using the district's health insurancee program. A $340,000/year cost for this buyback program.
• 110 teachers had the family health insurance plan and 37 teachers had the single health insurance plan, at an estimated 2008-09 cost of $1,860,624.

As the School Committee negotiates a new contract with the NEA now, it knows the underlying issues which it will face after the contract is signed:

• The tax cap will limit the allowable increase in spending.
• If the new contract maintains the status quo and does not eliminate the cash bonus for the buyback program, then the budget will be $340,000 higher.
• If the new contract maintains the status quo of a 5%/10% co-pay mixture and does not yield at least a 20% co-pay, then the budget will be about $200,000 higher.
• If the new contract only tweaks the status quo, the tax cap will likely force school budget cuts next year. And the "price" for maintaining the current excessive adult entitlements will mean the School Committee has only two other alternatives: Cut educational programs or cut teachers - or both.

As Ms. Forti asks in her editorial, how do either of these two alternatives benefit our children's education?

Educational programs and jobs for teachers OR excessive adult entitlements. The power of the tax cap law is that it is finally forcing everyone to make conscious tradeoffs between these two alternatives so towns can live within the financial means of their taxpaying citizenry.

Which alternative will the School Committee choose? Which alternative will the NEA choose? Which alternative do individual teachers prefer and will they speak to the NEA about it? Which side of the debate will you personally choose to be on? And are you going to speak up about your opinion right now - when it matters?

We will learn a lot in the coming weeks and months about the priorities and values of the various stakeholders, won't we?

Remember: Anchor Rising is THE place to go for information on the teachers' strike and contract issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to all Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion

Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts (The reports linked to in this post make an important contribution to understanding how teachers' union contracts are about adult entitlements, not the education of our children.)

Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day (This is a particularly important post for understanding the NEA's political agenda and financial resources.)

Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday

More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute in East Greenwich.)

The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update
Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"
The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama
News Flash: Judge Orders East Greenwich Teachers Back to Work on Friday, September 7

Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals (This is an important post to read as it torpedoes another critical lie by the NEA.)

The NEA in East Greenwich: Reflections On The Week That Was (This post includes some important comments on the issues underlying the debate about the unresolved statewide education funding formula issue.)

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities

(These three posts immediately above in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)

This Is the Way the System Works, the System Works, the System Works
A Mere Suggestion for the Teachers' Unions
Tiverton School Committee Shuffles Its Offer
Hold on, hold on. Keep the money coming!
These Are Professionals?
Other Public Education News

Behind My Reaction

My purpose with last night's post from the parking lot, now that I'm able to do it, was to convey my gut reaction to the experience. Having slept on it, I think I can better articulate what was bothering me.

The truth is that some of the requests from the teachers raised worthwhile questions, even those pertaining to the procedural minutia. The school committee ought, for example, to emulate the town council in reading summaries of such things as the consent agenda (wherein they mainly acknowledge receipt of letters or information). And of course leaks and the like ought to be fixed as quickly as possible.

What struck me about the behavior, and its seemingly deliberate fostering of an atmospheric tension, was that it was more appropriate to those holding democratic authority (such as stockholders or, in this case, voters and parents). It is their role to put an elected or appointed body's feet to the fire.

Of course, it's worth noting that teachers are most definitely stakeholders. It also oughtn't be forgotten that some of them are probably both voters and parents. However, other channels are in place to address their suggestions and concerns in their capacity as professional employees. It is perhaps laudable that they would step up their advocacy on behalf of the schools and their students in response to public apathy, but even there, their activism would be more appropriately directed toward motivating parents than leaning on the school committee.

The problem with their assuming the role of the democratic authority is that, as a group, they are also advocates in their own self-interest as employees. And not only shouldn't professionals presume to behave as they did last night, but the context of the ongoing contract negotiations suggests that they created that tension more to benefit themselves as employees than as stakeholders. After all, in times of tight school district budgets, infrastructural problems and faulty PA system are in direct conflict with their compensatory demands.

Whither the Don't Knows Will Go

Under the headline "Hiring plans looking up in Providence area":

More than 4 of every 10 Providence-area employers plan to maintain their current staffing, while few plan to cut their payrolls in the fourth quarter, according to the latest Manpower Employment Outlook Survey.

The study showed that from next month to December, 43 percent plan to keep the same work force level and 7 percent plan to cut jobs.

About 17 percent of the companies interviewed said they plan to hire more employees in the fourth quarter, while 33 percent said they are not certain of their hiring plans.

I don't want to see Rhode Islanders losing their jobs, and I certainly don't want to talk down the economy any more than participatory realism requires, but the "looking up" phrase seems a little optimistic to me. If 17% of companies plan to hire, while 7% already plan to fire, that's a net increase of 10%. But imagining ourselves in the place of the interviewees, which way are those "uncertain" companies more likely to go? Because all employers would prefer to be hiring (which would mean that they are growing), my guess is that at least a third of that 33% comes from businesses that are hoping that they won't have to lay anybody off.

Anthony Colaluca, Man Without a Party

I know it's possible to develop overly sensitive rabbit-ears over stuff like this, but it is interesting to note that when the reporters at the Projo mistakenly thought that Coventry Town Councilman Anthony Colaluca was a Republican, his party was mentioned in their coverage of his drunk-driving arrest.

But now, after the Projo's news department almost certainly has been informed that Councilman Colaluca is actually a Democrat, the follow-up item on a delay in his arraignment refrains from mentioning a party affiliation.

The NEA in East Greenwich: Reflections On The Week That Was

Some reflections on the week that was, on what happened last week in East Greenwich and how it connects to broader issues across Rhode Island:

LESSON #1: THE NEA LIES REPEATEDLY

Just like they did in 2004-05, the NEA resorted to its typical Kremlin-esque disinformation campaign of lies and distortions to the working families and retirees of East Greenwich - including these false claims:

• Teachers would take pay cuts under any School Committee contract proposal. FALSE.
• After informing the School Department on August 29 of their intent to strike at the beginning of school in September if there was no contract, teachers were not told in advance that their paychecks for September classroom work - to be paid prospectively on August 31 - would be withheld. FALSE.
• Declining to pay teachers (prospectively for work not done) was a blatant act of coercion by the school leadership. FALSE.
• Teachers were not paid for summer work done prior to the start of school in September. FALSE.
• The School Committee forced the teachers not to report to work on September 4 because the Committee refused to bargain on September 3. FALSE.
• Teachers can strike or do work stoppages. FALSE.
• The School Committee has created an environment of intimidation and demoralization and failed to negotiate in good faith, including being unavailable to meet with the mediator until August. FALSE.

All of these NEA claims were debunked in Anchor Rising blog posts listed in the Extended Entry below. The bottom line: East Greenwich residents learned - again - how they cannot trust anything said by the NEA and its union hacks.

LESSON #2: THE TEACHERS' UNION CONTRACT MATTERS GREATLY BECAUSE ITS TERMS DOMINATE TOTAL SPENDING IN EAST GREENWICH

Michael Isaacs, President of the East Greenwich Town Council and someone I have known for upwards of 10 years, was kind enough to pass along some summary 2007-08 budget information and related web links:

• The town budget is $11,954,197.
• The school budget is $30,889,947. (A not-quite-the-final version of the budget can be found here.)
• Total debt service is $2,496,591, of which $1,049,503 is for the schools.
• The total budget is $45,340,735.

More information here.

In other words, the school operating budget is 72% of the total town and school operating budget. I have been told that expenses related to teachers' compensation are roughly 82% of the school budget.

Therefore, the teachers' union contract is critically important to overall spending and taxation in East Greenwich because it represents nearly 60% of total town and school operating spending.

LESSON #3: RHODE ISLAND RESIDENTS ARE ALREADY GENEROUS IN THEIR SUPPORT OF PUBLIC EDUCATION

A new study from the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council (RIPEC), entitled How Rhode Island Schools Compare, notes:

• Spending per pupil of $11,089 in Rhode Island is the 9th highest among the 50 states and 122.9% of the national average.
• The average Rhode Island teacher salary of $54,730 is the 8th highest among the 50 states and 111.4% of the national average.

Given the performance of our public schools, it is easy to say that Rhode Island taxpayers are overpaying for under-performance.

LESSON #4: RHODE ISLAND RESIDENTS HAVE THE 7TH HIGHEST TAX BURDEN AMONG THE 50 STATES

But there is a price being paid for that generosity: Another report by the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council documents how Rhode Island has the 7th highest tax burden among the 50 states, up from 14th highest in 1995.

It is this high and perpetually increasing tax burden which led to the passage in 2006 of Senate Bill 3050. The goal of the tax cap is to ensure taxes do not keep going up faster than the taxpaying public's incomes, thereby reducing their standard of living. The latter is what has been going on for years in Rhode Island and nobody in the NEA cares about all the working families and retirees in our towns who experience that decline. But residents in many towns are the (increasingly less silent) majority who are now saying enough already, we have been generous for years and willingly so - but we will not fund the gravy train ride any longer.

LESSON #5: IT IS TIME FOR A PARADIGM SHIFT IN OUR THINKING

We cannot afford the status quo in Rhode Island - financially or educationally. It is time for a paradigm shift.

Financially:

A crushing tax burden and the tax increase limits imposed by 3050 together create a new incentive for thinking outside the box, for a change in our approach to the financial structure of public-sector union contracts, including teachers' contracts.

Alternatively, the aggressive actions this Fall by the NEA confirm its goal is to blow up or neuter the tax cap so it can continue its relentless campaign for higher spending and taxes which enable further adult entitlements in its contracts.

History shows that public-sector players - like the NEA - always fight relentlessly to undermine spending limitations imposed by the will of the people. We are in a race against time to determine if we can develop a public consensus around a paradigm shift before the tax cap possibly gets watered down.

Along the way to developing such a consensus, be leery of fanciful talk that a new statewide education funding formula will somehow magically solve our problems. Here is why:

An earlier cited RIPEC report and this ProJo article note that:

Rhode Island, which has long depended heavily on local property taxes to pay for schools, has become even more reliant on those taxes over the past decade, and now ranks third highest in the country.

Nationally, local property taxes covered 43.3 percent of school costs in 2006, compared with 60.2 percent in Rhode Island...This year, the council compared information from 1996 to 2006.

RIPEC's analysis found that a decade ago, Rhode Island ranked 14th highest in its dependence on local property taxes to finance schools. By last year, the state had jumped to third...

But then ask yourself: What caused this huge increase in local property taxes? It was the terms of the teachers' union contracts negotiated over the last decade in each town. In other words, there have been tangible and adverse financial consequences to giving out 8-12%/year increases to 9 of the 10 job steps as well as having almost zero health insurance premium co-payments, $5,000/year cash bonuses for not using the school insurance program, and outlandish pension benefits. 3050 is a direct response to the never-ending increases in local property taxes.

Unlike the local tax cap, a statewide funding formula - as discussed to-date - does nothing to change the incentives which have resulted in far-too-expensive public-sector contract terms over the last ten years. In fact, it would neuter the local community tax cap by shifting more education funding from those communities to the state level where there is no cap and where the public-sector unions' power is greater. Why is this in the best interests of the average taxpayer? How does this encourage economic growth in the state?

Besides, when Rhode island already spends the 9th most out of 50 states on education, there is not an overall educational funding problem. It could be said that we have an overspending problem. Why is it in the best interests of the local taxpayer to transfer more spending power to a state government which has no history of disciplined financial behaviors and where the taxpayer has less direct input and control over their spending and taxation practices?

Furthermore, there have been ongoing disagreements between the urban and surburban towns on how to structure a statewide funding formula. If there was a logical and affordable solution, it would have surfaced already. But it has not and Andrew explains why. With thanks to Andrew for a brainstorming session, here are some further thoughts: As a result, it could be argued that a single funding formula will be deemed acceptable to politicians and bureaucrats across the entire state only if all of them get more money. But there is no extra money to be had in this era of endless budget deficits. So that only leaves one option: New tax increases on an already overtaxed citizenry. Think of the storyline they will pitch to provide political cover: "It is for the children." Nope, it is just to provide more adult entitlements. Why is this in the best interests of the taxpayer? How does this encourage economic growth in the state?

In summary, taxpayers need to be vigilant to ensure that the purpose and power of the 3050 tax cap is not diluted by power plays from politicians, bureaucrats, and public-sector unions - all of which have no incentive to look after the personal interests of taxpayers.

Educationally:

The second area requiring a change in our thinking revolves around these four strategic questions about public education:

• Do we believe a quality education is the gateway to the American Dream for all children?
• Whom do we trust to make better educational decisions for children: their parents or the government?
• Within each neighborhood school, who is in the position to make the best decisions regarding individual students, individual teachers, and the curriculum: federal bureaucrats, state bureaucrats, unions or the school's principal and teachers?
• What incentives will ensure accountability to taxpayers and parents as well as reward behaviors which lead to improved educational performance outcomes?

Summary:

The overarching strategic question which should drive our thinking about the required paradigm shift is this:

• Can the failed status quo be made to work by minor adjustments at the margin OR will the delivery of affordable and high-quality performance only come from a completely different structural approach to union financial contracts and to how we deliver educational services?

Stay tuned for more thoughts in the coming days on how to shift the paradigm.

LESSON #6: GETTING UP TO SPEED ON THE BASIC ISSUES IN EAST GREENWICH

If you are new to these issues, I would strongly encourage you to read 3 important blog posts.

The first two define the issues in East Greenwich:

More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike
Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals

The final post highlights the political agenda and financial resources of the NEA itself:

Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day

Remember: Anchor Rising is THE place to go for information on the teachers' strike and contract issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to all Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion

Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts (The reports linked to in this post make an important contribution to understanding how teachers' union contracts are about adult entitlements, not the education of our children.)

Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day (This is a particularly important post for understanding the NEA's political agenda and financial resources.)

Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday

More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute in East Greenwich.)

The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update
Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"
The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama
News Flash: Judge Orders East Greenwich Teachers Back to Work on Friday, September 7

Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals (This is an important post to read as it torpedoes another critical lie by the NEA.)

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities

(These three posts immediately above in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)

This Is the Way the System Works, the System Works, the System Works
A Mere Suggestion for the Teachers' Unions
Tiverton School Committee Shuffles Its Offer
Hold on, hold on. Keep the money coming!
These Are Professionals?
Other Public Education News

Other Public Education News

Word is in that Franklin, MA settled its contract with a 33% health insurance premium co-payment. Plus step increases of 2%, 2.25%, and 2.5% over 3 years. Starting to make 20% look like a deal!

The ProJo weighs in on the teachers' strikes.

More on developments in West Warwick here and here.

A License to License

As an add-on to my recent column about the effects of occupational licensing on competition, I wanted to note an article from Sunday's Projo that doesn't appear to be available online:

Pharmacists, barbers, electricians, elevator mechanics, massage therapists, travel agents, landscape architects, acupuncturists, fire alarm installers, auctioneers. All those occupations, and lots more, are licensed by the State of Rhode Island, according to a report by the Reason Foundation, a libertarian organization in Washington, D.C. According to the study released last month, Rhode Island ranks sixth, tied with Michigan, in the number of occupations it regulates. ...

[Adam B. Summers, author of the report,] said one of the chief reasons occupational licensing exists is as a means for interest groups to reduce competition, and keep prices artificially high. "They [licensing laws] are simply a means of utilizing government interests to serve narrow economic interests," he said.

As it happens, during the same time frame that I was writing my column, I spotted the license on the wall of my Main Street barber here in Tiverton, and it struck me, at the time, that it doesn't just limit competition, but is a hidden tax on a particular form of business. It isn't a one-time fee for a piece of paper that a barber (in that case) is qualified; it's a regular source of income for the government. One can almost picture a legislator waiting for a haircut and having an epiphany about an untapped source of revenue.

Oh well. Just one more list on which Rhode Island ranks poorly.

These Are Professionals?

In response to tonight's post from the minivan in the Tiverton High School parking lot, the usual suspects will declare that I'm writing to script. My sympathizers will respond as if what I say is just common knowledge. But I have to admit that I was a little surprised at the comportment of the audience at tonight's school committee meeting.

As the committee went through the initial components of the agenda, microphone feedback led the young man running the PA system to kill the audio and run to the media room. It isn't surprising that, in the intervening time, members of the audience asked for certain things to be repeated more loudly, but the tone with which the requests were made was, shall we say, not what one would expect from people who daily have their patience and understanding tested by children. That tone was also audible in the requests that the minutia of the regular opening business of the committee be explored in detail.

At one point, a gym teacher of some sort shouted out, regarding a leak that has just been fixed in the gymnasium: "I have twenty-five young ladies who want to know why they waited until two weeks into the school year to fix the leak, when the gymnasium was empty all summer, and they want the right answer!" I'm sure very few of those 25 young ladies inconvenienced by the leak share even a fraction of their teacher's indignation, but I'd be surprised if their disinterest saves them from some choice comments about the committee and administration.

Another woman asked whether a leak in some new construction is still covered under warranty. The superintendent answered that it is and would be addressed on a punchlist. As the conversation continued, one of the council members interjected to ask whether the school's administrators had been alerted to the problem. When the relevant administrator responded in the affirmative, the councilman told the woman that that was the appropriate channel, before the committee need be brought into it. Somewhat abashed, the woman returned to her seat, but not before turning around on her way to give the councilman a catty glare and to hiss, for the benefit of anybody within a fifteen-foot radius, "Twerp."

The committee then voted to enter into executive session in order to discuss the contract, and the crowd began to depart. Perhaps if some other interested Tiverton resident than myself was within that crowd, I am not the only one who left the room thinking, "These are professionals?"

Behaving like testy adolescents at a public meeting of those whom the townspeople (the parents of their students) have elected to run the schools does not suggest that the schools' employees have any respect for their authority. Directing open hostility toward those with whom they must negotiate suggests that they know how imbalanced the union's power is in this situation.

If what I witnessed tonight is any indication, concerned citizens have reason to fear that the dynamic created by unionization makes our school systems much less effective, making it more difficult for all of those involved to work together in mutual respect. The teachers were acting as if the committee members are their representatives and are attempting to drive them into poverty to perpetuate some mysterious corruption.

I hope that future participation will disprove my impression that these meetings could be, and often are, worse than the mild dose that I experienced tonight. If not, I'd suggest that anybody who is interested in encouraging professionalism in our schools ought to call for the end of teachers' unions.

ADDENDUM:

I think it goes without saying, but I want to make absolutely explicit, one, that my habit at all events that I've described on Anchor Rising is to behave more as an observer than as a reporter (i.e., I don't mingle or roam the room in order to make sure that all "voices" are represented in my impressions) and, two, that I'm still relatively new to the local Tiverton public scene and may be missing part of the backstory. All that I can claim for these vignettes is that they are my honest impressions — no doubt colored to some degree by my ideology and expectations, neither of which I keep secret.

Trash Day Rant

After years of bringing my garbage to the town dump in Portsmouth, I actually rather enjoyed not having to go farther than the end of my driveway when I moved to Tiverton. The glow wore off the experience of deceptively free trash collection when my one non-construction-grade barrel was demolished during pickup.

Being a believer in self-directed corrections, I went out and purchased one of those super-heavy-duty (and large) wheeled garbage barrels, and for a while, all was blissful at my curb. Then came the day that I returned home from work to find my garbage still in the barrel, with a note taped thereto highlighting the town's maximum barrel size. So my wife went out and purchased a moderately sturdy (and smaller) wheeled barrel.

Almost immediately, the garbagemen popped a plug out of the lid, resulting in pints' worth of maggots on certain days in the summer. Overcoming an urge to just let the trash collectors deal with it, we taped the hole. Then I found the handle half broken off after collection, and the maggots returned.

Tonight my garbage can has no handle at all. They didn't even leave it for an attempted fix. Perhaps I can opt out and receive a tax rebate...

Not Alone, but Alone?

The movement of the Tiverton School Committee meeting from the library to the auditorium at least seems merited tonight. In that sense, I'm not alone. Inasmuch as I've no evidence that I'm the only plain ol' interested citizen in the audience, I may prove to be alone in another, perhaps more important sense.

Perhaps it was my imagination, but I'm pretty sure that I heard the voice with which a drive home with Dan Yorke made me familiar the other day. At least I've got this tenuous connection with y'all. If only they'll let me hit "Post" before they run me out of the room.

(I kid. I kid.)

Montal-bunk-o

Montalbano's public statement gives the impression that he thinks $12,000 is a reasonable fine for a minor paperwork error:

I am pleased to have reached a resolution of this matter that is fair and just. The finding of the Ethics Commission in this case - that I failed to complete my paperwork - accurately reflects what happened. I offer no excuses. I have freely admitted this mistake from the beginning, I take full responsibility for it, and I accept the fine of the Commission as appropriate.

To their credit, the Ethics Commission recognized that there was no personal benefit to me or my clients based on my vote last May regarding the constitutional amendment. Further, the Commission agreed with me that there was no conflict between my votes and the public interest, or the Code of Ethics. It was never my intent to hide the fact that the Town, like several other Rhode Island communities, has been my client for many years. Fortunately, in this case, there were plenty of instances on the public record where my work for the Town was freely available in the public realm - including newspapers, on-line and in state and local documents that were readily accessible to anyone. My activity on behalf of my client was out in the open and above-board.

I am embarrassed that I failed to complete the required paperwork. The transparency that these documents are designed to create fosters public trust in the people’s government.

I sincerely regret that by my actions I have contributed to a cynical view held in some quarters that something is just not right in Rhode Island government, and that for some elected officials, private interest takes precedence over the public good. There may be exceptions, but in my experience, the exact opposite is true. I will spend the rest of my career working diligently to prove the cynics wrong.

With this matter closed, I look forward to continuing to do my best to address the people’s business as President of the Senate, and next year, for the 11th time, to face the judgment of my neighbors and constituents.

Thank you.

I think one learns everything necessary from the fact that the first three words of the statement are "I am pleased."

ADDENDUM:

The press release from Gio Cicione hits some good points, but the party organization still has to improve its understanding of its audience and the facts that ought to be seeded into news reports on political happenings:

Rhode Island Republican Party Chairman Giovanni Cicione says Senate President Joseph Montalbano may have settled his ethics case with the State Ethics Commission today, but the larger problem of General Assembly Democrats using their public office for professional opportunities remains.

"The Senate’s top Democrat’s decision to pay this fine rather than go through a public airing of the ethics violations against him, does not end the bigger problem of leading Democrats viewing political office as a means of enhancing their professional endeavors," says Chairman Cicione.

Montalbano was accused of a conflict of interest by failing to report tens of thousands of dollars in income from legal work he performed for the town of West Warwick in connection to the proposed site for the failed Narragansett Indian casino while the Senate was holding hearings and voting on the controversial proposal. The settlement, the third highest ever reached by the Ethics Commission, also means Montalbano is dropping a lawsuit against the Commission he was filing in Superior Court. "Maybe this is why the highest ranking Senate Democrat’s approval ratings by Rhode Islanders come in at an embarrassing 16%. Paying a fine won't restore the trust Rhode Islanders have lost in top Democrats as the poll indicates."

A Brown University survey out today showed approval ratings for Democrat leaders of the General Assembly to be sinking since an earlier poll last January. In addition to Montalbano's approval rating, the poll showed Speaker William Murphy’s approval ratings have dropped from 26% to 21%.

Poll numbers are of interest only to those who follow politics closely, and that's not the crowd on which the RIGOP ought to be focusing (except as a medium for controlling the debate). Somebody working with Gio ought to develop a collection of talking point lists to increase the degree to which newsworthy items can be placed in a context favorable to Republicans. This press release, for example, should have listed names of the ethically challenged Democrats of the past (as Ragin' Rhode Islander rattled off in the comments to my previous post. The bulk of the press release, however, ought to have noted other suspicious circumstances indicating Rhode Island's endemic corruption. (The practice of the judiciary hiring relatives of legislators comes immediately to mind, although I'm sure Anchor Rising's readers have many more that they'd be willing to supply if asked.)

Mr. Montalbano...

... becomes probably the last person in Rhode Island to admit the obvious:

Resolving months of legal back and forth, state Senate President Joseph Montalbano today settled the ethics case against him for a $12,000 civil penalty. ...

Montalbano was accused of engaging in a conflict of interest by voting to put a casino proposal before voters while he was profiting from legal work for the town of West Warwick involving real estate neighboring the proposed casino site.

$12,000 doesn't strike me as too example-setting of a penalty, but at least now we can stop hearing his lawyer's dangerously delusional arguments for the guilty man's innocence.

Michael Morse: "If they thought the job hopeless, they never would have tried it…those who entered the towers thought the poor souls on the upper floors had a chance and they went to go get them"

Providence firefighter (and Rescuing Providence blogger) Michael Morse spoke to the assembled crowd at today's 9/11 memorial service at Providence Police and Fire headquarters…

Michael Morse: It is vitally important that we come together on this date to honor those who lost their lives on September 11th, 2001. It’s hard to believe, but six years have passed, and though the memorials have grown smaller, the painful memories are easier to bear. Some people prefer to block it from their minds, act as if it never happened. That’s their choice, not ours. Time marches on; new experiences take the place of memories we once thought would be with us forever. From the depths of sorrow, we find hope. It’s a good and necessary thing. Without it, we would be crushed by the weight of sorrow that builds as the years go by.

We’ve learned to live with the painful memories from that day, but we will “Never Forget!” It is up to us to keep the memory of the fallen alive. This isn’t just another day. It’s a day when all Americans, and especially Firefighters, need to stop and think of what we have, of those who fight for it and of those who died protecting it, and vow to keep their memories alive.

Never forget that every time we put our gear on the truck, we honor the memory of the 343 firefighters who died while doing their job six years ago. Every one of us knows we may be asked to risk everything while doing our job. It’s not heroic or glamorous or anything else we may have thought it was before we took the oath. It’s simply what we do. We are born with it; it’s in our blood. Some see it as a curse; most consider it a blessing.

The firefighters that died that day were people like us, proud of their profession, their families and their ability to save lives and protect property. I’m sure there was a little swagger in their walk that morning when they started their shift; confident they could handle anything thrown at them and somehow walk away. We think the same way, if we didn’t, we wouldn’t be wearing these uniforms. But with that swagger comes a price. People expect us to save them, and we usually do. Sometimes we don’t, and sometimes we die with them.

Thousands of regular citizens showed up for work that day, entered the elevators, sat at their desks, talked at the water cooler and prepared to start their day. Nothing could have prepared them for what happened next. Most of those who weren’t killed instantly waited. For us. We responded. As the world watched the drama unfold on their televisions, helplessly, we responded.

If they thought the job hopeless, they never would have tried it. They thought there was a chance and they marched to their deaths. They didn’t go to work that day expecting to die. None of us go to work expecting to die. Ours is a different profession. We take risks. We work hard and punish our bodies, not because we have a death wish, but because we have a wish that we can make things right when they go horribly wrong, as they did on September 11th, 2001. Those who entered the towers thought the poor souls on the upper floors had a chance and they went to go get them.

When the first tower fell, I knew. Before the top floor hit the ground, I said to my wife, “We just lost a lot of firefighters.”

“Why were they still in there?” she asked.

“They were doing their job.”

She looked at me, shook her head and looked back at the TV, knowing if I were there, I would have been in the tower. It’s harder on our families than it is on us.

We owe it to the firefighters who died that day to keep getting on that truck and doing our best, whether it’s in New York City, Providence, Warwick or Cumberland and to keep doing what they did six years ago for them the final time. Our duty.

I learned an important lesson that day and the weeks and months to follow. The people we are sworn to protect are worth protecting. We stood together as a nation like nobody could have dreamed possible. We remembered what it meant to be Americans; we stood together, cried together and together have moved forward. Racial and economic divisions didn’t matter, differing political philosophies were irrelevant.

In a many ways we’ve returned to our pre-911 mindset, and that is unfortunate, but the togetherness and resolve that existed then still resides in all of us, and comes to the surface when necessary. I know it’s there, I remember, and that is what keeps me going.

It’s good to be alive, and an honor to be part of the Providence Fire Department, and member of local 799, but most of all, it’s good to be a firefighter.

9/11 Six Years Later

I had a piece in NRO this morning about 9/11 and the meaning of victory. It is here. It's always important to remember that the war is over when the loser says its over, not the winner.

Petraeus and Crocker

No Such Thing as A Stupid Question? Not So Fast, My Friend!

As I watched Gen. Petraeus and Amb. Crocker field questions during the House hearing yesterday, I was reminded of a personal experience. As a young Marine captain, I was assigned to the US Army Field Artillery School to teach artillery tactics. My mentor there was an Army captain who remains the best teacher I have ever known. Before I actually got to teach, I observed my mentor as he took a class of brand new lieutenants through the course. During one session, a student asked him a question. I'll never forget Howard's reply. "Lieutenant, we all know that there's no such thing as a stupid question, but I want you to know that yours is the closest to one I have ever heard."

So it was with the ambassador and the general. I don't believe I have ever heard so many inane and repetitive questions in my life. It's one thing to push the Democratic story line, but couldn't these guys come up with some decent questions? How Gen. Petraeus and Amb. Crocker kept straight faces is beyond me. One thing is apparent. There has been a precipitous drop in congressional military experience. This applies to staff as well. God help the Republic.

9/11 Recalled

The opening of President George W. Bush's address to the nation, delivered about a week after the September 11 attack on America, remains the best assessment of how the nation responded six-years ago today…

Mr. Speaker, Mr. President Pro Tempore, members of Congress, and fellow Americans:

In the normal course of events, Presidents come to this chamber to report on the state of the Union. Tonight, no such report is needed. It has already been delivered by the American people.

We have seen it in the courage of passengers, who rushed terrorists to save others on the ground -- passengers like an exceptional man named Todd Beamer. And would you please help me to welcome his wife, Lisa Beamer, here tonight.

We have seen the state of our Union in the endurance of rescuers, working past exhaustion. We have seen the unfurling of flags, the lighting of candles, the giving of blood, the saying of prayers -- in English, Hebrew, and Arabic. We have seen the decency of a loving and giving people who have made the grief of strangers their own.

My fellow citizens, for the last nine days, the entire world has seen for itself the state of our Union -- and it is strong.

By the Way

It occurred to me to suggest that, whenever one of us appears on TV, on the radio, or in print, notes from y'all commending the appropriate producers, hosts, and editors for their good sense certainly couldn't hurt. You know, if you've the time and motivation.

Hold on, hold on. Keep the money coming!

The following segment of Rhode Island Association of School Principals Executive Director John Golden's op-ed in yesterday's Providence Journal struck me as noteworthy — taken in context of his declaration that public education ought to be left to educators — and his appearance on Dan Yorke's show today deepened the concerns that the passage originally raised:

Rhode Island principals and teachers are engaged in a reform effort that is unprecedented in this state and — this is the impressive part — American school reform. In Rhode Island, there have been sweeping changes in how we approach student literacy, how we structure secondary schools, how we award diplomas, how we create school cultures that meet student needs, and how we intervene when students perform below standard. The impact of these changes can already be seen in our schools, but the full affect will not be felt for years.

And there's the rub. For the reasons cited above, it appears that neither the General Assembly nor Governor Carcieri is willing to wait to see the current reform initiatives through to fruition. By flat-funding education for 2007-08, the legislature is in effect starving the reform effort and ensuring that the people needed to make change happen — literacy coaches, performance-based-graduation-requirements coordinators, and curriculum leaders — will be lost to tight budgets. For his part, the governor has alternated between celebrating the gains made and expressing frustration that the pace of change is not fast enough.

Of course, experts ought to be prominent in public decisions. The testimony of military leaders (for example) ought to carry substantial weight as Americans decide whether a particular war effort is worth continuing. Just so, education specialists certainly ought to be heeded when it comes to public decisions about our educational system. That necessity, however, only highlights the fact that the public ought to have the final call.

On Yorke's show, for example, Golden argued that schools in states that emphasize mandatory standardized testing may tend to lower standards in order to make it look as if more students are passing. But Rhode Island's supposed alternative is a more comprehensive evaluation system — involving such folks as "performance-based-graduation-requirements coordinators" — that allows for more subjective, student-specific criteria. Wouldn't that be susceptible to inflation, as well? I'd suggest that the public's intuition is correct in preferring standards with an external standard that they can understand and trust.

Similarly, Golden's plea for continued funding emphasizes the necessity of specialty teachers, but he doesn't appear able to show improvements commensurate with the larger workforce. What strikes me with this is that kids start fresh, so the fruits of new paradigms might reasonably be expected to be increasingly visible with each successive class. (Perhaps such efforts on the part of educators as entering children into regional and national competitions of one sort or another might make improvements more visible.) The reality is that Rhode Islanders are looking at a state with fleeing and faltering middle and upper classes. A plea for money must take into account money's scarcity.

And there — I'd suggest — is the rub. Mr. Golden, and those of his profession, ought to marry each public appeal for money with a public appeal to teachers and other educators to step back a bit and let the benefits of efforts of which they (at least) must be aware become more widely known. If the Goldens of the industry aren't able to show explicit and tangible advances, and if those implementing the reforms continue to behave as if they are mainly motivated to get as much as they possibly can each year — rather than placing their hopes increasingly in the future — why should the public trust that more time will bring more than a another request for more time and (of course) money?

If the Anti-War Movement Wants More Traction, They Should Try Actually Being Anti-War for a Change

The Politico reports on frustration that anti-war types are experiencing over their marginalized role in mainstream politics. Rabbi Michael Lerner, an "anti-war" leader from Berkeley, California, says that…

"The Democrats don’t have – and even the people in the anti-war movement don’t have – a coherent alternative world view from which to base a strategy. That’s why they end up debating everything on the same terms that the Republicans do.”

If Rabbi Lerner really wants to understand the limitations of the "anti-war" worldview, he needs to reread his own quote on Speaker of the House Nancy Pelsoi from later in the same article and undertstand the contradictions…

“We’re not that concerned about what’s going on in her heart,” he said. “We’re trying to end the war, and in that, she does not seem to be very much with us, [she] is not willing to take any serious political risk.”

The belief that the war in Iraq will "end" -- that's Rabbi Lerner's term -- immediately upon an American withdrawal from Iraq shows that the "anti-war" movement does have a coherent worldview, albeit a discredited one. To believe that an American withdrawal is all that's needed to "end" the war in Iraq requires believing either…

• …that it is purely the presence of America in Iraq that is driving otherwise normal people to go kill one another, or
• …that Iraqi citizens getting slaughtered by foreign or foreign-backed fighters in any numbers doesn't count as war, if American troops are not there, because war is an evil that can only be associated with America, and that in places in the developing world where America is not present, large scale violence just doesn't matter.

Fortunately, the great majority of the American people have rejected both these bases of contemporary anti-war ideology, and that is the reason the movement has failed to gain any traction.

Re: Do Anything, Say Anything for Political "Victory"

Is it possible to view the MoveOn.org ad mentioned by Marc in the previous post as anything less than a questioning of General Petraeus' patriotism?

Tomorrow--as General David Petraeus provides his Iraq assessment to Congress--the antiwar group MoveOn.org is running a full-page advertisement in the New York Times under the headline: "General Petraeus or General Betray us? Cooking the books for the White House."

If the General's patriotism is not being called into question, then who exactly does General Petraeus stand accused of betraying?

Governor Mitt Romney has already responded to MoveOn's message, via an e-mail to National Review Online…

Democrats must make a choice. Will they embrace these deplorable tactics or give General Petraeus a fair hearing? It should be the hope of all Americans that we give him a fair hearing. Certainly, he and our men and women in Iraq deserve it. In the coming days and weeks, there will be much debate about the future course in Iraq, but this debate should be free of the kind of shameful tactics MoveOn.org has shown today. It's time we heard from the generals, not Washington politicians and not ultra-liberal advocacy groups. All Americans should keep an open mind.

Do Anything, Say Anything for Political "Victory"

Just weaving together a couple of threads....first:

[T]he Federal Election Commission handed Americans Coming Together the third-largest fine ever levied by the agency. The $775,000 fine against ACT followed an FEC investigation that found the group, which was organized for the 2004 campaign with substantial funding and active encouragement from Soros, spent $70 million of its $137 million budget on “clearly identified federal candidates in a manner that could only be paid for with federal funds.” ACT claimed it spent the money on voter registration drives. The FEC concluded ACT illegally spent the $70 million to support Democratic candidates. A $775,000 fine for a $70 million crime seems a mere pittance, but that’s an issue for another day.

In the second verdict, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — better known as ACORN — agreed to pay a $25,000 fine to settle vote fraud charges brought by Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed. ACORN employees were supposed to help eligible voters fill out their registration cards, but instead were submitting cards with false names like that of former boxing champion Leon Spinks. Reed called ACORN’s actions “the largest case of voter registration fraud in the state’s history.” Again, the fine seems paltry given the seriousness of the crime, but at least ACORN, which has received much funding from Soros, was caught and made to pay something.

And second:

With its full-page “General Betray Us?” ad in the New York Times, MoveOn.org has once again put itself at the forefront of the antiwar movement. And if past patterns are any guide, a number of Democrats are embarrassed, and even angered, by MoveOn’s actions but are afraid to reveal the true extent of their feelings. MoveOn simply has too much fundraising clout — and a fear-inducing inclination to attack Democrats who stray from the MoveOn line — for many in the party to take it on.

And finally:

Democratic Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware on Jan. 18, 2007: “Mr. President, please change course. Listen to your generals. Listen to former generals. Listen to the Iraq Study Group.”

Bush changed course. Listened to the generals. Pushed for the Surge.

Biden on Sept. 9, 2007, on Gen. David Petraeus: “I really respect him, and I think he’s dead flat wrong.”

And on Bush: “This president has no plan — how to win and/or how to leave.”

General Petraeus' Recommendation

The New York Times' version of General David Petraeus much-anticipated recommendation on how to proceed in Iraq is that 1) the surge has been successful enough, both against the enemy and in giving Iraqis the confidence to fight on our side, to allow a draw-down of troops to pre-surge levels, possibly between December and next August and 2) that the situation on the ground must be re-evaluated in six months to decide where to go from there…

The top American commander in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, has recommended that decisions on the contentious issue of reducing the main body of the American troops in Iraq be put off for six months, American officials said Sunday.

General Petraeus, whose long-awaited testimony before Congress will begin Monday, has informed President Bush that troop cuts may begin in mid-December, with the withdrawal of one of the 20 American combat brigades in Iraq, about 4,000 troops. By August, the American force in Iraq would be down to 15 combat brigades, the force level before Mr. Bush’s troop reinforcement plan....

“He has also argued that recommendations on reductions below the presurge force levels would be premature at this time, and that recommendations on such adjustments should wait until March 2008,” the officer added.

Re: And Another One Gone (Representative Singleton Changing Parties)

Today's weekly Political Scene column in the Projo has more detail on Representative Richard Singleton's (I – Cumberland) decision to switch from Republican to Independent. He says he's upset at both the national and local Republican parties…

Singleton said he has been upset for some time over President Bush’s handling of the war in Iraq and the support Republican lawmakers in Washington gave to a Bush-backed immigration bill that he described as “a disgraceful amnesty bill at the very least” and “some other scandals we’ve witnessed within the Republican party”....

On the local level, he cited “disappointment over the past four years with the general management of the Republican Party,” and what he perceives as a “lack of interest” by Republicans in running for office or contributing. “It’s tough to get Republicans out to even donate.”

At the moment, my primary concern is that I don't think there's another appropriate line from the lyrics of Queen's Another One Bites the Dust to use as the title of a posting should another Republican legislator change parties.

Skeptical, Cynical, Sarcastic, or Just Saying "Heh"

During a perusal of Instapundit, I came across two (seemingly) unrelated items. The first reports that British skulls appear to have grown 20% above the eyes since the times of the plague:

The two principal differences discovered were that our ancestors had more prominent features, but their cranial vault -- the distance measured from the eyes to the top of the skull -- was smaller.

Dr Peter Rock, lead author of the study and director of orthodontistry at Birmingham University, told the BBC News website: "The astonishing finding is the increased cranial vault heights.

"The increase is very considerable. For example, the vault height of the plague skulls were 80mm, and the modern ones were 95mm -- that's in the order of 20% bigger, which is really rather a lot."

Then, by sheer happenstance, no doubt, I clicked over to a tongue-in-cheek quip about this picture:

Bushitler "Shrub" types should feel welcome to flock to my serious question (not mentioned in the BBC skull article) whether the size of British skulls might have more to do with the long-term effects of interbreeding with large-skulled, small-featured foreigners than with blossoming brain function on the isle.

Too Appropriate to Make Up

Periodically, one comes across coincidences that are so appropriately rife with subtext that only a heavy-handed author would layer them in a fictional story. Putting aside the RI-welfare-state practice in question, there's an example of reality's too-obvious plot line in Elizabeth Gudrais's Projo piece, "R.I. is ripe for welfare abuse, critics say":

Last spring during General Assembly hearings on bills aimed at thwarting illegal immigration, some lawmakers asked whether the state was doing enough to limit social-service programs to people who are legally eligible for them.

The lawmakers’ questions focused on the practice of entering a standard code number — 666 — into the state computer system when someone seeking benefits such as welfare or childcare assistance can’t provide a valid Social Security number, generally available only to U.S. citizens and those with legal immigration status. ...

Compared with other states, Rhode Island’s numbers are easy to track because all programs use the same code number. Back in the late 1980s, the developers of the computer system used by the social-services programs chose 666 because they needed a number that was not in use by the federal government as a prefix for Social Security numbers. Edward P. Sneesby, who was a policy officer with DHS at the time and is now the department’s associate director for program operations, says there were “only a handful of options” and that other states used the same number.

Taking our Social Security numbers as a form of identification, from the government's perspective, how appropriate that those drawn under the government's wing with no SSN identity of their own would be branded with 666! Woonsocket's Rep. Jon Brien (a Democrat, incidentally)...

... finds it hard to believe that the law is being enforced without exception. "There exist actual guidebooks that are given to illegal aliens, once they get here, by social organizations in this state, telling them how to go about getting State of Rhode Island benefits," he says.

"We're talking about people who have just arrived here illegally, children in tow."

What are the odds, I wonder, that the person to call for copies of the guidebooks would be Lucy Devlin (or some such), at extension 13? Perhaps when she hands one to you, she'll say, "All these benefits the state of Rhode Island will give to you."

There's that "B" Word Again

An old joke down in Washington (as I've heard) is that inhabitants have a peculiar method of reading books: index first. Of course, "Washington" is a metonym for American politics, and the index-first urge is a natural one for anybody who may find his own name (or that of another person or an organization about which he cares) in a political book.

That is why, although I'll confess that my interest in political memoirs in general and Steve Laffey's in particular is a nearly inaudible hum, this line in a front-page Providence Journal piece on his forthcoming book caught my attention:

The narrative travels from debates and behind-the-scenes strategy sessions to advertisements and door-knocking and the Laffey campaign’s efforts to seed its message into political blogs and radio talk shows.

The "B" word appears again in Darrell West's review in the Books section:

He says he has no regrets about his campaign and he blames “shameful journalism,” unfriendly newspaper columnists, aggressive bloggers, and national figures such as Karl Rove and the D.C. Republican establishment, which poured millions of dollars into ads, direct mail, and opposition research attacking him.

Honestly, I don't expect to find Anchor Rising in Laffey's index. We weren't particularly "aggressive" during the primary season, for one thing. For another, I don't believe that we played that large of a role in either his momentum or his defeat. But then again, I don't recall any blogs figuring very largely in the saga, so perhaps some adviser — of either a political or literary sort — put the "B" word so prominently in the marketing vocabulary of Laffey's book because "blogs are hot," or some such headline phrase from a marketing trade publication.

That said, if anybody who reads Laffey's book comes across a paragraph akin to the following made-up possibility, I'd be interested to hear about it:

My staffers so harassed the comment sections of Anchor Rising (the state's uninspiring conservative blog) that the Web site's contributors seriously considered closing down the interactive feature altogether.

If the book is of the Tell All variety, perhaps we'll finally learn who posted under which nicknames.

Tiverton School Committee Shuffles Its Offer

The Tiverton School Committee has notched up its pay proposal slightly, and although, to be honest, I can't testify to the comparative values of the various health proposals, there's a new one on the table:

The school committee's latest position on salaries made Wednesday, according to school committee vice-chairman Michael Burk, consists of an offer of a two percent increase in the first year, and 1.5 percent increases in each of years two and three, for a total of five percent over the life of the contract

"This is part of the total salary/benefit package we offered," he said, which also included a health cost element.

The health plan, he said called for "a 15 percent copay in year one for all teachers (no more sliding scale); [and] 20 percent in years two and three for all teachers."

I'll be pleasantly surprised if the union acknowledges the obvious and realizes that there simply isn't much more to be wrung out of the town, no matter how brazenly it attributes the small increases in the school committee's proposals to obstinacy.

Just for a Chuckle

Has anybody caught that new WPRO promo spot that runs as follows (or pretty close):

Question: Where do bloggers turn for information?

Answer: WPRO 630 AM

So, in a literary sense, does that make us models of the well-informed citizen whom all should emulate? I'm not sure whether to be flattered or frightened. (Although all related emotions must be adjusted to account for the fact that I've apparently been given double vision, too.)

A Mere Suggestion for the Teachers' Unions

When we at Anchor Rising and the Providence Journal's Bob Kerr are (at the least) headed toward the same page, you might want to turn some of your questions inward:

A lot of years later, conditions are obviously better. Teacher pay has gotten downright comfortable. Teachers are often seen showing up at school in some very nice wheels. Benefits are wonderful. And there are the summers.

But there has been a high cost for the relative prosperity. It is the gradual erosion of that special place teachers used to hold in their cities and towns.

It usually shows itself in the late summer when parents start telling stories of how they have had to reorder their lives because children who they expected to be in school are not.

There are scowling, finger-jabbing citizens who point to hard times in their communities while teachers exploit their unique hold on the most important service those communities provide. ...

And, of course, they go on strike sometimes, knowing they are risking absolutely nothing because they will still be required by state law to work the same number of days. And days lost in September are recovered in June. They’re not really putting a whole lot on the line. None have gone to jail in a long time.

Every year, the teacher strike or strikes of the season seem a little more tedious, a little more tacky, a little more out of touch.

What a horrible, corrosive blow this whole unionized system has become to our communities. Kerr does open describing the low pay that his teacher parents accepted as the tradeoff for "personal satisfaction," and I, as one of a certain many, would fight against a return to those days. Instead, I find myself fighting against the teachers, with an unshakable feeling that being known as doing so may affect my children adversely.

It shouldn't be this way. The union organizations' hands have no business in our schools, in our pockets, or around our necks.

Re: The Death of Edimar de Araujo

Here's the key paragraph of Andrew's post on the supposed traffic arrest fatality:

From what we know, anyone with Mr. Araujo's medical condition -- citizen or non-citizen -- could have suffered the same unfortunate fate, if discovered to be the subject of an outstanding warrant following a traffic stop. Mr Araujo's immigration status is only relevant to his death while in custody to the extent that the United States (or any society) enforces any system of laws at all.

As occurred to me when I first read Ms. Ziner's piece, a bare minimum consequence of being an illegal immigrant is that one's entire life must be lived in shadow, hiding from the law. If that basic determination is not tolerable, then borders are not tolerable.

The Death of Edimar de Araujo

Nobody should die as the result of a traffic stop. But the timeline of events leading to the unfortunate death of Edimar Alves de Araujo while in Federal custody, as assembled from witness testimony and audio/visual evidence provided by the Woonsocket Police and Providence Fire Departments, points to a tragedy that was sudden and unforeseeable, not the result of neglect or cruelty.

Karen Lee Ziner has an update on the investigation into Mr. Araujo's death in today's Projo, including pictures taken from surveillance video and recordings of several emergency calls that were made.

Two points worth adding to the Projo's coverage...

1. The stomach-turning attempts by immigration activists to advance a political agenda using Mr. Araujo's death make no real sense…

“I think everybody is waiting to see how this tragedy really occurred,” said Ali Noorani, executive director of the Massachusetts Immigrant & Refugee Advocacy Coalition, a group that demanded answers at the outset.

“At the end of the day, somebody died because they were an undocumented immigrant who was detained,” said Noorani. “Those are the facts that we know.”

From what we know, anyone with Mr. Araujo's medical condition -- citizen or non-citizen -- could have suffered the same unfotunate fate, if discovered to be the subject of an outstanding warrant following a traffic stop. Mr Araujo's immigration status is only relevant to his death while in custody to the extent that the United States (or any society) enforces any system of laws at all.

2. There had been initial reports that the Woonsocket Police department, for unknown but probably not good reasons, refused to provide Mr. Araujo with medication he needed. Here's what the Boston Globe reported on August 9…

Edmar Alves Araujo, 34, of Milford, called his sister to say he had been detained by local police after a traffic stop. Irene Araujo said she immediately brought his medication, Gardenal, to Woonsocket police headquarters, where he was being held, only to be turned away by officers who refused to accept it.

"I told them he needed the medication, and I told them he had seizure problems," Irene Araujo said yesterday. "He can't skip a day without medication."

Today's report from Ms. Ziner reminds us that this version of events was quickly debunked...

Randy Olen, a Providence lawyer who represents the family, said the case “represents a tragedy that should have and could have been avoided.” Olen said the family maintains that authorities “were put on notice that Mr. Araujo required life-sustaining medication, and the information was not acted upon, and that the failure to do so may have led to his death.”

Mr. Olen made this distinction that it was "information" and not "medication" brought to the Woonsocket police as early as August 11. Between the statement of Araujo family's lawyer and what can be observed from the audio/visual evidence that has been released, there is nothing to support a claim that either Woonsocket Police or Federal authorities denied any medication that was otherwise readily available to Mr. Araujo.

DCYF Changes Afoot

The ProJo's Steve Peoples reports:

The Department of Children, Youth and Families is about to fundamentally change the way it does business.

The state child-welfare agency is moving forward with an aggressive plan to rely on a handful of private companies to manage care for Rhode Island’s most vulnerable children. By streamlining services and reducing the number of children taken from their homes, state officials say they can improve the state’s troubled child welfare system while living within a budget that was cut by $60 million this year.

“Rhode Island has relied on many residential programs for too long. Kids need to be in the community, provided that you have the right services for the children,” said DCYF executive director Patricia Martinez. “We’re taking the concepts of 30 years of recommendations and really staying true to our mission: keeping kids safe and making sure families have the resources to really support their kids.”

Child-welfare advocates largely agree with the philosophy behind the new plan, which is dubbed the Family Care Community Partnerships. It follows similar moves in recent years by Massachusetts and New York.

However, some are wary:

“Good idea. Great concept. But like anything when you’re dealing with people’s lives, you need to make sure you have everything in place. Something like this should take a year or two to do. It’s not something you do in six months,” [state child advocate, Jametta] Alston said yesterday. “They’re saying let’s do this and work out the kinks later. That’s all well and good if I’m knitting. It’s not good if I’m dealing with someone’s life.”

Nonprofit leaders across the state echoed Alston’s concerns yesterday.

“The dollars are driving decision making, which is unfortunate,” said Margaret Holland McDuff, chief executive officer of Family Service of Rhode Island, which works with 3,000 children across the state. “To do it this way isn’t realistic. The RFP just came out a couple weeks ago.”

Afraid that "dollars are driving" change? Well, what else has worked?! However, it sounds like the cost-savings are secondary and that the real goal is to fundamentally change the way that DCYF does business. The new plan is called "high-fidelity wraparound,” which, on its face, seems to be less about throwing money at the problem and more about really involving families and communities in the process. What is Wraparound (PDF)?

The Wraparound process is a collaborative, team-based approach to service and support planning. Through the wraparound process, teams create plans to meet the needs—and improve the lives—of children and youth with complex needs and their families. The Wraparound team members—the identified child/youth, parents/caregivers and other family and community members, mental health professionals, educators, and others—meet regularly to design, implement, and monitor a plan to meet the unique needs of the child and family...Briefly, the Wraparound process can
be described as one in which the team:

• Creates, implements, and monitors
an individualized plan using a collaborative process driven by the perspective of the family;
• Includes within the plan a mix of professional supports, natural supports, and community members;
• Bases the plan on the strengths and culture of the youth and their family;
• Ensures that the process is driven by the needs of the family rather than by the services that are available or reimbursable.

Wraparound’s philosophical elements are consistent with a number of psychosocial theories of child development, as well as with recent research on children’s services that demonstrates the importance of services that are flexible, comprehensive, and team-based. However, at its core, the basic hypothesis of Wraparound is simple: If the needs of a youth and family are met, it is likely that the youth and family will have a good (or at least improved) life. Much of the early work on Wraparound was focused on children, youth, and their families with very complex needs.

However, it is important to note that the process has been proven useful with children, youth, and families at all levels of complexity of need, including those whose needs are just emerging. The intuitive appeal of the Wraparound philosophy, combined with promising initial evaluation studies and success stories from communities around the nation, has promoted explosive growth in the use of the term "Wraparound” over the last two decades. In fact, it has been estimated that the number of youth with their families engaged in Wraparound could be as high as 200,000 (Faw, 1999).

There are some important things that "wraparound" is not (PDF):

• a “service”
• case management
• simply what occurs with a new funding source or the availability of flexible dollars
• merely any service or support that is not typically reimbursable (e.g., respite care, karate lessons, or transportation)

AND

Wraparound is an Alternative to the Typical “Three-Step” Process:
• Assess problems, assign a diagnosis
• Look around for the services that are available
• Plug services into the family
• Provide what’s available and reimbursable rather than what’s really needed

Now, apparently there is a difference between just "wraparound" and "high fidelity wraparound," with the difference being on the amount of training the providers receive. The core principals of this approach, laying there behind all of the social-scientific jargon, is that the fundamental units of society--marriage, family, community--need to be re-introduced to this troubled portion of our society:

In considering the history of Wraparound, it becomes apparent that the idea it represents is nothing new. Humans have been creative, and effective, in supporting one another for eons. Building on this seemingly simple idea, Wraparound represents a process that has the potential to be extremely efficient and useful in improving the lives of children, youth, and families.

In a perfect world, we wouldn't need the government to teach families and communities how to be, well, families and communities. While a portion of the damage that has already been done is attributable to government enabling in the first place, maybe this approach will help to positively enable individuals and communities to reduce these problems on their own. Call it on the job life-training, if you will.

The cautionary note sounded by Alston should be heeded: do it right, don't rush it. However, so long as the new direction is plotted carefully--and the average DCYF worker buys in--maybe it will help the children and families free themselves from a generational pattern of abuse, neglect and poor choices. "Managing" cases and throwing money at the various problems--no matter how well-intentioned--hasn't worked. It's time to try something different. This may be the first step down that path.

Another Lie by the NEA: East Greenwich Teachers Would Take Pay Cuts Under School Committee Proposals

One of the other lies being spread by the NEA is that the proposals offered by the East Greenwich School Committee would result in pay cuts for teachers.

The NEA tried to pass off this lie as fact in 2004-05 and Anchor Rising showed it was a lie then.

And it is a lie in 2007, too.

An example of the propaganda being spread this year came earlier from Pam, a teacher in East Greenwich, who wrote these words in the Comments section of another Anchor Rising post:

Please ask the administrators to take the same pay cut I would take if my contribution to health care went up to 15-20% and my salary increased 1-2%.

In the early years of my career, I served as a Chief Financial Officer at several companies. Bear with me while we go granular in this post and do a CFO analysis to blow this latest lie out of the water.

As a citizen concerned about this NEA claim, the first step I took was to have a meeting with Maryanne Crawford, Director of Administration for the East Greenwich School Department. I met with her on September 6 for the purpose of getting empirical data so I could complete my own independent analysis. Therefore, please note that this analysis has not been prepared by the East Greenwich School Department.

After the meeting, I completed this Excel spreadsheet with 7 tables so my analysis would be completely transparent and subject to public scrutiny on this blog, unlike the NEA's claims. If you want to dive into this issue, I would encourage you to open the spreadsheet and read the rest of this post while referring to the tables in the spreadsheet.

Here we go:

TABLE I: MASTER'S DEGREE PROJECTED SALARY SCHEDULE (2006-07 THROUGH 2009-10)

Maryanne informed me that 156 of the 231 East Greenwich teachers employed last year held Master's degrees. I then chose to use that salary schedule because it represents the most likely pay scenario for teachers.

The first 2 columns present the actual 10 job step salaries for Master's degree teachers in 2006-07, based on the most recent signed contract.

According to the East Greenwich Pendulum issue on September 6, the School Committee's most recent offer was to increase salaries for every job step and education grade by 2.5% in 2007-08, 2% each in 2008-09 and 2009-10.

The balance of Table I then calculates the higher salaries for the 3 upcoming years based on those rates of increase.

TABLE II: MASTER'S DEGREE PROJECTED SALARY INCREASES (2007-08 THROUGH 2009-10)

For every job step below the top step 10, a teacher moves up each year to the next higher step. This is how teachers in job steps 1-9 realize 8-12%/year salary increases. I picked job step 5 as the example to review as it is the mid-point between step 1 and step 10 and would, therefore, have roughly the average increase among non-step 10 teachers.

Once at step 10, however, the salary increase each year equals just the rate of increase shown in Table I. Maryanne told me that just under 60% of last year's East Greenwich teachers were at step 10. Therefore, if anyone is going to suffer a "pay cut" in a new contract, it will be these teachers who receive the smallest annual increase in salaries (albeit after up to 9 years of receiving 8-12%/year increases).

Table II shows that:

• Step 5 teachers receive $4,372-4,525/year salary increases over the next three years
• Step 10 teachers receive $1,431-1,745/year salary increases over the next three years.

TABLE III: HEALTH INSURANCE PREMIUM PROJECTED COSTS

Table III notes that family coverage with Blue Cross Blue Shield - Healthmate is the most common form of health insurance utilized by East Greenwich teachers, with 110 FTE's out of 231 teachers using such coverage last school year.

Second highest is the single person coverage with Blue Cross Blue Shield - Healthmate, with 37 FTE's using such coverage last year.

All other school department health insurance options were only used by 16 additional FTE's as the remaining 68 FTE's did not use any form of the East Greenwich schools-based health insurance coverage and instead took a buyback cash bonus of $5,000 in 2006-07.

Therefore, Table III focuses on the family and single person health insurance premium costs for Healthmate over the next 3 years. Actual premium costs in 2007-08 for such family coverage costs the school department $13,618 and the actual single coverage costs them $5,229.

Premium costs are assumed to go up 10%/year in the two years following 2007-08. The East Greenwich School Department's policy is a self-insured, claims-based policy through the West Bay Collaborative.

TABLE IV: HEALTH INSURANCE CO-PAYMENT EXPENSES PROJECTED TO BE INCURRED BY TEACHERS

In 2006-07, teachers at job steps 1-4 paid a 5% co-pay while teachers at job steps 5-10 paid a 10% co-pay.

According to the East Greenwich Pendulum, the School Committee's most recent offer proposed increasing co-pays for all job steps to 12% in 2007-08, 15% in 2008-09, and 18% in 2009-10. Table IV assumes those percentages and computes what the teachers would pay in co-payments for the next three years:

• Family coverage annual co-pays would increase from last year's $655-1,311 to $1,634, $2,247, and $2,966.
• Single coverage annual co-pays would increase from last year's $260-519 to $627, $863, and $1,139.

TABLE V: NET INCREASES IN PRE-TAX HEALTH INSURANCE CO-PAYMENT EXPENSES PROJECTED TO BE INCURRED BY TEACHERS

Table V simply takes the data in Table IV and calculates the annual net increases in pre-tax co-pays made by the teachers.

• The single step 5 and step 10 teachers would pay $235-368/year in higher pre-tax health insurance premium co-payments.
• The married step 5 and step 10 teachers would pay $323-719/year in higher pre-tax health insurance premium co-payments.

TABLE VI: NET INCREASES IN AFTER-TAX HEALTH INSURANCE CO-PAYMENT EXPENSES PROJECTED TO BE INCURRED BY TEACHERS

The East Greenwich School Departments offers what is called a Section 125 plan where teachers can pay their health insurance premium co-payments in pre-tax dollars, thereby lowering their taxable income and subsequent taxes.

Using a 2006 Federal Tax Rate Schedule, married couples filing jointly pay 25% income taxes on every marginal dollar earned above $61,300. So I assumed 25% plus the Rhode Island income tax rate is about 25% of the Federal rate or about 6.25%. I rounded the two percentages to 30% and Table VI calculates the true, after-tax cost to teachers of the higher health insurance co-payments.

• The single step 5 and step 10 teachers would pay $165-257/year in higher after-tax health insurance premium co-payments.
• The married step 5 and step 10 teachers would pay $226-503/year in higher after-tax health insurance premium co-payments.

Bluntly, that is not asking very much and suggests the School Committee should be more aggressive in demanding higher co-pay percentages in its next offer.

TABLE VII: NET CHANGE IN CASH COMPENSATION PROJECTED TO BE REALIZED BY TEACHERS

Table VII gives us the "bottom line" and proves the NEA has lied once again when they claimed that the offer from the School Committee would result in the teachers taking pay cuts.

• The single step 5 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $4,207-4,332/year.

• The married step 5 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $3,943-4,243/year.

• The single step 10 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $1,266-1,487/year.

• The married step 10 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $956-1,518/year.

No negative numbers anywhere to be found.

[Later Note: Enjoy Bob Walsh's challenge of this conclusion in the Comments section - and my response debunking his claim. To provide the numbers in support of my conclusions, I have added an additional summary analysis of the net cash compensation numbers for the original School Committee offer - even adding the modified spreadsheets for public scrutiny. It can be found at the bottom of the Extended Entry section below.]

As an aside, the negotiating teams can debate whether step 10 teachers should get larger increases but my position - if I was on the team - would be that such changes are only possible if the hefty increases to steps 1-9 teachers are reduced to at least offset the additional step 10 salary increases.

CONCLUSION #1 ABOUT INTENT

Every East Greenwich teacher should bluntly ask their union leadership why the NEA is lying to them. And then every adult resident in town should ask the NEA the very same question.

The NEA likes to run around and accuse School Committees of negotiating in bad faith. But the NEA is the only party which has been shown - multiple times now - to lie to the taxpaying public and even its own members.

CONCLUSION #2 ABOUT ECONOMICS

It is not at all clear that the School Committee's latest proposal will allow its budget increases to remain under the tax cap restrictions. (That is a separate analysis for another day. Stay tuned.)

Whether all of us want to admit it, the gravy train ride is over. Welcome to the real world of constraints, like ordinary working families and retirees live with every year.

I believe the only really effective contract that both does right by deserving teachers and lives within the tax cap will require wholesale changes to the 10-step salary schedules. That kind of change won't happen quickly and it certainly won't happen with a mediator trying to split the status-quo baby. The latter is a process which ensures the unsustainable economics of past contracts is only tweaked when it needs a complete overhaul.

I am concerned that the School Committee, which has shown decidely more courage than the norm so far, is still not thinking sufficiently outside the box.

Nobody expects the NEA to think outside the box. After all, their agenda here is to blow up the tax cap so uncontrolled spending can continue.

I hope the School Committee appreciates how much support there is already for them taking a firm stand to find a new way. It is too bad that the negotiating party across the table is only capable of lying instead of being constructive problem solvers.

Remember: Anchor Rising is THE place to go for information on the teachers' strikes issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to other Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion
Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts
Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day
Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday
More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute.)
The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update
Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"
The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama
News Flash: Judge Orders East Greenwich Teachers Back to Work on Friday, September 7

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities
(These three posts immediately above in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)
This Is the Way the System Works, the System Works, the System Works

ADDITIONAL SCENARIO ANALYSIS

In response to Bob Walsh's challenge that failed, here are the spreadsheets analyzing the original School Committee offer of 2%, 1.75%, and 1.75% salary increases to the 10 steps over the 3 years plus 20% health insurance premium co-payments in all 3 years.

The Table VII in this modified analysis gives us the "bottom line" and proves the NEA has lied once again when they claimed that the offer from the School Committee would result in the teachers taking pay cuts.

• The single step 5 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $3,652-4,256/year.

• The married step 5 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $3,213-4,127/year.

• The single step 10 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $846-1,187/year.

• The married step 10 teacher would realize annual net cash compensation increases of $407-1,058/year.

Some lower numbers, as you would expect. But, again, no negative numbers anywhere to be found. So who is being personally dishonest and manipulative of data?

And Another One Gone

WPRO's (630 AM) Dan Yorke reported last evening that state Representative Richard Singleton (R - Cumberland) has announced that he is leaving the Republican party. Yorke (as well as a few other sources) say that Representative Singleton will not become a Democrat, but will act as an independent where the organization of the General Assembly is concerned.

A Movable Sob Story

My heartless campaign to explain to Rhode Island that there are alternative, more comprehensively beneficial ways of helping families than maintaining our state's structural deficit and driving out businesses and our most promising citizens continues in today's Providence Journal.

In Case You Missed It (The Article and the History)

Mac puts Gen. Petraeus in his historical military context in today's Walll Street Journal:

Events have vindicated the claims of those who argued that President Bush's "surge" strategy in Iraq could work. Security, the sine qua non for ultimate success, has improved. This is especially true in Anbar and other Sunni-dominated provinces where the Sunni sheiks, who may have previously supported al Qaeda, have concluded that the Americans are now the "strongest tribe" in the region and have turned against their erstwhile allies.

This is an important development. Of course, success also depends on the actions of the U.S. Congress and the behavior of the Iraqi government. But the military element is important. Advocates of the surge argued that militarily, success would depend less on the number of U.S. troops in Iraq than on how they were used. Under Gen. David Petraeus, they have been used correctly to conduct effective counterinsurgency operations. What perhaps is not fully appreciated is the significant cultural change that his approach represents.

Some years ago, the late Carl Builder of Rand wrote a book called "The Masks of War," in which he demonstrated the importance of the organizational cultures of the various military services. His point was that each service possesses a preferred way of fighting that is not easily changed. Since the 1930s, the culture of the U.S. Army has emphasized "big wars." But this has not always been the case.

Throughout the 19th century, the U.S. Army was a constabulary force that, with the exception of the Mexican and Civil Wars, specialized in irregular warfare. Most of this constabulary work was domestic, the Indian Wars representing the most important case. But the U.S. Army also successfully executed constabulary operations in the Philippines after the Spanish-American War, which involved both nation-building and counterinsurgency.

Never Know Unless You Ask

There's an odd omission from Steve Peoples's article about the new medicine copays for impoverished recipients of state aid. We get the policy's numbers:

McCaffrey is among 14,000 impoverished Rhode Islanders on fee-for-service Medicaid who will be asked to shoulder a portion of their prescription drugs — $1 for generics and $3 for brand-name drugs — as of Oct. 1. The fees were enacted by the General Assembly in the state budget, part of a larger effort to close a massive budget deficit.

State officials say the copays will save state taxpayers nearly $600,000.

McCaffrey, who is disabled and receives $680 each month, estimates her monthly drug costs will grow to about $16.

We get the sad story:

McCaffrey, 47, needs medicine to function. The disabled Providence woman takes eight medications each day for a list of ailments that include major depression, asthma, diabetes and posttraumatic stress disorder.

We get the incensed calls for the government to spend money advertising a loophole:

"It's outrageous, shameful really, that DHS made a deliberate decision ... not to tell people that, under federal and state law, the drugstore has to fill their prescription if they are unable to afford the copay," Mary Curtain, a paralegal with Rhode Island Legal Services, said at yesterday's hearing.

We even get the Rhode-Island-suffers-in-a-national-comparison factoid:

In charging copays for this program, Rhode Island is not unique. More than 40 states already do, according to the federal Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

But nobody in the story offers — nor does Mr. Peoples ask about — suggestions of familial or community charity. Apparently, nobody worth quoting for the story is able to come up with creative ideas for helping the most needy among us drum up sixteen bucks a month for medicine. How about a jar at the pharmacy counter? How about a community fundraiser? What if kids — under the heading of Civic Participation — volunteered for short bursts of work (either in pharmacies or elsewhere) and donated their pay to a copay fund?

Why, in this state, must it always be career advocates pushing the government to find ways of forcing one group of citizens to bankroll another? Sure, the extra government spending for this program, set apart from the rest, amounts to very little for the average taxpayer, but it is not set apart, and the very littles add up. As for the costs to the individual in dependency and to the community in apathy, those are incalculable.

This Is the Way the System Works, the System Works, the System Works

As pleasant of an evening as it is to be sitting in my car at the Tiverton High School writing blog posts, I have to say that I'm a little disappointed at the way the system apparently works.

Having been informed that tonight's negotiation-related school committee meeting, wherein the committee would bring the town council up to speed, was open to the public, I overcame my four-day-week-Thursday inertia and traveled out to observe and, if given the chance, to participate. The two heads of the committee, Chairwoman Denise deMedeiros and Vice Chairman Michael Burk, were heading in just as I arrived, and they let me know that the public component of the meeting would consist of little more than a motion to enter closed executive session. They mentioned that the union had decided not to attend — and can you believe that gesture of good will? — and I quipped that I had hoped the reason Pat Crowley had left Dan Yorke's airwaves was to make it out here to the boonies.

As I sat down in the library and began to take out my stealth bloggerware, I first heard somebody say "that's Justin Katz," and the town council immediately moved for executive session (not that I'm implying that the latter words were hastened by the former). Out I went, sardonic smile irresistible.

Now, I understand that the committee and the council have money matters to discuss, and that cards might be shown that are best not seen by the other party to the teacher contract negotiations. But couldn't there be some pro forma production put on for the benefit of citizens? Some announcement of the meeting's purpose and allowance of public comment as our representatives debate how to handle the single largest component of the town's financial business?

So which came first? The chicken of closed meetings, or the egg of public apathy?

(By the way, with my subject line, I'm thinking less nursery rhyme and more T.S. Eliot.)

News Flash: Judge Orders East Greenwich Teachers Back to Work on Friday, September 7

More details when we have them.

UPDATE

I just got off the phone with Superintendent Charlie Meyers who told me the Judge made these primary points at court this afternoon:

• There would be irreparable harm if the children were not back in school tomorrow.

• The School Department clearly demonstrated the point about irreparable harm in court today.

• The court order states that teachers in Rhode Island are prohibited from engaging in any work stoppage or strike.

I then talked to a School Committee member [Subsequent note: As a point of clarification, this member was not present at the courtroom.]. The member told me that the Judge also read off the names of the East Greenwich teachers who serve on the NEA negotiating team and, paraphrasing, said these words:

If you are not performing your jobs tomorrow in your schools, then you must report back to me here in this courtroom at 9 a.m. tomorrow.

It was the impression of this School Committee member that the Judge would have them arrested if they were not back in their classrooms.

East Greenwich NEA members are meeting tonight at 7 p.m. Not much for them to talk about now, is there?

A public relations disaster for the NEA.

And it is a disaster even before any East Greenwich students ask them why they went out on strike when the teachers already knew it was illegal for them to do so in Rhode Island.

Anchor Rising is THE place to go for information on the teachers' strikes issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to other Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion
Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts
Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day
Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday
More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute.)
The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update
Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"
The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities
(The last three posts in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)

The Continuing NEA Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich: Lies, More Lies & Even Some Melodrama

The NEA disinformation campaign continues.

It is so patheticly transparent that it should be funny. But it is hard to laugh when they willingly and consciously exploit our children as pawns in their game of greed.

However, just like we saw during the collapse of the Iron Curtain, technology allows us to immediately skewer the outmoded NEA playbook and point out their lies and deceit.

The latest NEA-East Greenwich Letter contains lies, more lies and even some melodrama:

An Open Letter to East Greenwich Residents:

East Greenwich Teachers returned to school on August 30, participating fully and enthusiastically in our jobs. On Friday, August 31, we were scheduled to receive a paycheck according to the town payroll schedule. We did not. Why? We don’t know. Our representatives were negotiating a contract as state law permits us to do. But apparently the school committee and school department who represent the Town of East Greenwich do not believe in the right to collective bargaining, as granted by state law. In a blatant act of coercion, the school department simply decided not to pay us. Citizens of East Greenwich, is this the way you want your elected officials to treat the educators who care for your children?

We were there when your children forgot their lunch money and we made sure they ate. We were there when your children didn’t have a ride home, and we made certain they were safe. We were there when your children called us at 10pm because they didn’t know where else to turn for help. We have been here from their first day jitters through their post graduate plans.

We have been and will continue to be there for your children. We believe you care. Please do not allow your school committee to dismantle and destroy one of the best things about this town. They have created an environment of intimidation and demoralization amongst the teachers that will not resolve itself for a very, very long time. Please consider what we have meant to your children. Please pick up the phone and demand that the school committee engage in good faith bargaining – regardless of what you believe the contract should read. Fair and reasonable people understand that contract negotiations in a civilized society cannot take place under coercion.

The teachers have been working extremely hard in an effort to achieve a fair settlement. A cut in pay to go back to work is not a fair settlement. The school committee forced the teachers to not report to work by refusing to bargain on Monday night. Those representing the school committee did not have the authority to reach agreement. They would not call other school committee members who were not present in order to gain that authorization.

It is the union’s wish to reach settlement as quickly as possible.

Thank you for supporting the quality education your children deserve.

You would think the Kremlin's former press office had taken over the communications function for the NEARI! With about as much success and professionalism.

The East Greenwich School Committee has issued a September 6 press release (Word document) response to the NEA letter:

The East Greenwich School Committee continues to be disappointed and frustrated that the East Greenwich teachers’ union has decided to continue their strike and refuse to return to school. We are proceeding with court action to force the teachers back to the classrooms based on our concern that our students are suffering irreparable harm due to their actions. It is our hope that the judge will agree with us and order the teachers back to work. The Committee will continue to pursue negotiations with the teacher’s union.

The School Committee has been actively involved in the negotiation process since February, designating Superintendent, Charlie Meyers, as our representative with full authority to act on our behalf in order to reach an agreement at any point in the negotiation process. At every negotiation and mediation session, Superintendent Meyers has had full authority to reach an agreement on behalf of the School Committee.

While constantly involved and informed over the status of the negotiations, school committee members joined the mediation process, in person, to offer support to Superintendent Meyers in reaching an agreement. Unfortunately, we have offered multiple proposals that have consistently been rejected by the teachers’ union and they have not offered any substantial compromise in return.

The School Committee was notified by the teachers’ union on Wednesday, August 29th, that their members would strike if no agreement was reached. We asked, twice, for a clarification of this through the mediator. Our hope was that they would return to school, while continuing negotiations. The union officials confirmed, through the mediator, that they would strike without a contract. Since the teachers are paid two weeks in advance, it was determined that we could not pay people for not working. The scheduled pay period for the first two weeks of the new school year was scheduled for August 31st. We felt it was a prudent decision to withhold the advanced payment of wages until we knew for certain the teachers would be back to work. Teachers were paid for all summer work. Out of concern for their families, we notified the teachers’ union through the mediator on Wednesday, August 29, that we would be withholding paychecks because we could not pay anyone for not working.

The School Committee will continue to act in fairness and good faith with the teachers’ union and will endeavor to bring them back to the negotiating table. We will also continue to do what is in the best interests of our children and our community.

The NEA is on the wrong side of history and they tell lies.

Anchor Rising is THE place to go for information on the teachers' strikes issues in Rhode Island. See the Extended Entry for all relevant links.

To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to other Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion
Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts
Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day
Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday
More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute.)
The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation
East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities
(The last three posts in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; (ii) the tax cap and level funding of education; and, (iii) statewide education funding formula.)

Mr. Subliminal Must Have Written the EG Teachers "Open Letter"

I know Dan Yorke has been giving this some play this afternoon, but I honestly thought the same thing when I stumbled across this "open letter" from East Greenwich Teachers to the public. Namely, it's not a good idea to imply that you--the teachers--are better at raising the kids than their parents. Especially this part in which I've provided--in honor of Kevin Nealon's Mr. Subliminal--an interpretation of what they're really saying:

We were there when your children forgot their lunch money {because you didn't care enough to double-check} and we made sure they ate {when you'd have let 'em starve}. We were there when your children didn't have a ride home {deadbeats}, and we made certain they were safe {lucky we didn't call DCYF}. We were there when your children called us at 10pm {where the hell were you?} because they didn't know where else to turn for help {because you are unsympathetic and uncaring parents}. We have been here from their first day jitters through their post-graduate plans {more than you, even}.

The Continuing Saga of the Funding Formula Distraction -- A Tale of Two Cities

I'm not sure if Jennifer D. Jordan is speaking for herself or indirectly quoting State Senate Majority Leader Teresa Paiva-Weed in the highlighted section of this excerpt from Wednesday's Projo…

A state law known as Senate Bill 3050 also went into effect this year; the law gradually lowers the cap on the amount cities and towns can raise through property taxes to finance municipal services and schools. The intent of the bill was to control escalating property taxes and force communities to analyze and rein in spending, not encourage teachers to strike, said state Senate Majority Leader, M. Teresa Paiva-Weed, a Newport Democrat who designed the bill.

But the property-tax cap was never intended to solve the problem of school financing — that must come from the development of a statewide school financing formula, which Paiva-Weed says she will push lawmakers to focus on this year,

…but whoever is saying that a "funding formula" by itself can solve the problem of school financing is wrong. A funding formula can shift money from one place to another, but the problem of school financing can only be solved by raising taxes or reducing spending.

This is most clearly illustrated with real numbers. A target proposed in a Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council study that Ms. Jordan reported on earlier this year is a good place to start…

The proposal would more evenly split the burden of paying for schools between the state and local communities, gradually requiring the state to cover 44 percent over a period of several years.

Last year, the state paid about 38 percent of school costs statewide — or $645 million. Another 10 percent came from $181 million in federal financing. Property tax revenue from cities and towns made up the rest — more than $1 billion, or 52 percent.

Increasing the state's share of education aid from 38% to 44% would require increasing the total amount of state aid by about 16%. Now, let's compare what this could mean for two Rhode Island communities, the two largest municipalities in the state, Providence and Warwick. Different approaches are possible; here are two that demonstrate the range of possibilities....

"The Providence Plan"

One approach to increasing the percentage of education funding provided by the state would be to increase the total amount of state aid while keeping the share received by each RI community the same. We'll call this “the Providence Plan” (the reason for this will be obvious by the end of the analysis). To hit the RIPEC target with the Providence Plan, every community would individually receive a 16% aid increase relative to their current baselines. Had that plan been implemented this year, Providence would have received an additional $31 million (16% of its $194 million in aid) while Warwick would have received an additional $6 million (16% of its $38 million). Both cities could then reduce their local tax-collections by their additional aid amounts, without reducing spending on education.

But would this mean true “tax relief” for both communities?

Increasing every district's state aid by 16% would require a total of about $110 million in new state-level revenues, generated mostly from income taxes, sales taxes and gambling. (The figure is $110 million because total aid to cities and towns was closer to $690 million than the $645 reported in Ms. Jordan's article. I suspect the difference comes from the fact that aid to the Central Falls district, run directly by the state, is treated separately in the budget from other districts).

For a first estimate, we will assume that each community contributes an amount to state revenues that is proportional to its population. Given the progressive nature of the income tax, this probably understates the contribution from the suburbs and the exurbs, but sales tax and gambling revenues help flatten things out. Based on population, Providence residents (16.4% of Rhode Island's population) would be expected to contribute about $18 million dollars to the state, while Warwick residents (8.1% of the population) would contribute about $9 million.

“Tax relief” is the difference between the reduction in local taxes made possible by new state aid and the new state-level taxes necessary to pay for that aid…

1. Providence would get community tax-relief of $13 million, $31 million dollars in new state education aid minus $18 million dollars in new state taxes.
2. Warwick would get property tax cuts summing to $6 million while paying out $9 million dollars in new state taxes -- for a community tax increase of $3 million.

Bottom line: Under the Providence plan, Warwick residents pay an aggregate tax-increase to help fund tax cuts for Providence.

“The Warwick Plan”

The “funding formula” could be approached in a different way. Instead of keeping the existing state-aid percentages fixed, each community could be given an aid increase that attempts to match their new contribution to state revenues. That would be the "fair and equitable" thing to do, would it not?

Again using a proportion-of-population approximation of the state tax distribution and a target of $110 million in new revenues, Providence would receive $18 million dollars in new state aid (16.4% of $110 million) while Warwick would receive an additional $9 million (8.1% of $110 million). Both communities could then reduce their property tax-burden by these amounts to break relatively even at the community level.

But will the politics of this plan fly? Under this plan, Providence's percentage of state aid drops from about 28% to 26.5%, while Warwick's increases from 5.5% to 7%. Will the urban communities still be interested in signing on to the funding formula as the answer to all of their problems, if it means that their total share of state aid will be reduced? Or will they only support a version specifically designed to increase the urban subsidies?

Senator Paiva-Weed has said that a new funding formula should focus on helping the second-tier and suburban communities, suggesting she supports something closer to the Warwick plan. I doubt that's what Mayor David Cicilline has in mind when he talks about new funding formula being needed to help Providence. The important point is that generic talk about a "funding formula" is currently being used to obscure honest and necessary debate about whether the legislature's priority is raising statewide taxes to fund increased urban subsidies, or if it is reducing the current imbalance that strongly favors urban districts.

More News You Can Hsuse

According to the Associated Press, after Democratic Party fundraiser and convicted con-man Norman Hsu missed his court date yesterday, Congressman Patrick Kennedy reversed his original decision to keep his $6,200 in donations from Mr. Hsu and decided to give the money to charity instead.

However, even after the no-show at court and the issuance of a warrant for Mr. Hsu's arrest, the Rhode Island State Democratic Party still has not yet made any statement I can locate on whether they intend to forgo the $11,000 they have received from Mr. Hsu. Michael McKinney's report in today's Projo on the plans of Congressman Kennedy and Senator Jack Reed to return their suspect donations makes no mention of the direct financial ties between the State Democratic party and Mr Hsu. According to campaign finance records, the State Democrats have received more money from Mr. Hsu than Senator Reed and Congressman Kennedy combined.

Is the Rhode Island Democratic Party really comfortable keeping money received from a fugitive from justice who has apparently listed non-existent addresses on campaign-finance disclosure forms?

The New WPRO Lineup

Ian Donnis of the Providence Phoenix's Not-for-Nothing blog has obtained the WPRO lineup card that includes former Providence Mayor and the recently released-from-prison Buddy Cianci as the DT ("designated talker")…

Each weekday morning, starting at 5, Bill Haberman will anchor WPRO’s First News. John DePetro and the WPRO Morning News will follow from 6 a.m. until 10 a.m.

The Buddy Cianci Show premieres on Sept. 20, and can be heard daily from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. Ron St. Pierre will be on-air with The Buddy Cianci Show each day.

The Dan Yorke Show will move up an hour, airing from 2 p.m. until 6 p.m.

East Greenwich School Committee: Press Release & General Update

A late Wednesday night press release (a Word document) from the East Greenwich School Committee:

The East Greenwich School Committee is disappointed and frustrated that the East Greenwich teachers’ union has decided to continue their strike and refuse to return to school.

When the Committee asked the union to return to the classrooms while continuing to negotiate, they refused, leaving Superintendent Meyers no choice but to cancel school for yet another day. We are greatly concerned over the irreparable harm being done to our students and will seek relief from the court system to get the teachers back to school.

The Committee has continued to negotiate in good faith since February of this year. Our proposals have consistently been rejected by the teachers’ union and they have not offered any substantial compromise in return.

We have persisted in explaining to the union the very serious impact that the tax levy cap (SR 3050) without a viable funding formula will have on our budget over the next 6 years. We cannot act in a fiscally irresponsible manner nor will we run a deficit over the length of the contract. We had hoped that the teachers union would work with us and not against us under these circumstances.

The School Committee will continue to act in fairness and good faith with the teachers’ union and will endeavor to bring them back to the negotiating table. We will also continue to do what is in the best interests of our children and our community.

Related ProJo article here.

Events which occurred on Wednesday or are anticipated for Thursday include:

• The School Committee and NEA negotiating teams met in conference with a Judge on Wednesday. There was no formal action which came from that meeting.

• There is another meeting with the Judge on Thursday, at which time the School Committee will ask that the Judge issue an order requiring the teachers to return to the classrooms.

• The entire School Committee, the NEA negotiating team, Jane Argenteri from NEARI and the mediator met from 5 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon until about 12:15 a.m. Thursday. Larry Purtell (NEARI President) and Roger Ferland (former head of NEA in East Greenwich) were "around" and joined their NEA colleagues in breakout sessions. No progress was made.

• At the end of the meeting, the mediator said that there needed to be a cooling off period, they should all go think about the issues, and he did not want any further meetings before Friday, September 14.

Can you say....paradigm shift?? Stay tuned because it is time to think - and act - outside the conventional box.

Anchor Rising is the place to go for information on the teachers' strikes issues in Rhode Island. To get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to other Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion
Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts
Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day
Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday
More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute.)
The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich
Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation

Other relevant posts on Anchor Rising include:

Burrillville Teachers to Students: Let the Pawns Skip School
Crowley, You Charmer
Researching from Outside the Library
Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.
Citizen Context for Negotiations
One Side of the Phone Conversation
My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote
The Guidebook to Public-Abuse
Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)
The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton
The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics
A Case of Crossed Hands
Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time
(The last two posts in this section address the important questions of (i) what RI law and court decisions say about teachers' strikes; and, (ii) the level funding of education and tax cap issues.)

Studies Show: You Should Let Us Teach Your Children About Our Product!

I'll admit that I was suckered into believing that yet another opinion writer had come to a faulty conclusion about sex ed:

A SHORT ARTICLE in the Aug. 14 New York Times reported that, according to a survey of more than 15,000 young Americans, abstinence-only programs do not work for HIV prevention. The analysis was published in the August issue of The British Medical Journal and tracked 13 studies.

Most of the programs were school-based. The random trials included control groups. “None of the programs made any significant difference in preventing pregnancy, reducing unprotected sex, or delaying sexual initiation,” reported The Times. The study replicates results from similar trials.

Not to be picky, but the report was actually an analysis of various much smaller studies, not a large survey of that many children. And not to repeat myself, but although these studies purport to have scientific control groups, such claims are ludicrous in the face of the children's mingling and their natural interest in collecting information about sex and, moreover, they involve "programs," usually curricula, as opposed to sustained socially based efforts at encouraging specific behavior. (I'd also point out that British researchers might do more good by studying their own problems.)

Of course, in the case of Barbara Dickinson's op-ed, all of these arguments become moot once the sales pitch is made:

If you can’t bring yourself to have this conversation, Planned Parenthood of Rhode Island offers a wide range of educational resources and teaching tools on human sexuality and reproductive health available to teenagers and parents. We have skilled counselors who can help your teenager make good decisions.

As you may have discerned, Ms. Dickinson works for Planned Parenthood, as the chairwoman of the organization's Rhode Island branch. In other words, it's as if a fast-food restaurant's top RI executive placed an op-ed citing studies that eating a balanced lunch once a week for a month didn't have an appreciable effect on health.

Sometimes What is Old is New: Misguided Incentives Drive Public Sector Taxation

As we debate the teachers' strikes, some of the issues at stake took me back to my second post ever on Anchor Rising:

Talking about a pro-tax ballot initiative defeated in Oregon during 2002, a Wall Street Journal editorial stated:

When the budget issue is framed in terms of higher taxes, voters don't understand why government should be exempt from the same spending discipline the rest of us live by. "I am a normal person and when I don't have enough money I have to change my habits," 26-year-old Heather Bryan told the AP, explaining her vote against the measure. "Government should be the same way."

But it isn't and that begs the question of why?

Terry Moe offers this opinion of why government behavior is problematic (PDF):

Public agencies usually have no competition and are not threatened by the loss of business if their costs go up, while workers and unions know they are not putting their agencies or jobs at risk by pressuring for all they can get. Governmental decisions are not driven by efficiency concerns, as they are in the private sector, but by political considerations, and thus by [political] power.

In comparison, when faced with competition in the private sector, irresponsible management action eventually results in loss of market share, lower profits, and loss of jobs. In other words there are direct and dire consequences to bad behavior.

Or, as Wendell Cox wrote last year in a National Review Online article:

How different government is to the real world of the private sector. When [corporations get] into financial trouble, they cut costs and get concessions from their unions, while doing everything they [can] to maintain service levels. When government gets into trouble, it threatens deep service cuts, all too often cuts aimed at the programs that cause the greatest public consternation, in a calculated strategy to obtain the additional funding necessary to maintain the status quo.

The bottom line consequences for working families and retirees are clear: When taxes increase, your standard of living declines.

Practically speaking, the decline in your family's standard of living results in some combination of the three following outcomes: (i) you incur new debt; (ii) you use some of your savings; and/or (iii) you reduce your current spending for items such as food, clothes, heating oil, medical care, car repairs as well as savings for college and retirement. All three outcomes are direct and tangible costs incurred by every family - you have less of your hard-earned income to spend on your family's needs.

It is worth noting that politicians, bureaucrats, and public sector unions suffer no similar consequences when they act irresponsibly. This creates a curious lack of incentive for them to change their behavior.

It was what led Calvin Coolidge to say:

Nothing is easier than spending the public money. It does not appear to belong to anybody. The temptation is overwhelming to bestow it on somebody.

Or, as Lawrence Reed said in his October 2001 speech to the Economic Club of Detroit:

When you spend other people's money to buy something for someone else, the connection between the earner, the spender and the recipient is most remote - and the potential for mischief is the greatest.

The mischief is clear when you see powerful interest groups (including both corporations and unions) manipulate the system for their advantage, all to the detriment of individual families who lose more of their freedom through ever-increasing tax burdens.

So, what can we do about this problem? Any solution requires a vigilant citizenry that makes the mischief transparent to the voting public. And then it comes down to engaged citizens gathering enough political power to bring about change.

Do we have the courage to do so in Rhode Island?

Best We Can Do Is Get Involved Every Time

Using his Rhode Island Law Journal blog for a much needed function, Jon Pincince digs into the judicial side of teacher strike law. You can go there for some relevant quotations from School Committee of the Town of Westerly v. Westerly Teachers Association (1973), but the part that requires further exploration is this:

[This] does not mean that every time there is a concerted work stoppage by public employees, it shall be subject to an automatic restraining order. Rule 65(b) of Super. R. Civ. P. specifically states that no temporary restraining order shall be granted without notice to the adverse party unless it clearly appears from specific facts by affidavit or verified complaint that irreparable harm will result before notice can be served and a hearing held.

What is Rule 65(b) of Super. R. Civ., and how did it come about? Yes, Jon is correct that the 1973 court stressed that the solution should come to the legislature, but in the meantime, it appears to have given itself the role of arbiter and, in doing so, has done nothing to give the General Assembly a nudge in the political will. In true Rhode Island fashion, the legislature appears to have spent the past quarter century behaving as if the problem has been adequately resolved.

A Case of Crossed Hands

Something about the following quotation — offered in "State blamed for teacher strikes — from Bob Walsh gives me the impression that there's a long-term plan behind the words:

"We predicted this would happen," said Robert A. Walsh Jr., executive director of the National Education Association of Rhode Island, which represents 28 teacher locals. "We believe this is bad government decision-making and we believe they have a responsibility to fix it. They are killing public education."

The context reporter Jennifer Jordan has given for the comment is "the decision by lawmakers in June to 'level fund' state education aid at last year's amounts and the impact of a new state law that limits how much municipalities can raise property taxes to pay for schools," and one can see why the top guy in the local teachers' union would want the responsible "they" to be the state government. For one thing, it would consolidate the contribution checks required to influence policies. Relatedly, and perhaps more importantly, it would pull the ultimate authority for schools one step further from citizens who share the interests of townsmen. And of course, the state has more places to hide its financial doings and more ways to disguise its fund-raising than do municipalities.

The article goes on to illustrate that it is a deeply embedded practice in Rhode Island to disperse responsibility to no group in particular:

The state law governing teacher contract negotiations does not give teachers the right to strike. In fact, teacher strikes have been ruled illegal by the state Supreme Court. But one or two teacher strikes a year are not uncommon, and usually end when a judge orders teachers back to the classroom while mediation or arbitration resumes.

Within Rhode Island's General Laws, the strongest language regarding teacher strikes is that "nothing contained in this chapter shall be construed to accord to certified public school teachers the right to strike." I've come across a few bills, especially from early this decade, attempting to strengthen this ambivalent negation, but none made it through to the statute. The rest of the relevant law (although I haven't been able to find it via casual research) comes from the judiciary. And we all can observe the process that the judges have devised: Teachers get to threaten strikes and to follow through; elected town officials get to complain and take legal action; and judges get a role in the administrative/executive function of negotiating contracts, often (as I understand) requiring that a mediator be employed to wrap the two sides together in legally binding terms.

At no point is there an official against whom the public can take direct action at the ballot box.

Subsequent comments from Senate Majority Leader Teresa Paiva-Weed, in Jordan's article, give somewhat more than the impression that another doozy of this sort of well-greased circular chute for blame is in the process of being constructed:

MEANWHILE, A STATE law known as Senate Bill 3050 also went into effect this year; the law gradually lowers the cap on the amount cities and towns can raise through property taxes to finance municipal services and schools. The intent of the bill was to control escalating property taxes and force communities to analyze and rein in spending, not encourage teachers to strike, said state Senate Majority Leader, M. Teresa Paiva-Weed, a Newport Democrat who designed the bill.

But the property-tax cap was never intended to solve the problem of school financing — that must come from the development of a statewide school financing formula, which Paiva-Weed says she will push lawmakers to focus on this year.

"I think there needs to exist a willingness of our cities and towns to give up some of their control, and a willingness of the state to accept responsibility," she said. "It is my hope we can overcome the natural tendency cities and towns have to keep education local and we can work together to achieve savings."

There's something almost defensive in her feeling it necessary to explain that the property-tax cap wasn't intended to "encourage teachers to strike." The image of a raincoated Peter Falk comes to mind, protesting that he insinuated no such thing.

I may be a simple dabbler in literature, but see, I get nervous when people start talking about overcoming natural tendencies. Maybe I'm paranoid. My wife tells me that I think folks are always out to sell me things. Ah, well, she's probably right. But that's me, and it sure does sound like there's some sort of transaction being proposed here. Control for responsibility. Oh yeah, responsibility and money. Now why would anybody want to buy responsibility?

Savings through consolidation certainly do sound attractive. But one thing I keep coming back to: the town's money and the state's money both come from me, only I see the people who spend the town's money walking their dogs and standing in line at the bank.

The Rhode Island Right's Bizarro Politics

Both intentionally and not, I'm on various email lists from conservative bloggers and activists from around the country, and their content is often too far toward meat-throwing for my tastes. I'll admit, though, that I often chuckle at what the guys are up to and delete their messages. I've got to side with Dan Yorke in saying that those red-meat emails are too often press releases from Republican Party Chairman Gio Cicione, including this one that arrived yesterday:

Rhode Island Republican Party Chairman Giovanni Cicione says the teacher unions which have authorized strikes in several Rhode Island towns this week are breaking the law, disrupting the start of the school year for tens of thousands of students, and creating chaos for families scrambling for child care arrangements at the last minute.

“Strikes are illegal in Rhode Island, and this is nothing but an organized effort by the unions to break the law and the unions have to be held accountable,” says Cicione.

“The U.S. Attorney should consider a RICO Act investigation against the NEA, Rhode Island, which is authorizing, and has authorized in the past, illegal strikes by teachers unions. The NEA involvement in these local teachers union strikes amounts to extortion, which is an explicit RICO violation,” Cicione continues.

“Both Robert Walsh and Lawrence Purtill, top officials of the NEA, RI should be named in such an inquiry.”

“This state faces a serious fiscal crisis, the unions have got to be told that the days of getting their way on every issue are over and they’re going to have to learn that their demands exceed what communities can afford.”

Strikes have been authorized in East Greenwich and Tiverton where contract talks failed to produce a settlement. In several other communities, including Burrillville, the Foster-Glocester school district, the Exeter-West Greenwich district and Providence, contracts remain unsettled but teachers are working while talks continue.

Cicione also emphasizes union leadership’s tactics of authorizing an illegal strike hurts the reputation of teachers who get caught in the middle and have no authority to overrule their own union. “The NEA is breaking the law, and using both teachers and students as pawns for their political gain.”

“Hard working and dedicated teachers in these communities may not want to strike and may only want to return to the classroom but they are not in charge of their own schools once the union takes over,” Cicione continues. “These kinds of illegal job actions hurt their reputation in their communities and the union does a disservice to their respected profession by doing this.”

The tax burden problem in Rhode Island is another key factor in the strike crisis. He credits the Governor with addressing the property tax burden on communities, who led the effort to implement a cap on how much communities can raise property taxes. Communities in the state overall depend on property taxes to fund 60% of school costs, compared to 43% nationally, in figures compiled by RIPEC this year. Overall, Rhode Island has the sixth highest property tax burden in the nation.

“Union leaders don’t want to see caps on property tax increases , they want to hike taxes on the grossly overburdened RI taxpayer, they want very little health benefit co-pays and the list goes on and on,” Cicione continues.

“Communities can’t afford it, the state can’t afford unlimited aid to communities for schools, and we can’t afford - or allow -illegal strikes to hold communities and families hostage.”

The notable thing is how backwards the conservative movement is in Rhode Island. Here's how it's supposed to work:

• Somewhat wacky and unaccountable bloggers and grassroots activists push right-wing views too vehemently.
• Right-wing talk radio hosts back off the message a bit, but shout it to a broader audience.
• Conservative Republican politicians go as far to the right as they think their constituencies will tolerate.
• Republican Party officials and back-room political geek types translate those views into a practical strategy that will build the party and move the political center.

Note the aesthetically pleasing flow as the more powerful figures back off the comments of the more heated ideologues. In Rhode Island, things are a bit different: We at Anchor Rising are geeky intellectuals. Our most prominent conservative talk radio host stresses responsible journalism. And the party chairman throws red meat when he ought to be translating our good ideas into practical policies that will help get Republicans elected and improve the state by moving its center to the right.

Will the Rhode Island Legislature be the Last to Know that RI is in Trouble?

A Projo editorial from Monday, quoting a press release from General Treasurer Frank Caprio, quoting all three major bond rating agencies, serves reminder that the rest of the country understands that Rhode Island's current financial quagmire is occurring at a time when the national economy is booming, increasing the difficulty of investment in RI…

Standard and Poor’s: “While the outlook remains stable, Rhode Island’s use of one-shot revenues to balance operations is growing. The state needs to make measurable progress in better balancing recurring revenues to expenditures; failure to address this concern will pressure the rating.”

Fitch Ratings: “The state’s financial position is strained, reflecting weakness in certain key revenue sources....Additional stress or failure to achieve spending restraint goals could result in downward rating pressure.”

Moody’s: “This is the second time in six years that Rhode Island has resorted to deficit bonds to resolve its budget imbalance, underscoring the state’s continuing financial strain at a time when most states are moving toward structurally balanced budgets.”

Add (or subtract, I guess) the big loss in revenue that could result if gambling is expanded in Massachusetts, and it becomes obvious that a fundamental change in the structure of Rhode Island's spending -- a change reducing the total level of spending, not a change that tries to shift the spending burden around -- is necessary very soon to prevent RI from falling into bankruptcy.

The NEA's Latest Disinformation Campaign in East Greenwich

I wrote these words about the NEA's last disinformation campaign in East Greenwich back in 2004-2005:

Comments by National Education Association (NEA) teachers' union officials remind me of words spoken years ago by Soviet officials, whose views of the world were subsequently shown to have no connection to any form of reality.

As the union cranks up its disinformation campaign to intimidate East Greenwich residents, let's contrast their Orwellian comments in recent newspaper articles with the facts.

To paraphrase Ronald Reagan's comment to Jimmy Carter in the 1980 Presidential debate, here they go again:

In information being handed out by teachers picketing the schools in East Greenwich, the NEA has made these claims about the negotiating process in East Greenwich:

• Teachers initiated negotiations in September 2006.
• Negotiating team met for over 30 hours during the school year between December 2006 and June 2007.
• Mediator requested and appointed in late June.
• School Committee unavailable for scheduled mediation until mid-August 2007.
• Teachers have met for over 100 hours of unproductive negotiations.

Here is what I was told when I asked for a response to those NEA comments:

• The mediator was not available to meet until August.
• Several members of the teachers' negotiations team were unwilling to give up their summer vacation to meet in July while the entire School Committee was here ALL summer working on trying to get this resolved.
• We have had budget discussions since October 2006. The teachers have all had input: They put in their requests, the principals submit their requests, the superintendent drafts up his budget, the School Committee looks at it, and negotiations begin with the Town Council.
• School Committee members have spend countless hours at the State House and RIASC working on financing while NO teachers ever helped because they always assumed they would get what they want.
• School Committee members asked for help in front of the Town Council and only 1 teacher showed up. The Town Council has cut the school budget by $1 million in the last two years as part of its efforts to be fiscally prudent. There is a 5.25% tax cap and the Town Council is responsible for ensuring we pay all our employees - school, police, fire, public works, etc.

In other words, the NEA is handing out information which contains lies.

In addition, with the tax cap and massive state budget deficits, the NEA knows the state and towns cannot pay for their outrageous demands and yet they strike to break the cap and have the state spend more. This is confirmed when you read this morning's ProJo article with these words from NEARI's executive director Bob Walsh:

We predicted this would happen...We believe this is bad government decision-making and we believe they have a responsibility to fix it. They are killing public education.

So the NEA doesn't think you are paying enough taxes in Rhode Island! We are in the top 10 states out of 50 in overall taxes paid, in property taxes paid, in spending per pupil and in teacher compensation - and Walsh's only response is that all of Rhode Island needs to pay more taxes. Is this the best he can say?

If I was a State legislator, I would be insulted beyond words that Walsh stated that the legislative leaders were killing public education because they refused to raise government spending and taxes even higher - all while the State faces enormous structural budget deficits. Where does the NEA think this money comes from?

The legislators know that it comes from the budgets of working families and retirees in the state - and have said enough! The NEA's demands are nothing short of an attempt at legalized extortion and they are willing to use our children as their pawns.

But be clear, Walsh's comments are simply the latest example of the NEA's disinformation campaign: He is trying to change the focus to the tax cap and level funding of statewide education aid so there will be less attention paid to his union's demands for 9-12%/year salary increases, only 5-10% co-pays on health insurance, $5,000/year cash payments for not using the school's health insurance plan, and rich (unfunded) pensions - the costs of which all drive budget increases in excess of the salary increases received by the taxpaying public. While leaving little money for building maintenance, curriculum development, and school supplies.

Walsh is advocating a position which lowers the standard of living for all Rhode Island residents. Put another way, the NEA is willing to first punish our children with a strike so it can then punish all taxpayers with a reduction in their standard of living. I fail to see how this is a winning strategy!

Here, in a Word document, is the September 4 press release from the East Greenwich School Committee. It contains some important information about why historical contract terms are no longer economically viable.

To allow people to get up to speed, here are the links - in chronological order - to other Anchor Rising posts about the East Greenwich teachers' strike and the NEA:

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion
Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts
Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day
Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions
Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday
More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike (This is a particularly important post on the substantive issues in dispute.)

See the Extended Entry below for links to blog posts documenting the NEA's 2004-2005 disinformation campaign in East Greenwich.

It was fax machines in Poland back in the 1980's that helped the Solidarity labor union get the word out and build the momentum which eventually freed people from communism.

Today, it is blogs which are getting the word out and helping liberate people from the NEA's unfree world of monopolistic control, a world only made possible by their ability to coerce dues money from the wallets of hard-working teachers.

How ironic is it that labor unions were once leaders in the fight for freedom against communism but are now on the wrong side of history fighting against freedom for working families, retirees, and our children?

EXTENDED ENTRY

One of the great things about the world of blogs is that there is ready access to history. In the last negotiations 2-3 years ago, this blog site documented the endless disinformation and bad faith actions by the NEA. Here are two of the more prominent posts from then:

The NEA's Disinformation Campaign
More Bad Faith Behavior by the NEA

And here is a summary perspective on those negotiations three years ago:

Reflections on the Negotiations

Immediately below the perspective referenced above is a complete list of all my blog posts from 2004-2005. A quick reading of them will show that the NEA's willingness to tell lies to citizens is a consistent behavior pattern.

News You Can Hsuse

Matt Jerzyk of Rhode Island's Future and Tim Raymond of Rhode Island's newest news aggregator StartRI (see comment #3 here) {UPDATE: the earliest source on this appears to be a Projo Political Scene item from last Friday} are reporting that Senator Jack Reed will return the $2,500 in campaign money he received from Norman Hsu, the Democratic fundraiser convicted of running an investment scam in the early 1990's that took over a million dollars from unsuspecting investors.

However, the Associated Press is reporting that Congressman Patrick Kennedy has publicly announced that he intends to keep his contributions from Mr. Hsu…

Rhode Island Rep. Patrick Kennedy said Tuesday he's not returning $6,600 in donations he got from Norman Hsu, a prominent Democratic donor whose criminal past was recently revealed.

Several top Democrats, including 2008 presidential candidates Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and Kennedy's father, Sen. Edward Kennedy, have said they will return Hsu's donations or give them to charity.

Rep. Kennedy will keep the money because there is no indication that Hsu's contributions to him were illegal, according to his chief of staff, Adam Brand.

And there has been no official word from the Rhode Island's State Democratic Party on whether they intend to take any action with regard to the $11,000 in donations they've accepted from Mr. Hsu…

Will the state Democratic leadership follow the example of Senator Reed's or the example of Congressman Kennedy, saying that they see no problem taking money from scam-artists and fugitives from justice, as long as it serves their political purposes?

A Role Model for Courageous, Principled Public Service: T. J. Rodgers

I spent nearly the first 20 years of my professional life attending Stanford Business School and working in Silicon Valley. Like many other young people in the formative years of their professional lives, I observed others who had attributes worthy of emulation, who provided examples of potential role models for the future.

Many years ago, T. J. Rodgers was the first such person in the business community for me: A demanding and entrepreneurial CEO of Cypress Semiconductor who was bluntly outspoken about public policy issues. A courageous and opinionated leader who stuck to his principles, regardless of whether they were fashionable. Someone who was imbued with a Western sensibility that valued freedom.

I was reminded of this long-ago connection by a recent Wall Street Journal interview of Rodgers which shared news on his latest public service initiative, being part of a "counter insurgency" on the Dartmouth College Board of Trustees:

Until recently, though, Dartmouth's elections have been indifferent affairs, with the alumni choosing from a largely homogeneous slate handpicked by a committee closely aligned with the administration. In 2004, things got--interesting. Mr. Rodgers bypassed the official nomination channels and was named to the ballot by collecting alumni signatures; he needed 500 and ended up acquiring more than 15 times that. He was dissatisfied with the college's direction and resolved to either "do something or stop griping about it." He was elected by 54% of the voters.

Although there were a lot of political issues churning about the campus, Mr. Rodgers decided "that I would pursue just one issue, and my one issue, the one substantive issue, is the quality of education at Dartmouth...I decided that if I started debating the political argument du jour it would reduce my effectiveness."

That kind of pragmatism, however, didn't inhibit a highly political response from the aggrieved, including the college administration and some of the faculty. Mr. Rodgers notes that certain professors "seemed to specialize" in accusing him of being retrograde, racist, sexist, opposed to "diversity" and so forth. Or, in the academic shorthand, a conservative.

A curious label for a man who is in favor of gay marriage, against the Iraq war, and thinks Bill Clinton was a better president than George W. Bush. Mr. Rodgers's sensibility, rather, is libertarian, and ruggedly Western. He is also a famously aggressive, demanding CEO, with technical expertise, a strong entrepreneurial bent and an emphasis on empirics and analytics. His lodestars, he says, are "data and reason and logic."

At Dartmouth, he remarks, he has produced dozens of long, systematic papers on the issues. His first priority was to improve its "very poor record of freedom of speech." Soon enough, the college president, James Wright, overturned a speech code. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a watchdog group, elevated Dartmouth's rating from "red" to its highest, "green," one of only seven schools in the country with that status. "We made progress, and I was feeling pretty good," Mr. Rodgers says.

He intended to move on to quality of education next, but the political situation at Dartmouth degenerated...

Curious, again, that Mr. Rodgers has been cast as the leader of some sinister conservative faction, since he is open about what his actual goals are. "They attack things that don't matter because they can't attack you for what you stand for--quality of education...The attacks become ad hominem...We get called the problem. The fact is that we're a response to the problem."

In Mr. Rodgers's judgment, the increasingly political denigration--the "rancor," he calls it--has seriously impinged on his effectiveness as a trustee, and on the effectiveness of the board in general. "Before I ever went to my first board meeting," he says, "I did what any decent manager in Silicon Valley does--management by walking around. You actually go and talk to people and ask how they're doing and what they need to get their jobs done."...

"In general, I don't have a prescription," he says. "I'm not trying to micromanage the place. What I'm saying is take the huge amount of money that an institution like Dartmouth has and focus it on your core business, which is undergraduate education, and make it really, really good. If you want to pinch pennies, pinch pennies somewhere else and not on the core business. That's all I'm saying."

Trustee politics is the reason that this problem with "the core business," as he puts it, has not been addressed. "I don't think we pay enough attention to it and care enough about it. We have time to worry about other things and somehow the main business of the college, which is to educate, doesn't dominate our meetings...

Now, Mr. Rodgers says, the argument has come to its endgame. "This is not a conservative-liberal conflict. This is a libertarian-totalitarian conflict."

One of the main criticisms leveled at the petition trustee process is that it is polarizing, divisive and somehow detrimental to the college. Mr. Rodgers replies, "If 'divisive' means there are issues and we debate the issues and move forward according to a consensus, then divisive equals democracy, and democracy is good. The alternative, which I fear is what the administration and [Board of Trustees Chairman] Ed Haldeman are after right now, is a politburo--one-party rule."

And so, after losing four consecutive democratic contests, the Dartmouth administration has evidently decided to do away with democracy altogether. "Now I'm working on the existence question," Mr. Rodgers notes mordantly.

Though he cannot say for sure--"I'll be kept in the dark until a couple of days before the meeting on what they're planning on doing"--a five-member subcommittee, which conducts its business in secret and includes the chair and the president, has embarked on a "governance review" that will consolidate power. "It looks like they're just going to abandon, or make ineffectual, the ability of alumni to elect half the trustees at Dartmouth," Mr. Rodgers says.

He believes that the model is the Harvard Corporation, where a small group "makes all the decisions. They elect themselves in secret. They elect themselves in secret for a life term. How's that for democracy?"...

But he contrasts the situation especially with his experience at Cypress: "Silicon is a very tough master. It operates to the laws of physics, there are no politics, you can't vote or will or committee your way around it...Therefore the culture of Silicon Valley, where winning and losing is being technologically successful or not, is an objective, nonpolitical culture. It's just different on the Dartmouth board."

Mr. Rodgers expects to be "severely criticized, unfairly and personally," for talking to The Journal. He may even be removed from his post entirely. "It's worth it," he says. "Doing what is right for the college that I love is more important than holding what is largely a ceremonial position."

We need more people in public service like T. J. Rodgers. It's not about having everyone agree on all the issues. But it is about having courageous people capable of grappling with the big issues which impact people's lives - including the proverbial "elephant in the room" that too many people know is present and hurtful but still choose to ignore.

It is about building a culture of public service where principled people take gutsy, reasoned stands based on what they believe is for the greater good.

Such efforts often come at a price. But the study of history shows that people who are willing to take principled stands and lose a short-term battle can alter the future of their world.

And that is the meaning of true leadership.

War and Warriors - Now and Then

Several interesting reads about Iraq, Vietnam and warriors:

Frederick Kagan: Al Qaeda in Iraq - How to understand it. How to defeat it.

Victor Davis Hanson: The Former-Insurgent Counterinsurgency

Robert Kaplan: Rereading Vietnam (h/t Instapundit)

The Kaplan article is a particularly rich piece and worthy of a close reading. Here is what Villainous Company writes about it:

Glenn Reynolds points to an outstanding article on Bud Day and other unsung Vietnam-era vets.

If you read nothing else this week, make time for this. And if you don't have time now, bookmark it and come back to it when you do have a free moment. You owe yourself that much. Last week I remarked that names like Bud Day, Leo Thorseness, and Jeremiah Denton ought to be household words, but aren't.

It's not so much that their courage and devotion to duty has been overlooked that troubles me. The disturbing thing is that a piece of our history - an important piece - has deliberately been airbrushed out of existence. These men's stories carry a vital message for future generations; an inspiring message, a message of hope. The media seem predisposed to portray America as weak; a passive victim of random forces we cannot control. But these stories show that even under the most painful, hopeless, and degrading of conditions the human spirit can soar to undreamed of heights. They show that nobility of spirit can breach the most unbridgeable divide:

"I experienced what I couldn't imagine human nature was capable of," Denton said. "I witnessed what my comrades could rise to. Self-discipline, compassion, a realization there is a God." He also experienced periodic compassion from the North Vietnamese. Sometimes the guards would weep as they tortured him.

One experience, he will never forget. Denton kept a cross, fashioned out of broom straws, hidden in a propaganda booklet in his cell. The cross was a gift from another prisoner. When a guard found the cross, he shredded it. Spat on it. Struck Denton in the face. Threw what was left of the cross on the floor and ground his heel into it. "It was the only thing I owned," Denton said.

Later, when Denton returned to his cell, he began to tear up the propaganda booklet. He felt a lump in the book. He opened it. "Inside there was another cross, made infinitely better than the other one my buddy had made," Denton said. When the guard tore up the cross, two Vietnamese workers saw what happened and fashioned him a new cross. "They could have been tortured for what they did," Denton said.

Contrary to the countless media stories of crazed vets returning with PTSD, these men are not broken. They endured horrors vastly worse than the average soldier or Marine in today's conflict. Jeremiah Denton survived nearly eight years in a North Vietnamese prison camp and went on to become a United States Senator for his home state, Alabama. How many people know that?

There is hope. Beliefs matter, but what is more important, standing up for your beliefs matters. The support and respect of your peers matters. But even if you are spat upon when you come home, even if your heroism is never recognized, even if your service is forgotten by a biased press that distorts history, you are not defeated, you are not shamed, you are not broken unless and until you decide to be...

Also from the Kaplan article:

"Character," writes the younger [John] McCain, quoting the 19th century evangelist Dwight Moody, "is what you are in the dark," when nobody's looking and you silently make decisions about how you will act the next day.

Don on Dan Yorke, WPRO 630 AM this Afternoon

Don Hawthorne will continue his media blitz and appear on Dan Yorke's radio show this afternoon to talk about the East Greenwich teachers' strike. Tune in!

UPDATE: Don will be on air during the 4 O'Clock hour.

Senator Montalbano's Flawed Defense, Part 2

Senate President Joseph Montalbano's claim of immunity from four Rhode Island Ethics Commission charges directly involving his Senate votes is based on a supposedly expansive view of speech-in-debate immunity recognized by the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of United States v. Brewster…

It is beyond doubt that the Speech or Debate Clause protects against inquiry into acts that occur in the regular course of the legislative process, and into the motivation for those acts.

The true scope of the Brewster ruling, however, cannot be inferred from this single sentence. Before applying a Constitutional immunity to everything considered to be part of a regular legislative process, the Court carefully limited the future application of its decision...

• First, by noting that the ruling was limited to certain types of laws,
• Then, by expressly declining to extend speech or debate immunity to laws narrowly constructed to regulate the conduct of legislators.

This exception is obviously relevant to the Ethics Commission charges against Senator Montalbano.

The Brewster decision drew upon the 1966 U.S. Supreme Court case of United States v. Johnson, where the Court recognized that speech or debate immunity could be applied differently to different kinds of laws. One set of applications was to "general criminal statutes", i.e. to laws that apply [nominally] to everyone. Here, legislative immunity was to be interpreted broadly, the classic example being the well-established immunity that legislators have from general laws against slander for anything said during legislative debate.

However, the Court in Johnson also made clear that immunity from general criminal laws did not imply immunity from all laws, expressly refusing to extend speech or debate immunity to the subset of laws specifically intended to regulate legislative conduct…

We emphasize that our holding is limited to prosecutions involving circumstances such as those presented in the case before us. Our decision does not touch a prosecution which, though as here founded on a criminal statute of general application, does not draw in question the legislative acts of the defendant member of Congress or his motives for performing them. And, without intimating any view thereon, we expressly leave open for consideration when the case arises a prosecution which, though possibly entailing inquiry into legislative acts or motivations, is founded upon a narrowly drawn statute passed by Congress in the exercise of its legislative power to regulate the conduct of its members.

Though not central to the matter being decided, the Supreme Court reaffirmed the Johnson distinction in its Brewster decision…

The [Johnson] opinion specifically left open the question of a prosecution which, though possibly entailing some reference to legislative acts, is founded upon a "narrowly drawn" statute passed by Congress in the exercise of its power to regulate its Members' conduct.

Since Senator Montalbano has been charged under a narrowly drawn constitutional grant of authority intended to regulate the conduct of legislators, any broad interpretation of speech-in-debate immunity derived from the Brewster precedent and rulings that follow do not apply to his case.

---

There is a second problem with applying the Brewster precedent to Senator Montalbano's ethics case. The explicit language of the Constitution talks about protecting the speech and debate of legislators. But is it a cut-and-dry matter that voting is really part of “debate”? In the Johnson case, this issue was not central because the defendant was charged with making a floor-speech in return for money. Still, the question remains: does it automatically follow that if a legislator cannot be prosecuted for selling his oratorical skills, he also cannot be prosecuted for selling his vote?

In Federal case history, the extension of speech or debate immunity to the act of voting dates back to the 1880 Supreme Court case of Kilbourn v. Thompson. Here, the Court introduced a broad reading of the scope of speech or debate immunity into Federal law, directly quoting an interpretation taken from the 1808 Massachusetts case of Coffin v. Coffin…

These privileges are thus secured, not with the intention of protecting the members against prosecutions for their own benefit, but to support the rights of the people, by enabling their representatives to execute the functions of their office without fear of prosecutions, civil or criminal. I therefore think that the article ought not to be construed strictly, but liberally, that the full design of it may be answered. I will not confine it to delivering an opinion, uttering a speech, or haranguing in debate; but will extend it to the giving of a vote, to the making of a written report, and to every other act resulting from the nature, and in the execution, of the office: and I would define the article, as securing to every member exemption from prosecution, for every thing said or done by him, as a representative, in the exercise of the functions of that office; without enquiring whether the exercise was regular according to the rules of the house, or irregular and against their rules. I do not confine the member to his place in the house; and I am satisfied that there are cases, in which he is entitled to this privilege, when not within the walls of the representatives' chamber.

Again, however, the case being decided concerned immunity from a general statute (Kilbourn was suing legislators who had voted to have him arrested on contempt of Congress charges), not from a law specifically regulating legislator conduct. Today, the scope of the Kilbourn ruling must be viewed in the light of the Court's opinion in Johnson, re-affirmed by Brewster. While the Kilbourn precedent makes clear that speech or debate immunity protects legislators from being prosecuted for the act of casting ethically challenged votes under general criminal statutes, that same scope of immunity does not necessarily extend to laws narrowly constructed to regulate legislative behavior.

---

Because of the clear limits established by the Supreme Court in United States v. Johnson and United States v. Brewster, the existing interpretation of Constitutional "speech or debate" provisions grants legislators no automatic immunity from ethics laws expressly intended to regulate their conduct. Thus, in asking for the ethics charges related to his Senate votes to be thrown out on the basis of Rhode Island's speech-in-debate clause, Senator Montalbano is not asking for the courts to apply an existing precedent. Rather, he is asking the courts expand immunity for legislators into a realm where it does not currently exist and, ultimately, for the courts to overrule the plain meaning of the Rhode Island Constitution and create a brand-new legal principle that a blanket immunity from ethics laws is necessary for legislatures to carry out their function.

More on the Issues in the East Greenwich Teachers' Union Strike

A lot of words are being said as the East Greenwich teachers go out on strike. Many of the public comments by union officials and some teachers have nothing to do with the facts.

These contract negotiations and strikes are not about doing right by our children or about education. They are about maximizing adult entitlements where the NEA is willing to use our children as pawns to get more money.

Along the way, they complain about unacceptable "working conditions." Let's spend some time on the facts underlying that claim.

SALARY COMPENSATION ISSUES

From the outset, be clear about the context for this part of the discussion: The debate has nothing to do with a lack of desire to treat teachers well. Out of the 50 states, Rhode Island is already in the top 10 in how much it spends per pupil and in teacher salaries. We are generous and willingly so, in spite of being in the bottom one-third among the 50 states for educational outcomes. The resistance is to continuing an expensive gravy train entitlement ride which the state and individual communities can no longer afford. The resistance is also to giving the same 9-12% annual salary increases to the worst teachers when we would gladly give high salary increases to the great teachers. But the NEA won't give school administrators the freedom to make those judgment calls.

Furthermore, school commmittees and teachers' union officials are all guilty of misleading the public about the real salary increases going to teachers under contracts around the state. I wrote about the hidden nature of these extreme salary increases in this 2004 ProJo editorial.

To further elaborate on this point and make it specific to East Greenwich, here is a 2004 analysis done when my term on the East Greenwich School Committee was ending. It is an Excel spreadsheet analysis based on data taken from union contracts over a 6-year period: 1998-99 to 2003-04 East Greenwich teacher salary data.

Here, again in an Excel spreadsheet, is an updated version of that salary increase data: 2003-4 to 2006-7 East Greenwich teacher salary data.

Handing out 9-12%/year salary increases for 9 of the 10 job steps is the norm. And we can't afford it anymore.

There are some nuances:

Roughly 60% of the East Greenwich teachers have now reached the top step 10 and that means their increases have been 3.25%, 3.6%, and 3.8% over the last 3 years. In other words, roughly what taxpayers working in the private sector have been receiving. But these teachers are unhappy about their recent "low" increases. After years of getting 9-12%/year increases, their expectations are skewed and out of line with the real world. But the pragmatic issue the NEA won't address is that if they want increases above 3.8% for step 10 teachers, then some other non-step 10 teachers are going to have to give up their 9-12%/year increases. And I repeat: Why should good and bad teachers get identical salary increases?

What part of 3.8-12%/year salary increases creates unacceptable working conditions?

On the John DePetro radio show this morning, one East Greenwich teacher called in to complain that there were 22 students in her class, 1 above the "approximately 21" contractual limit. What she didn't tell anyone is that her salary is increased pro-rata (22/21) based on that extra student. In other words, she is compensated under the contract for the difference. How many taxpayers working in the private sector get roughly 5% salary increases when their workload goes up 5%? [NOTE: Subsequent discussions have clarified that this extra pay is not the standard practice, although the idea had been thrown around recently.]

She also complained that recess had been "taken away" by the Superintendent. What she didn't disclose is that the Superintendent's original response to the State requirement of 20 extra instructional minutes was to extend their day by that 20 minutes. (9:10 a.m. is the start time at Meadowbrook; they are out around 3:10 p.m.) I understand that the high school did make some schedule changes. However, there was no apparent similar flexibility at this teacher's elementary school and that led to teachers there - and not just teachers' aides - having to spend recess time on the playground with students. So who is obstructing here?

HEALTH INSURANCE CO-PAYMENTS

There are 10 salary steps for East Greenwich teachers. Teachers at steps 1-4 only pay 5% co-pays. Teachers at steps 5-10 only pay 10%.

In my last company, the co-pays for employees were 25-35%. I don't know a single person in the private sector who pays less than 20%.

I am told the East Greenwich town employees under an NEA contract pay 20%. What should teachers be treated differently?

Why is it a matter of debate that a 20% co-pay creates unacceptable working conditions?

HEALTH INSURANCE CASH BUYBACK

East Greenwich teachers receive a cash payment of $5,000/year when they do not use the health insurance plan provided by the district. I am told that 68 of the 235 teachers in the district receive this additional cash payment. I am also told that the $5,000 payment is among the highest of any school district in the state.

Why do modest changes to that payment level create unacceptable working conditions?

Separately, I also understand the East Greenwich town employees under an NEA contract receive only a $1,000 cash payment. Why should teachers be treated differently?

I don't know a single person in the private sector who receives any cash buyback payments.

PENSIONS

We will save the pension debate for another day. Suffice it to say that Rhode Island public sector employees have some of the richest pension benefits of any state employees anywhere.

And private sector pension programs don't hold a candle to public sector programs in either dollar payouts or the age when such payouts can begin. The fact that nearly every public sector pension plan is underfunded doesn't seem to deter the unions from resisting reforms and demanding more.

WORK-TO-RULE

At some point, the strike will pass and teachers will return to the classroom. There is a good chance they will return to the classroom under work-to-rule conditions, where they only do the minimum legally required under the contract. In other words, they will continue to use our children as pawns while they demand retroactive pay and other financial benefits. They insist on being made whole financially but their actions do not allow our children's educational experiences to be made whole. Why do we tolerate them treating our children like that?

This is where contractual issues move from financial considerations to non-financial considerations. Here are excerpts of what a friend wrote me about work-to-rule:

The "rules and conditions" maintained in the contracts do not reflect the practices that have become expected of and provided by the school system. The unions always state that teachers typically work beyond the obligated work hours stipulated in the contract, including helping students after school, writing letters-of-recommendation for college apps, etc. Therefore, you would think these items and others should be written into the contracts. But, as much as unions like to point to these activities, they resist putting them into contracts because the more "best practices" or "past practices" are stipulated in the contract, the less leverage work-to-rule provides. This is why the unions are hesitant to write in either best practices or past practices - because the work-to-rule status quo allows them to extract more financial concessions. How is this good for the students?

The obviously fair thing for our children would be for all teacher practices not stipulated in the contract but which are, in fact, done must be continued because they represent past practices precedent under which school districts operated during prior contracts. But the union won't agree to that either.

So here we are, dealing with a union which doesn't negotiate in good faith, is all about adult entitlements, will use our children as pawns in the negotiations, funds its operations through coerced dues, and doesn't have the courage to allow its members to take a strike vote by secret ballot.

THE CHALLENGE MOVING FORWARD

The challenge for our society is to realize that many teachers not only don't want to be union hacks but they are classy professionals who want to be rewarded differentially for delivering excellence in the classroom.

But these teachers will never have the freedom to operate accordingly as long as we live in a world where unions have monopoly control over the public schools.

There is no way to tweak the status quo and improve public education as long as schools are controlled by unions whose mission is to maximize financial benefits to members, not produce excellence in education.

The more you learn about public education, the more compelling school choice becomes - for the great teachers and for all of our children. As Milton Friedman wrote:

...education...takes a system that should be bottoms-up and converts it into a system that is top-down. Education is a simple case. It isn't the public purpose to build brick schools and have students taught there. The public purpose is to provide education. Think of it this way: If you want to subsidize the production of a product, there are two ways you can do it. You can subsidize the producer or you can subsidize the consumer. In education, we subsidize the producer - the school. If you subsidize the student instead - the consumer - you will have competition. The student will choose the school he attends and that would force schools to improve and to meet the demands of their students.

Nothing will change until these great teachers and enough parents have the courage to say enough already and exert sufficient political pressure. It will be an uphill battle because we are not an organized big business like the NEA - which has monopoly control and over $295 million/year of cash from coerced dues money to buy political power through lobbying. But we all know history is full of examples where the rich and powerful fell - and fell hard. With all the failures of public schools and looming public sector financial implosions, the time is coming soon. The only question is how many children will be hurt along the way.

Only with such change will we then move toward a world of freedom where our children - especially the poor inner city kids - can break free from the enslavement of underperforming public school monopolies and get the education they so richly deserve.

For the good of our children, let's take up this fight and not give up until the battle is won!

Senator Montalbano's Flawed Defense, Part 1

Rhode Island Senate President Joseph Montalbano wants four of the charges brought against him by the Rhode Island Ethics Commission thrown out on the grounds that "members of the General Assembly cannot be prosecuted for an offense based on a past legislative act such as voting". The legal claim is based on the "speech-in-debate" clause in the Rhode Island Constitution, the last sentence of Article VI, section 5…

The persons of all members of the general assembly shall be exempt from arrest and their estates from attachment in any civil action, during the session of the general assembly, and two days before the commencement and two days after the termination thereof, and all process served contrary hereto shall be void. For any speech in debate in either house, no member shall be questioned in any other place.

Talking to Projo columnist Charles Bakst, Senator Montalbano's defense counsel Max Wistow explained how broad he believes the immunity privilege to be…

Montalbano is accused of a conflict for voting to support legislation for a West Warwick casino while doing legal work for the town involving land abutting the proposed site.

The commission plans a trial-like hearing in six weeks, but Wistow wants a court to block it…Under his view about votes themselves being off limits, Wistow says you could still prosecute a legislator if, for instance, you could show he agreed to take a bribe. But, I asked after Tuesday’s commission session, suppose he hadn’t plotted with anyone? Suppose he sought to make a buck by, say, voting to sell the state a building he owns?

Wistow said the solution is for voters to throw the guy out in the next election. Or delete the Constitution’s speech-in-debate provision, something I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting to happen.

Speech-in-debate immunity is an aspect of the doctrine of separation of powers, inserted into both the state and the Federal Constitution to prevent the executive and judicial branches of government from improperly interfering with the workings of the legislature by using criminal or civil charges to punish legislative debate.

According to briefs filed in this case, the key ruling establishing the scope of speech-in-debate immunity was the 1972 United States Supreme Court case United States v. Brewster (introduced to Rhode Island law via the State Supreme Court decision in the 1984 case of Holmes v. Farmer). In Brewster, the court held that a legislator could not be questioned about his votes, even when compelling other evidence existed indicating that he or she had accepted bribes…

It is beyond doubt that the Speech or Debate Clause protects against inquiry into acts that occur in the regular course of the legislative process, and into the motivation for those acts.

The response from the Ethics Commission to Senator Montalbano's claim that floor-actions of legislators are immune from Ethics Commission scrutiny rests heavily on the "unique constitutional mandate" (a phrase taken from the Ethics Commission brief) of the RI Ethics Commission. Under the Rhode Island Constitution, the Ethics Commission does not truly belong to the legislative, executive or judicial branches of government, but is built from an amalgam of functions that have been separated from their "natural" branches of government and united under the Commission. Because of its special nature, the Commission's lawyers argue that Ethics Commission proceedings do not constitute executive or judicial interference with the legislative branch, and that…

1. Ethics commission proceedings do not come into conflict with the speech-in-debate clause, and...
2. In the absence of such a conflict, there is no basis for the courts (or anyone else) to override the clear intent of the people expressed via the 1986 Constitutional Convention that subjected legislators to the jurisdiction of the Ethics Commission.

Even in the absence of any unique Constitutional standing, however, Senator Montalbano's claim of immunity would still be very weak, as the the Brewster precedent cited by Senator Montalbano’s defense team does not apply to the laws relevant to this case. We know this because the Supreme Court has said so....

John DePetro, WPRO 630 AM at 9 a.m. this morning

I will be on John's radio show at 9 a.m. this morning to talk about the East Greenwich teachers' strike.

TIMING UPDATE

I will now be on at 9:30 a.m. instead of 9:00 a.m.

The Other Side of the Conversation in Tiverton

Having just received the press release that the Tiverton School Committee sent around on Sunday, I'm surprised not to have heard the details of its side of the negotiation elsewhere:

"Just as with the health care proposal, we have been working with NEA-Tiverton regarding salary issues," stated deMedeiros. "However, it was our understanding that the two parties were trying to negotiate these issues at the negotiation table, not in the media. Given the NEA's decision to suggest publicly that we have not provided them with salary proposals, we now feel obligated to share publicly the two proposals we've made to NEA. The most recent of these proposals was submitted to the NEA-Tiverton leadership on August 16th and the NEA has not yet responded."

The School Committee's original salary proposal, submitted to NEA-Tiverton on May 8, 2007 was for a 3% total increase over the life of the 3-year contract, spread out as 1% in each year. These raises would be in addition to step increases also included in the contract proposal. Additionally, the Committee suggested providing salary incentives for teachers who have attained a Doctorate and those who have achieved national teacher board certification.

The School Committee received a counter-proposal from NEA-Tiverton on August 8th which called for a 12% total increase over the life of the contract, spread out as 4% in each year. These raises would also be in addition to step increases included in the contract proposal. While the NEA agreed with the addition of incentives for teachers who attain a Doctorate or achieve national board certification, the amount of those incentives differed substantially.

The School Committee reviewed the NEA's proposal on August 14th and immediately provided NEA-Tiverton with a counter-proposal that would provide a 4.5% total increase over the life of the contract with the annual percentages to be determined as part of the final contract negotiations. This counter-proposal was submitted to the Union on August 16th. Again, these raises would be in addition to step increases included in the contract proposal and the Committee kept their recommendations regarding Doctorate and national certification incentives.

Additionally, the Committee indicates that the District’s health care proposal submitted to the NEA on May 8, 2007, is projected to save the District approximately $270,000 based on projected cost increases for health care. NEA-Tiverton has not yet provided a response to the Committee's proposal. The Committee twice considered and health savings account proposal given them by NEA-Tiverton and twice rejected it as too costly to the District.

"We are sharing this to make sure that it is clear that we have presented two proposals to NEA-Tiverton regarding salaries but have not yet heard back from the NEA on our latest proposal which they were given on August 16th," said deMedeiros. "As you can see, it is not the School Committee that has delayed in making decisions on proposals. The NEA did not respond to our initial salary and benefit proposal for three months after we gave it to them. Each time we've received proposals, we've responded within a matter of a week or two. We are still waiting on their response to the counter-proposal we gave them on August 16th."

deMedeiros finished with stating "We must also underscore that we have a very limited amount of money with which to negotiate. We anticipate that costs will increase in other areas, such as heating oil and supplies, as they do normally. We are obligated to come to agreement on a contract which is fair to all parties involved — our students, our parents, our taxpayers, our teachers and the District, which is one that allows Tiverton to maintain high-quality schools that are affordable to our taxpayers."

The union has been using the media to generate the impression that the school committee has been playing games, but given the information that didn't make it into the stories — at first because the committee didn't wish to publicly release details of its negotiations — it looks as if the union just didn't like the terms to which fiscal restraints limit the town. As I expected, for example, the union's healthcare proposal wasn't floating in a void; its savings were not equal to those planned by the school committee.

In response to an email from one of the NEA negotiators (also a Tiverton teacher), School Committee Vice Chairperson Michael Burk explained:

I am sure you are aware that the Committee could not hold a meeting without providing proper written public notice 48 hours in advance. I believe that [Superintendent] Rearick indicated yesterday morning that he would have us post a meeting for Tuesday evening, the earliest we would be able to do so in compliance with the open meetings laws. Since your team decided to not present Mr. Rearick with a proposal, we were unable to schedule such a meeting. However, as we have also noted, we do have a meeting scheduled for Thursday, September 6th which has been properly posted to allow us to consider any substantive counter-proposals submitted to Mr. Rearick by NEA.

Given that it is the School Committee which as been waiting for nearly 3 weeks for a counter-proposal from the NEA, it seems odd to me that the NEA would be calling a strike because of delays in contract talks. We haven’t left the bargaining table but cannot respond to something that is not there. I and I know my fellow School Committee members strongly believe that an illegal Teachers’ strike is not in the best interest of our students, our parents or our taxpayers. Unfortunately, we are not calling this strike and therefore have no control over that decision.

In an email to me, Mr. Burk details subsequent events, including a meeting with the full committee, the absence of which had been an ostensible sticking point from the unions perspective:

This afternoon [Monday] we held another emergency meeting. At the beginning of our Executive Session, we asked the union for this proposal but they would not give it to us. After about an hour of our Executive Session, we came back to the public session and again asked for the union's proposal. They stated they did not have it with them and it would take them an hour to get it to us. We said we would wait.

They came back in an hour with a proposal that changed very little in salary and, dollar wise, very little in contributing to health care costs. Their salary proposal was for 3.75% each year over 3 years for a total of 11.25%, in addition to step increases. Currently they pay flat rates for health care - $1100 family and $650 individual. They suggested in this latest proposal to raise that to $1150 and $700 in year one; $1250 and $750 in year 2 and $1350 and $800 in year 3. (Our original health care proposal to them asked for a tiered system based on where a teacher is in the salary steps with teachers at the lowest step paying 15% of the health care premium, teachers in the middle steps paying 20% and teachers at the highest steps paying 25%).

While we spent a few hours working through the numbers, we still came up short in being able to identify a counter proposal that would stay within our fiscal constraints but provide teachers with salary increases in the last 2 years of the contract. We asked the union to give us until Thursday to have our fiscal staff work through more details to see if we could find a way address those issues; they instead chose to strike.

Breaking News on Anchor Rising: East Greenwich Teachers to Strike on Tuesday

You heard it here first: East Greenwich teachers will strike on Tuesday morning.

More thoughts on their illegal strike here.

UPDATE: ARE THERE REALLY 8-12% ANNUAL SALARY INCREASES IN THESE CONTRACTS?

Regarding Bob's comment of "I am certain no one is asking for such high pay increases, as you propose...You might want to get accurate facts before claiming to know all..."

Bob is simply wrong. I sat on the East Greenwich School Committee from 2000-2002 and analyzed teacher salary schedules in contracts from the late 1990's through 2004. I subsequently looked at the salary schedule for the last 3 year contract.

The salary increases are indeed that high.

I wrote about the hidden nature of these extreme salary increases in this 2004 ProJo editorial.

To further prove the point, here is a portion of my actual 2004 analysis. As noted, it is an Excel spreadsheet analysis and this portion of it is based on data taken from union contracts over a 6-year period: 1998-2004 East Greenwich teacher salary data.

As WJF notes in the Comments section, the Education Partnership has analyzed all teachers' union contracts in RI in recent years, including looking at salary data. They discuss many aspects of the union contracts in their 3 reports which are linked to in this earlier post.

UPDATE #2: 2003-04 TO 2006-2007 SALARY INCREASE DATA SHOWS SAME HIGH ANNUAL INCREASES

In the Comments section, Ken and Bob asked to see the salary increase data for the last 3 years, 2003-04 to 2006-07.

Here, again in an Excel spreadsheet, is that data: 2003-2006 East Greenwich teacher salary data.

As predicted, salary increases of 9-12%/year for each of the last 3 years were realized by teachers in 8 of the 10 job steps.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON 2004-2005 EAST GREENWICH NEA TEACHERS' UNION CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS

Now that the NEA is striking at East Greenwich schools in 2007, East Greenwich residents and School Committee leaders can prepare themselves with what is likely to happen now by looking at how the NEA acted in 2004-2005, a time when I did many posts which monitored the NEA's actions.

This was a summary I wrote at the end of the 2004-2005 contract negotiations:

The formal labor dispute between the residents of East Greenwich and the NEA teachers' union is now over. However, the dispute showed the true colors of the union and many teachers. With the veneer stripped off, residents have learned many valuable lessons.

First and foremost, we learned - by their practice of work-to-rule - the union and numerous teachers were willing to use our children as pawns in an attempt to avoid a health insurance co-payment. They even had the audacity to say publicly that work-to-rule was not hurting our children.

Second, the union demanded to be made whole financially via full retroactive pay for last year even though our children's educational experience could not be made whole - due to their work-to-rule actions.

Third, they confirmed how teachers-union contracts are the antithesis of good teaching practices when they stressed that work-to-rule was a contractual right - while at the same time protesting that they wanted us to treat them like professional workers. They stated publicly that before-school and after-school assistance was not part of their job description. They dared us to take them to court if we believed they were not working the legally proper hours.

Fourth, they insulted residents by claiming that a majority of us could afford to hire tutors for our children but have been receiving these services free from public school teachers for years. Teachers also claimed that they - not parents - were responsible for our town's favorable test scores.

Fifth, they showed how they live in a make-believe world when they said that no one in the private sector works overtime without getting paid and, if they're off the clock at 5 p.m., you can bet they're out the door at 5. They also claimed more than 50% of residents earn at least $500,000.

Sixth, we also learned they would make verifiably misleading comments to get what they want, including: (i) Taxes in East Greenwich aren't that high compared to other communities; (ii) Insurance co-payments would result in pay cuts to teachers; and, (iii) East Greenwich pays lower than other districts.

These are not honorable people. It is clear now that these union negotiations are nothing less than one big racket, rigged to yield financial gain to the union. They certainly are not for the benefit of our children or for excellence in education...

Unfortunately, work-to-rule and other management rights issues are specified in RI General Law, which means it is impossible to change these rules at the local level...

This was an editorial I wrote late in the 2004-2005 process: In a nutshell, here was what I thought the negotiating position of the East Greenwich School Committee should have been on some of the key financial terms of the contract.

Other postings included:
Background Information on the East Greenwich NEA Labor Dispute
The NEA's Disinformation Campaign
East Greenwich Salary & Benefits Data
More Bad Faith Behavior by the NEA
The Debate About Retroactive Pay
Would You Hurt Our Children Just To Win Better Contract Terms?
The Question Remains Open & Unanswered: Are We/They Doing Right By Our Children?
Will The East Greenwich Teachers' Union Stop Their Attempts to Legally Extort Residents?
You Have To Read This Posting To Believe It! The Delusional World of the NEA Teachers' Union
So What Else is New? Teachers' Union Continues Non-Productive Behaviors in East Greenwich Labor Talks
"Bargaining Rights are Civil Rights"
The NEA-Rhode Island's Pathetic Attempts to Manipulate East Greenwich Residents
What's Wrong With This Picture: 800 Applicants for 14 Teaching Jobs & the NEA Says There is a Problem

Not Quite Breaking (Except of Taxpayers' Backs)

All indications are that Tiverton's teachers will be striking tomorrow. This bit from the Providence Journal adds a little bit of flesh (although not much) to the rumors floating among parents in town:

The Tiverton School Committee and the union representing town teachers appear headed for a confrontation tomorrow, when the schools are scheduled to open, after contract talks broke down yesterday and the union notified the superintendent of schools that teachers will not report for work.

"A job action will start Tuesday morning," said Patrick Crowley, of the National Education Association Rhode Island.

The School Committee issued a news release in which it insisted the schools would open on time. The committee added what seemed to be a strange comment. The panel, referring to itself in the third person, said, "However, they caution parents to have a plan in place in case the teachers decide to illegally strike, especially in light of last Wednesday's attempted abduction of a middle school student from a bus stop." ...

The School Committee's release said that the panel had authorized its lawyer, Stephen Robinson, "to take all legal action necessary to stop an illegal strike should it be called, as well as to stop any other job action, such as a work stoppage."

The committee said that the union had "failed to provide a salary and health care proposal" at yesterday's curtailed talks.

My two cents as a Tiverton parent and taxpayer continues to be that the school committee should pen the want ad and prepare the emergency certification paperwork.

ADDENDUM:

Not surprisingly, a more local media source has more current information:

Tiverton's estimated 205 teachers will go on strike Tuesday morning, Sept. 4, and not show up for work, said Amy Mullen, lead negotiator for the teachers' union and the president of NEA-Tiverton, an affiliate of the Rhode Island chapter of the National Education Association.

Picket lines, she said, will be up Tuesday at the intersection of North Brayton and Bulgarmarsh roads from 7:30 to 9:30 a.m. and from 4 to 6 p.m. Under normal conditions, about 1,080 students, almost half of Tiverton's total student body of 2,140 students, pass through the intersection.

School committee vice chairman Michael Burk confirmed the all-school closure Tuesday for all of Tiverton's students. "We are cancelling school for students but expecting all staff to show for work," he said.

He said the school committee attorney has been authorized to take legal action against the teachers if they do strike as expected. He said a temporary restraining order compelling the teachers to return to work would be sought.

And get this bit of audacity:

Finally, Monday afternoon the teachers made a counter offer reducing their salary demand from 4 percent to 3.75 percent for each of the three years, and scuttling their high deductible health care proposal in favor of reverting to a variant of the traditional plan. Around 6 p.m. the school committee asked for more time to consider the proposal and "crunch the numbers," but by then time had run out.

The salary steps have increased 3% for each of the past four years, and this year, amidst a fiscal crisis, with worsening financial circumstances for the citizens in general and flat funding from the state, the union wants more? Sounds to me like the school committee should be less concerned with crunching numbers and more concerned with starting from scratch. Here's the updated version of the table that I posted yesterday:

Step	2006–2007 Salary	Requested (+3.75%) 2007–2008 Salary	Raise for Teacher Entering This Step
1	$35,484	$36,815	–
2	$38,077	$39,505	11.3%
3	$40,672	$42,197	10.8%
4	$43,415	$45,043	10.7%
5	$46,255	$47,990	10.5%
6	$49,177	$51,021	10.3%
7	$51,974	$53,923	9.7%
8	$54,860	$56,917	9.5%
9	$58,041	$60,218	9.8%
10	$64,205	$66,613	14.8%

Bring Some Up... Bring More Down

In an attempt to understand the "unusual" something (as Andrew put it) that led to simultaneous drops in Rhode Island's poverty rate and median household income, I've spent some time sifting through the U.S. Census Bureau's recently released data from its annual American Community Survey. The first resulting chart gives a pretty clear indication of the basic dynamic:

The blue segment of the "Decreased" column shows that, indeed, 12,084 fewer people live in households with income below the relevant poverty level. The unfortunately corresponding fact is that the red segment represents the 21,637 fewer people whose households make over twice the poverty level. And these two drops equate almost exactly with the 3,144 fewer people in the total plus the 30,577 more people with households just over the poverty level. In other words, it would be fair to say (albeit in a rough way) that the economic system that succeeded in pulling a good number of people out of poverty came with the cost of dragging almost twice as many people toward it.

To get a better sense of who, precisely, was gaining and losing in this trade-off, I plotted varying family types (married versus unmarried, with and without children) on line graphs corresponding to their household incomes. Although there were some interesting shifts in the data, from 2005 to 2006, it didn't appear that they crossed the above ratio lines in any significant degree, most being well above twice poverty or well below poverty. One possible reason for that unexpected finding would be if smaller families were doing better, while larger families have fared worse, blurring the movement of individuals as represented in the ratio chart. The way poverty levels work, for example, a divorce in a borderline family could actually result in an on-paper elevation of one spouse and the children. Or a third income, from a working son or daughter, could disappear if he or she no longer counted as a child.

So what's going on under the poverty level?

The first thing to note, as I jump into this series of charts, is that it's very difficult to make generalizations. It goes beyond my time (and interest) to attempt to distill, say, retirees from newlyweds or growing families from economically declining ones. The movement of actual families could be all over the place. But in a general way, it's reasonable to observe that the trend was out of poverty for all family types and sizes, but that unmarried families with children did a lot better. Perhaps the married families on this chart have more intransigent problems. Or perhaps unmarried families are having more children (thus rising above poverty... again on paper). Or maybe Rhode Island's welfare system favors the unmarried.

A glance at impoverished families by the number of family members working suggests that the trends might be healthy. (I'd count it as unhealthy, for example, if the number of families under poverty with low numbers of workers were increasing.)

Now, what about over the poverty level?

It's difficult to make generalizations about this data, although there's certainly nothing to disprove theories crediting our aging population for the shifts in income distribution. The increases in married couples with no children and with three or more, along with the slight decrease in married families with one or two children, would be consistent with older couples and growing families. I'd note, however, that the largest increase was among unmarried families (which includes cohabitors and single parents) with one or two children. That would be consistent with the trend of poverty-level divorces that I noted, or perhaps with increasing generosity to non-nuclear families.

As for workers:

Of these four mildly helpful charts, this offers the most food for thought (or further research). For one thing, the increase in married families with one worker suggests that more families might be living on one income, as the price of childcare makes a second income less attractive. On the whole, I'd take that as a positive development. On the other side of the ledger, though, it's discouraging to the taxpayer to find that there are actually more unmarried families with no workers on this chart.

But having gone through the trouble to research this data and feeling unsatisfied at having only meager grounds for general hypothesizing, I thought to mix my two types of data:

A bit more can be said of this. Note that, when broken out by families, rather than people, more have risen out of poverty than fallen closer to it. It may be that smaller families are improving while larger ones are sinking after all. It's downright disconcerting that married families with children fell out of the top group at the greatest rate, while unmarried families with children slid into it at the greatest rate.

Lest anybody with social views different than mine protests that I'm making too much of this mere transition, a more granular representation of the data from the first chart of this post illustrates that it is not an even trade:

What this shows is that the change at the edges is more drastic than pictured above. We're not, in other words, merely talking working class people slipping past an arbitrary 2 x poverty line to help the poor slip above a less arbitrary poverty line. We're talking about a much more precipitous drop among those above what might be thought of as a comfort line. Believe me that I deal with enough very wealthy people to know how that previous sentence sounds, but we're not talking the ultrarich, here. We're talking about a family of four (two children) that earns around $60,000–100,000 per year.

If one were to form a prognosis from this information, I can't see that it matters much whether "comfortable" families have plummeting resources, divorces are splitting incomes, or some other cause is to blame. This is the range of income in which families move from just getting by, with some hope of a reasonable retirement, to having enough money to put it to good use in the economy. It's also a key range in the collection of the taxes that weave the tenuous safety net helping those toward the bottom, and although I'm making a guess based purely on personal experience, it likely lies around some sort of threshold at which it becomes relatively easy to pack up and leave.

Update on the East Greenwich Teachers' Contract & Suggested Future Actions

Here is the latest on the East Greenwich School District teachers' contract status:

The NEA voted last Thursday to let their negotiating team call a strike.

The current contract expired last Friday.

There was a special School Committee meeting last Saturday.

Tuesday is the first day of school.

Teachers are paid prospectively and, because of the strike vote on Thursday, were not paid last Friday for work that they may or may not choose to do in the first weeks of September.

In this time of no extra public monies, I hope the community is willing to support an aggressive stance by the School Committee toward the NEA's greedy demands. If the teachers actually strike on Tuesday, here is what I hope the School Committee will do:

Do NOT go to court to force them back.

Let the current teachers stay at home and remain unpaid. (Since the teachers are legally required to teach 180 days in a school year, staying at home only postpones their work year but does not shorten it.)

Give these teachers an ultimatum: It is illegal in RI for teachers to strike so every teacher who doesn't voluntarily return to work by Friday morning of this week is terminated.

Post job openings on Friday for all teaching positions which are unfilled on that day. (Just think of all the teachers in RI who would love to teach in East Greenwich!)

Hire new teachers for all openings.

If faced with work-to-rule after the teachers return, immediately declare all retroactive pay is off the table forever under any new contract. Immediately apply the funds which would have been used for such pay to hiring tutors for the children so their educational experience is made whole in spite of the teachers' actions.

In the meantime, I hope the School Committee rallies support in the community by letting the community see the NEA union for what it is. The NEA is not about our children. The NEA is not about education. It is only about adult entitlements for union members, about outrageous contractual costs which can no longer be afforded.

There are no more tax monies available to pay for 8-12%/year salary increases, anything less than 25% healthcare co-payments, or more than $1,000 cash buyback payments for not using health insurance. The gravy train ride is over.

Can you imagine if each of the 7 School Committee members went to 10 home meetings over the next 3 weeks to explain School & Tax Economics 101 to town residents? That would be 70 meetings and, if 20 people could attend each meeting, the School Committee would have directly reached over 1,400 of the 13,000 people in town. Add in spouses of attendees who would likely hear about the meeting afterwards and then another 1-2 friends for each home meeting attendee and the School Committee would have reached about 50% of the town before the end of September.

The NEA and its members need to join the real world where taxpayers live every day. Salaries and benefits just like the rest of us, the working families and retirees who pay for their compensation. It is all we ask.

The Guidebook to Public-Abuse

I'd also like to thank Mr. Crowley — especially on Labor Day — for highlighting the tactical philosophy of one of his union heroes:

1. Power is not only what you have, but what your enemy thinks you have
2. Never go outside of the experience of your own people
3. Whenever possible, go outside the experience of your opponent
4. Make your opponents live by their own rule book
5. Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon
6. A good tactic is one that people enjoy
7. A tactic that drags on to long becomes a drag
8. Keep the pressure on
9. The threat is usually more terrifying that the thing itself
10. Maintain a constant pressure on the opposition
11. If you push a negative hard enough and deep enough it will break through to its counter side.
12. The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative
13. Pick the target opponent, freeze the issue, personalize the issue, polarize the issue.

Still wondering why the rift is growing between teachers and the communities of which they ought to (often want to) be a part?

My Favorite Samuel Gompers Quote

Since it's appropriate to Labor Day, and since NEA Executive Director Bob Walsh has already invoked his name in an earlier comment, let's post a few more quotes from Samuel Gompers, the first President of the American Federation Labor. This is my personal favorite...

The worst crime against working people is a company which fails to operate at a profit.

Anyone want to take a stab at applying this wisdom to public-sector organizations?

Also, here's another quote from the Gomp, less pithy but still interesting, on the subject of social welfare policy…

Doing for people what they can and ought to do for themselves is a dangerous experiment. In the last analysis the welfare of the workers depends upon their own initiative. Whatever is done under the guise of philanthropy or social morality which in any way lessens initiative is the greatest crime that can be committed against the toilers. Let social busy-bodies and professional “public morals experts” in their fads reflect upon the perils they rashly invite under this pretense of social welfare.

Is the entire Gompers package of ideas still in play over on the left, or has the modern labor movement reduced him to a guy on a street corner shouting "I want more"?

(And is Pat Crowley now going to write Samuel Gompers off as a right-wing neo-con plant?)

One Side of the Phone Conversation

I'll start by thanking Pat Crowley for taking the initiative of putting some actual details out there for consideration. Having read through his description of the NEA-Tiverton's healthcare proposal — doing my best to see past his ham-handed spin — I find I can only say that it's not enough information. Given the privacy of the negotiations and the lack of information about the other side's response, there's simply no way of knowing how this proposal fits in with the overall discussion.

As a starting point of explanation, consider this:

A High Deductible Plan is coupled with a Health Savings Account. Because the Tiverton School Committee would be responsible for funding 50% of the HSA, the actual year 1 savings in real dollars to the tax payer is more than $185,000.

Unless my understanding is mistaken, it makes no sense, in this context, to speak of funding some percentage of an HSA. There's only a maximum contribution to such accounts, not a minimum or required amount. According to the site to which Pat refers readers for further description of HSAs in general:

For 2007 and forward, your maximum annual HSA contribution is based on the statutory limit for your type of coverage. For 2007, if you have self-only HDHP coverage, your contribution is $2,850; $5,650 if family HDHP, no matter what your HDHP deductible is. Before 2006, the contribution could not exceed the deductible of your HDHP. If you are age 55 or older, you can also make additional “catch-up” contributions (see below).

How this fits in with the data in his spreadsheet is impossible to determine. He notes, thereon, that the teacher's HSA contribution for an individual plan would be $750 and for a family plan would be $1,500. The nature of HSAs, however, makes this number arbitrary (unless the specific plan, which he does not provide, makes it not so). If the HSA is underfunded, necessary health expenses below the deductible must simply be paid out of pocket.

A teacher on an individual plan who doesn't spend more than $750 each year (assuming that the district's "50% contribution" is that much) wouldn't pay a penny all year long. Moreover, if the total contributions are more than is spent, then that money accumulates in the account. It can be saved and invested, and it can be withdrawn — albeit taxably, with a 10% penalty for those under 65. It is also inheritable, should the owner die. Intelligently managed, HSAs could become a sort of back-door pension.

As like-minded readers may be wondering, I'm not arguing against HSAs. These are some of their best features, and I think school districts ought to give them serious consideration. If teachers are free, however — and I believe they should be — to contribute as little as they like and to keep what remains from year to year, then that arbitrary contribution demanded of their employer raises an obvious question: why aren't more of the savings being passed on to the town?

That brings us back to the reason that this information is nigh upon useless in judging the contract negotiations from the outside. Disregarding the possibility that the union sought to transfer the "savings" to some other part of the contract (such as higher salaries or other benefits), it could be that the school committee counter-proposed some sort of modification to the HSA formula — say, a decreasing employer contribution over time, as the accounts grow — or just refused to accept the healthcare proposal as balance to some other aspect of the contract.

Suggesting public outrage over the rebuff would then seem just one more posturing tactic.

Reflecting on Labor Unions on Labor Day

In a prior post, these words were written:

It is incredibly ironic that it is now the labor unions who spend lobbying monies like a Fortune 500 corporation - just so they can protect their powerful monopolies. Underperforming monopolies at that!...

[On the other hand], this belief in freedom also leads [others of] us to support school choice because we believe every poor inner city child should have the same educational opportunity that some of us - who are more economically fortunate - can "buy" for our own children...

Isn't it ironic that conservatives are the ones pushing educational freedom for poor inner city children while the teachers' unions want to keep those same children enslaved in their underperforming public school monopolies?...

On this Labor Day, to appreciate how labor unions have evolved into just another big business intent on promoting their own self-interest and maintaining their own economic and political power, reflect not on their public relations spin offered to the American public but focus rather on their actions:

A January 3 Wall Street Journal editorial (available for a fee) discusses the new Department of Labor disclosure requirements:

If we told you that an organization gave away more than $65 million last year to Jesse Jackson's Rainbow PUSH Coalition, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, Amnesty International, AIDS Walk Washington and dozens of other such advocacy groups, you'd probably assume we were describing a liberal philanthropy. In fact, those expenditures have all turned up on the financial disclosure report of the National Education Association, the country's largest teachers union.

Under new federal rules pushed through by Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, large unions must now disclose in much more detail how they spend members' dues money. Big Labor fought hard (if unsuccessfully) against the new accountability standards...They expose the union as a honey pot for left-wing political causes that have nothing to do with teachers, much less students.

We already knew that the NEA's top brass lives large. Reg Weaver, the union's president, makes $439,000 a year. The NEA has a $58 million payroll for just over 600 employees, more than half of whom draw six-figure salaries. Last year the average teacher made only $48,000, so it seems you're better off working as a union rep than in the classroom...

..."What wasn't clear before is how much of a part the teachers unions play in the wider liberal movement and the Democratic Party," says Mike Antonucci of the Education Intelligence Agency, a California-based watchdog group. "They're like some philanthropic organization that passes out grant money to interest groups."...

When George Soros does this sort of thing, at least he's spending his own money. The NEA is spending the mandatory dues paid by members who are told their money will be used to gain better wages, benefits and working conditions. According to the latest filing, member dues accounted for $295 million of the NEA's $341 million in total receipts last year. But the union spent $25 million of that on "political activities and lobbying" and another $65.5 million on "contributions, gifts and grants" that seemed designed to further those hyper-liberal political goals.

The good news is that for the first time members can find out how their union chieftains did their political thinking for them...

It's well understood that the NEA is an arm of the Democratic National Committee. (Or is it the other way around?) But we wonder if the union's rank-and-file stand in unity behind this laundry list of left-to-liberal recipients of money that comes out of their pockets.

You can go to here for more/ongoing LM-2 report information on labor union financial matters.

A follow-up editorial (also available for a fee) added several other interesting points:

...the NEA also works though these same state affiliates to further its political goals by bankrolling ballot and legislative initiatives. To that end, the Kentucky Education Association received $250,000 from the NEA last year; the Michigan Education Association received $660,000; and the California Teachers Association received $2.5 million. We doubt this cash goes into buying more laptops for poor students.

And then there's the money that the NEA sends directly to sympathetic interest groups working at the state level, such as the $500,000 that went to Protect Our Public Schools, an anti-charter outfit in Washington State (never mind that charters are "public schools," albeit ones allowed to operate outside the teachers' union education monopoly)...

A January 28 ProJo editorial added several other insights:

...The national NEA spent $47 million on "representational activities," such as bargaining contracts; $25 million on political activities and lobbying; $64 million on overhead; and $65 million on contributions, gifts, and grants, many to political causes associated with the Democratic Party.

At the local level, National Education Association Rhode Island reported giving total compensation of more than $100,000 to nine people: Executive Director Robert Walsh ($142,015); Deputy Executive Director Vin Santaniello ($131,952); President Larry Purtill ($116,332); General Counsel John Decubellis ($109,862); Business Manager Walter Young ($106,306); and field representatives Jane Argenteri ($108,790), Jerry Egan ($110,111), Robert Roy ($103,985), and Jeannette Woolley ($107,252). Another four received total compensation of $86,000 or more.

The Rhode Island NEA spent $63,432 on "public relations" at Warwick's Cornerstone Communications, the company of Guy Dufault, who last made news by promising to defeat Governor Carcieri by revealing the names of Mr. Carcieri's apparently nonexistent girlfriends. Another $58,800 went to WorkingRI, a political group opposed to the governor also linked to Mr. Dufault.

(The Rhode Island chapter of the American Federation of Teachers also filed a report, showing five employees each receiving more than $100,000: President Marcia Reback [$128,542], Director of Professional Issues Colleen Callahan Delan [$116,243], and field representatives Robert Casey [$125,656], Michael Mullane [$116,243], and James Parisi [$116,243]. The AFT gave $5,000 to Cornerstone Communications, and $7,500 to the lobbying group Citizens for a Representative Government, also associated with Mr. Dufault, which helped block a constitutional convention in Rhode Island.)

If serving the unions' economic interests is the goal, it is hard to argue that these local leaders have been overpaid.

How well that has served the state's students is, of course, up for debate...

The 2006 NEA Rhode Island agenda calls for: increased spending on schools; reduced class sizes (translating into more teachers); shifting more of the burden of school spending onto state government from the localities; stopping privatization or outsourcing of jobs; revising pension reforms passed last year by the General Assembly; and removing any barriers on public employees' and their spouses' running for public office.

That is an agenda that would keep money and power flowing to the teachers' unions, something they are well within their rights to seek. But it's fair to ask how much good it would do our struggling students...

Michelle Malkin has more here.

The Editors at National Review offered these words:

More and more, union leaders are also putting their organizations on the record on issues unrelated to labor or collective bargaining. The National Education Association spends less than 15 percent of its dues money representing members in the workplace, according to disclosure forms filed with the Department of Labor. It gives its leftover millions to groups that do such things as resist Social Security reform and litigate to prevent restrictions on abortion. It has also declared its support for a government-controlled and taxpayer-funded health-care system. Other unions advocate such causes as same-sex marriage, higher taxes (which their workers would have to pay), retreat from Iraq, and an amnesty for illegal immigrants that would adversely affect the wage growth of many union members.

In ages past, when the worker’s lot was much worse than it is today, union leaders stuck to what they did best: collective bargaining and improvement of work conditions. They fought for the well-being of their workers, but frequently opposed government intervention in the workplace, understanding that a free market would create jobs and opportunities for all. Today’s labor leaders simply fight to preserve their power, often at the expense of both the workers they represent and the country as a whole. Unfortunately, their closest political friends hold a majority in Congress.

Which is why Milton Friedman once said:

The president of the National Education Association was once asked when his union was going to do something about students. He replied that when the students became members of the union, the union would take care of them. And that was a correct answer. Why? His responsibility as president of the NEA was to serve the members of his union, not to serve public purposes. I give him credit: The trade union has been very effective in serving its members. However, in the process, they've destroyed American education. But you see, education isn't the union's function. It's our fault for allowing the union to pursue its agenda. Consider this fact: There are two areas in the United States that suffer from the same disease—education is one and health care is the other. They both suffer from the disease that takes a system that should be bottom-up and converts it into a system that is top-down. Education is a simple case. It isn't the public purpose to build brick schools and have students taught there. The public purpose is to provide education. Think of it this way: If you want to subsidize the production of a product, there are two ways you can do it. You can subsidize the producer or you can subsidize the consumer. In education, we subsidize the producer—the school. If you subsidize the student instead—the consumer—you will have competition. The student could choose the school he attends and that would force schools to improve and to meet the demands of their students.

There is a pro-jobs and economic growth alternative to the forced-dues mentality which stifles economic opportunities for hard-working people across America.

So who then "stands for progress, for protection of the interests and rights of the masses" so no American is enslaved? Who then believes most fervently in freedom, self-government, and enabling every American to live the American Dream?

Education Partnership Reports: Learning a lot more about RI teachers' union contracts

A lot of fur is flying in the Comments sections of various posts on teachers' union contracts.

If you want to get some good information on such contracts in RI, your best bet is to go read the three annual reports by The Education Partnership:

Teacher Contracts: Restoring the Balance (Volume I, 2005)
Teacher Contracts: Restoring the Balance (Volume II, 2006)
Teacher Contracts: Restoring the Balance (Volume III, 2007)

Oh, you won't find it a surprise that the NEA whines about these reports. No doubt they will do it again. But just remember this: The terms of these union contracts have been the dirty little secret of government. Unions and their partners in government have thrived by being largely invisible to the working families and retirees whose hard-earned monies are taxed to pay for all of the outrageous public school teachers' salaries and benefits.

That invisibility is finally being destroyed now -- and the resulting transparency explains their vehement reactions.

The good news is that the new-found transparency will never go away.

FURTHER THOUGHTS ON UNIONS & BOTH ECONOMIC AND EDUCATIONAL FREEDOM:

In the Comments section, the NEA's Bob Walsh shares an 1893 Samuel Gompers speech which he suggests shows that labor unions have offered a consistent message over the years. It is worth reading for its historical value.

Here is what I wrote as a response to Bob in the Comments section:

It is now 114 years since that speech. A lot of societal dynamics have changed in major ways since then.

Many of us agree that private sector labor unions contributed to the betterment of society back in those days.

However, in recent decades, labor unions have become just another big business whose self-interest is promoting the ongoing strength of the unions, not doing things like ensuring our children get the best possible education so they can compete successfully as adults in a global economy.

Furthermore, an important distinction has arisen with the growth of public sector unions.

The demands of private sector unions have always been subject over time to market forces, where economic competition moderates the demands of both unions and management.

However, the demands of public sector unions are not subject to any market forces but achieve their ends through political power which then is used to protect their monopoly operations, like public schools.

It is incredibly ironic that it is now the labor unions who spend lobbying monies like a Fortune 500 corporation - just so they can protect their powerful monopolies. Underperforming monopolies at that!

For those of us in this century, the dominant issue is a passionate belief in freedom. But, my-oh-my, how times have changed who truly supports freedom. And who believes in the Founding principle that Americans are capable of self-government.

For some of us, this belief in freedom and self-government leads us to support entrepreneurial capitalism - not big business or country-club Republicans - because entrepreneurial capitalism enables any hard-working American to start a new business and have a shot at living the American Dream. (Nearly 20 years in Silicon Valley gave me a chance to see it up close.)

This belief in freedom also leads us to support school choice because we believe every poor inner city child should have the same educational opportunity that some of us - who are more economically fortunate - can "buy" for our own children.

Isn't it ironic then that conservatives are the ones pushing economic freedom for the average American who, like each contributor to Anchor Rising, was born with no silver spoon or trust fund?

Isn't it ironic that conservatives are the ones pushing educational freedom for poor inner city children while the teachers' unions want to keep those same children enslaved in their underperforming public school monopolies?

Who then "stands for progress, for protection of the interests and rights of the masses" so no American is enslaved? Who then believes most fervently in freedom, self-government, and enabling every American to live the American Dream?

Citizen Context for Negotiations

So this is the final month of severance pay from the editing job that I lost in the spring.

We've resources for approximately another six months — longer if my wife goes back to work. The local economy is such, however, that even if we were comfortable putting our children in daycare to allow for a full 40-hour workweek on her part, it is unlikely that she could make up the deficit. (Our investment in her education, you see, was to qualify her to teach. Lapses in both certifications and continuing education requirements have placed the necessary additional investments beyond our reach.) If it proves necessary, some mixture of daycare, waitressing on my wife's part, and side work on my part could fill in the gaps, but then I'd have to loose the progress that I've made with writing for the second time in the space of a few years.

I offer this not to bemoan my circumstances, but to give a sense of the context in which I've been considering the following information from a Newport Daily News story about the Tiverton teachers' preparation to strike:

The School Committee's current proposal for salary and health care would decrease teachers overall salaries by 1.5 percent, according to union officials. The average loss in wages for a member on a family heath-care plan is $2,201 and the average loss in wages for a member on an individual plan is $1,315, according to union figures.

I haven't seen any specifics from the various proposals (although I'd note for Mr. Crowley's benefit that my email is linked beneath my name on the Contributors tab to the left), but I'd say it's a reasonable assumption that the union is factoring at least its usual 3% step raise into its calculation of teacher "losses." Taking the numbers as laid out in their most recent contract (PDF) and increasing them 3% as required by the one-year extension (PDF) that they accepted last year (all of which information Pat Crowley has helpfully provided on his Web site), the following table presents the amounts in question:

Step	2006–2007 Salary	Assumed 2007–2008 Salary
1	$35,484	$36,548
2	$38,077	$39,219
3	$40,672	$41,892
4	$43,415	$44,717
5	$46,255	$47,643
6	$49,177	$50,652
7	$51,974	$53,533
8	$54,860	$56,506
9	$58,041	$59,782
10	$64,205	$66,131

Readers should keep four things in mind when considering these numbers. First, these are not the whole story as far as cash remuneration is concerned. Advanced studies can add up to 6.53% to the salary. Teachers receive longevity bonuses from $200 for 10 years of service to $600 for thirty. Coaching or taking on advisory roles (whether of students or of fellow teachers) can add thousands of dollars to a salary. And other, professional development–type activities also yield additional money.

Second, these salaries are for a 7-hour 180-day work year, with school vacations and a full summer available for extra work, if desired. Add to that consideration the opportunity to accumulate a full year of sick days as well opportunities for partially paid sabbaticals and such.

Third, the health benefits cost teachers well below what most people in the private sector must pay. The copays (dental included) are $675 for an individual plan and $1,100 for a family plan — or $26 and $42 per biweekly paycheck. Any teachers who decline the dental coverage receive a $250 payment. Any teacher whose spouse also works for the Tiverton school district receives $1,000 stipend instead of a unique health plan.

Fourth, teachers go up a step each year, so the actual raise for any teacher not yet at step 10 is the step increase plus the 3% adjustment. With each step increase amounting to a 6–7% raise (10% from step 9 to step 10), the actual increase in earnings for teachers in their first decade with the district is around 10%.

Now reread the above paragraph from the Newport Daily News report. If I'm correct that the 1.5% "overall salary decrease" is calculated after the expected 3% step adjustment, then the union is complaining that the take-home pay of teachers who have no other adjustments to their compensation will only be increasing by 1.5% for those above step 10, only around 8.5% for teachers below step 10, and only 11.5% for teachers going from step 9 to step 10.

Forgive me if my heart doesn't bleed for them as I contemplate 80-hour-plus workweeks, 51 weeks per year, just to get by.

Anatomy of a Tribal Revolt in Iraq

With a h/t to National Review Online, here is a perspective on the revolt by Iraqi tribes against al Qaeda, with the author - Australian Col. David Kilcullen, who just completed a tour as senior counterinsurgency aide to U.S. commander General David Petraeus - offering this "tentative conclusion:"

As we all know, there is no such thing as a "standard" counterinsurgency. Indeed, the basic definition of counterinsurgency is "the full range of measures that a government and its partners take to defeat an insurgency." In other words, the set of counterinsurgency measures adopted depends on the character of the insurgency: the nature of counterinsurgency is not fixed, but shifting; it evolves in response to changes in the form of insurgency. This means that there is no standard set of metrics, benchmarks or operational techniques that apply to all insurgencies, or remain valid for any single insurgency throughout its life-cycle. And there are no fixed "laws" of counterinsurgency, except for the sole simple but difficult requirement to first understand the environment, then diagnose the problem, in detail and in its own terms, then build a tailored set of situation-specific techniques to deal with it.

With that in mind, it is clear that although the requirements for counterinsurgency in a tribal environment may not be written down in the classical-era field manuals, building local allies and forging partnerships and trusted networks with at-risk communities seems to be one of the keys to success – perhaps this is what T.E. Lawrence had in mind when he wrote that the art of guerrilla warfare with Arab tribes rests on "building a ladder of tribes to the objective." Many excellent recent posts and discussions here at the Small Wars Journal have explored these issues. Marine and Army units that have sought to understand tribal behavior in its own terms, to follow norms of proper behavior as expected by tribal communities, and to build their own confederations of local partners, have done extremely well in this fight. But we should remember that this uprising against extremism belongs to the Iraqi people, not to us – it was their idea, they started it, they are leading it, it is happening on their terms and on their timeline, and our job is to support where needed, ensure proper political safeguards and human rights standards are in place, but ultimately to realize that this will play out in ways that may be good or bad, but are fundamentally unpredictable. So far so good, though...

Kilcullen's post is lengthy but worthy of reading in full. Jeff, over at Protein Wisdom, offers further thoughts:

...move the conversation back to the topic we’ve been dealing with the past few days, namely, what role does the media play in how democratic republics, in which electorates rely on a free press for the raw material used to inform their beliefs, come to pressure foreign policy and the political positions adopted by (largely opportunistic or pragmatic) politicians?

Here, the ethnic “civil war” theme we’ve seen digested and then re-contextualized for rhetorical use by both opponents and proponents of the Iraq campaign, is — if Col Kilcullen’s analysis is correct — a deliberately deployed strategic construct, a means by which al Qaeda has attempted to pit ethnic groups against one another, and so keep the country divided politically while the resulting violence increases the appearance of chaos.

And our press, having bought into the construct and having pushed it for domestic consumption, has aided in the misunderstanding of the far more important (and real) tribal dynamic, which, according to Col Kilcullen is actually helping bring about political change, and in a manner far more precipitous than is “normal” under conditions of insurgency and counterinsurgency.

All of which raises the question: if the press doesn’t understand the dynamic on the ground, why are they so committed to pushing a particular version, one that happens to favor the propaganda efforts of al Qaeda? Is it mere credulity? An inveterate distrust of our own military and the administration’s foreign policy? Or do they find such an intergral narrative of a burgeoning civil war in Iraq useful to their larger narrative, the most prominent theme of which appears to be a kind of pervasive fatalism, often manifested in a return to the Vietnam paradigm and the specter of a quagmire?

I can’t know, for certain — but what I can say is that there is a substantial danger in pushing a narrative that hasn’t been thoroughly considered, particularly if you recognize that it is the precise narrative being served up by your enemy.

In a war where commitment and will are the deciding factors, a campaign to undermine that will — whether it is intentional or merely the product of shoddy journalism or a poor understanding of conditions on the ground — is one that the press should take great care to avoid, if, as in the present case, they lack the proper means (as Karl so clearly showed yesterday) by which to vet the narrative they are promoting.

After all, it’s not like milbloggers haven’t been offering similar observations to Kilcullen’s since 2003.

A Rookie No-Hitter

Last night was special.

As I sat working in the family room, I had the Red Sox game on in the background. Clay Buchholz, a rookie pitcher making just his second major league start, was steadily getting outs. Suddenly the game began to demand more attention - at least in the top half of each inning - as the announcers reminded viewers how Clay had still allowed no hits and it was now the sixth inning.

The 7th inning went by without any hits. Then the 8th inning. All the while, Clay was impressing everyone with his dazzling assortment of pitches: curveballs, changeups, fastballs. Fastballs in the 90's. Curveballs and changeups in the 70's. Simply beautiful pitches.

Various fine plays in the field made the no-hitter possible. The best was when Dustin Pedroia made a stunning defensive play which saved the no-hitter in the 7th. Both Coco Crisp and Clay himself had other nice defensive plays in the 6th and 8th innings, respectively. After walking Brian Roberts in the 6th, Clay picked him off 1st base, allowing a return to a full wind-up thereafter. Roberts would be the last Oriole to reach base. Catcher Jason Varitek deserves credit for calling a really good game.

Everybody at Fenway was standing during the entire 9th inning. And the rest of us at home just stopped working to watch the game!

More on the story here, here, and here.

This is baseball at its best: It is now September, nearly every division has a close race between teams, and then we get this beautiful no-hitter. What more can you ask for?!

Clay is only the 3rd pitcher in major league history to throw a no-hitter in either his first or second start. Not bad for a kid who just turned 23 several weeks ago and was only called up from the Pawtucket AAA team the day before!

Congratulations!

What do the Wobblies Seek to Deliver?

Ian Donnis writes in this week's Providence Phoenix about the Industrial Workers of the World's August 26 protest and the IWW mission in general. Donnis asks a sensible question, too often glossed over by the MSM when covering events like the North Providence rally…

Considering how the IWW has mostly been a barely perceptible entity since its pre-World War I heyday, one has to wonder whether the protest at North Providence High will mark a contemporary high point for the union in Rhode Island.

In other words, how much more to this movement is there than protest itself?

Donnis mentions a perspective offered by some observers at the rally to explain the group's limited appeal…

To a few curious onlookers at last Sunday’s protest, the band of gathered liberals and lefties were remnants of discredited political theories.

Rocco DiPippo discusses this perspective in great and colorful detail, over at the Autonomist website.

When asked about IWW goals and its fealty to the ideas of the past, organizer Mark Bray gave a similar answer as he did when asked by Anchor Rising if the goal of his organization was to criminalize private income…

“We are not a communist organization, or a socialist organization, or anything ‘ist’ ” Democracy in the workplace, he says, is “perhaps our most important value.”

However, "democracy in the workplace" is not mentioned in the IWW Constitution, though "abolition of the wage system" and the "the historic mission of the working class to do away with capitalism" are. Those ideas are pretty difficult to separate from old-line, conventional Marxism.

The caution for young idealists to be aware of here stems not just from the specifics of what the IWW may or may not stand for as a group, but from the consistent unwillingness of local IWW leaders to state their most fundamental organizational goals when given the opportunity to reach a large audience. Such unwillingness to put to the public their ultimate objectives is difficult to reconcile with a legitimate belief in the system of democracy, be it in the workplace or elsewhere, as democracy depends on honest deliberation and exchange about the purposes and limits of what can be achieved collectively by the people.

Not coincidentally, the idea that the mechanics of building a movement are more important than its ultimate goals, and therefore saying anything to win hearts and minds is acceptable in the pursuit of power, is one that has corrupted collectivization movements throughout history. That idea may be one more point of commonality between today's IWW and those discredited 'isms from yesterday.

Sexless Sex Scandals & Liberal Moralizing

Idaho Republican Senator Larry Craig has resigned.

With a h/t to Instapundit, I found these comments from Eric Scheie on the Craig story to be most amusing:

I realize that there are things missing in this analysis, and of course the biggest problem is that it does not involve actual sex, but the perception of sex. In that respect, Craig's "sex" is like the nonexistent sex of Mark Foley, whose crime was not sex, but sending suggestive emails. (Or Vitter, whose name was found in an address book.)...

What is it with these guys that they can't even run a proper sex scandal?

Who ever heard of sex scandals without sex?

At least when the Democrats have a sex scandal, it involves real, honest to goodness sex. Yeah, I know, Bill Clinton said the sex wasn't sex. But let's face it, it was. Had Bill tapped Monica's foot, the most he'd have been accused of was playing footsie, and there'd have been little to no outcry, much less an impeachment. And as Matthew Sheffield makes clear, the double standard is appalling; Democrats keep their jobs after drowning women in cars or keeping male brothels, while Republicans are hounded out of office for sex scandals without even the component of sex.

If I were the American people, I'd be totally sick of sexless Republican sex scandals by now.

The GOP needs to shape up.

Jonah Goldberg offers both some light-hearted and more serious reflections on this news and the surrounding debate:

In the wake of the Larry Craig “Bathroomgate” story, some intrepid free-market-oriented bloggers came up with a novel solution to the problem of closeted gay conservatives indulging their carnal desires on the side. Gay-sex offsets.

The same market-based approach is used by environmentally crapulent liberal celebrities all the time. They use private jets, drive around with big entourages and own numerous energy-sucking homes. To make amends, they purchase an indulgence in the form of “carbon offsets” — a contract whereby the equivalent amount of greenhouse gases are soaked up by newly planted trees and the like.

So why not do the same thing with gay sex? Cruise the bus station, cut a check to the heterosexuality-promoting organization of your choice.

Since most on the Left think Craig’s alleged sexual liaisons are perfectly benign, they shouldn’t object. “Who are we to judge?” and all that. Rather, the Left claims it hates Craig’s hypocrisy, not his behavior.

From Rush Limbaugh’s drug use to Bill Bennett’s gambling to the long list of Republican politicians who’ve thrown a few earmarks and riders into their marriage vows, the Left has chosen to denounce the perceived hypocrisy rather than the behavior. The indictment sometimes loses its punch in the details. Bennett never inveighed against gambling, for example.

But that misses the point. The Left claims to hate “moralizers.” So any failure to live like Jesus while telling others to follow his example is an outrage, even the defining challenge of our lives...

One solution to the hypocrisy epidemic, of course, is to have no morals at all. You can’t violate your principles if you don’t have any. Another solution: simply define down your principles until they are conveniently consistent with your preferred lifestyle...

But the Left has another solution. Under its system, you can still be a moralizer. You can still tell people what to do and how to live. And, best of all, you can still fall short of your ideals personally while guiltlessly trying to use government to impose your moral vision on others. All you have to do is become a liberal moralizer.

Once you become a liberal, you can wax eloquent on the glories of the public schools while sending your kids to private school. You can wax prolix about the greedy rich while making a fortune on the side. You can even use the government to impose your values willy-nilly, from racial quotas and confiscatory tax rates to draconian environmental policies and sex-ed for grade-schoolers — all of which will be paid for in part by people who disagree with you.

You don’t even have to give up traditional religion, so long as you now define the teachings of your faith in perfect compliance with the Democratic platform.

Why, just look at John Kerry. In 2004, the Democratic nominee repeatedly insisted that his religious faith is "why I fight against poverty. That’s why I fight to clean up the environment and protect this earth. That’s why I fight for equality and justice. All of those things come out of that fundamental teaching and belief of faith." Great! But when it comes to, say, abortion, consulting one’s faith is a no-no: "What is an article of faith for me is not something that I can legislate on somebody who doesn’t share that article of faith."

So I guess under a Kerry administration, America’s civil rights and economic and environmental policies would all be voluntary?

The point is simply this: Hypocrisy is bad, sure. But it’s a human failing that should fall upon the individual in question. What the left wants to do is use hypocrisy as a cudgel to declare that conservative ideals are categorically illegitimate because some conservatives fail to live up to them. But we all fail to live up to our ideals sometimes (just ask John Edwards, who wants get rid of everyone’s SUV, save the one in his driveway). That’s sort of why we call them "ideals." Most of us don’t fall as far as Larry Craig seems to have fallen, but that’s not necessarily an indictment of his arguments, it’s an indictment of the man.

Saying "No" to Legalized Extortion

I endorse John's words in the Comments section of Justin's post entitled Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.:

Maybe someday in RI a school committee will have the guts to fire striking teachers, replace them with new ones, and say to the union, "see you in court." I have no doubt where most parents' and other taxpayers' sympathies would lie.

And, as to the NEA's other favorite tactic of work-to-rule (doing only the absolute legal minimum specified in the contract) - combined with demanding retroactive pay increases - I wrote these words back in 2005 when those were the union actions during the East Greenwich negotiations:

The issues of retroactive pay and "work-to-rule" are at the heart of the dispute in the East Greenwich NEA teachers union contract dispute. The union expects salaries to be made whole via retroactive pay increases. But if the union believes they will get such pay, then they have no incentive to settle the contract for anything less than their one-sided outrageous demands. Yet, in the meantime, our children will not be made whole retroactively for all the times teachers have, due to "work-to-rule," refused to do the same things for our children that they did in past years. This is an inequitable situation that needs to be rectified.

Therefore, I would like to propose a straightforward settlement offer to the East Greenwich NEA teachers' union contract dispute:

• Retroactive pay: Tell the union that retroactive pay is off the table now and forever. Actions have consequences and teachers should not be made whole if our children cannot be made whole. Take away any incentive for the union to continue its refusal to negotiate in good faith and make time their enemy, not ours.

• Taking care of our children: Take some or all of the funds originally set aside in the budget for retroactive pay and dedicate those funds to paying for outside help, including tutors, for our children. In other words, let's take control of the situation and make our children whole from this day forward...

Parents will support such aggressive actions because they are in the best interests of their children.

Taxpayers will support such aggressive actions because they protect the standard of living of working families and retirees in the community.

And while we are at it, Just Say No to (i) 9-12% annual salary increases; (ii) healthcare co-pays less than 25%; (iii) cash buybacks of any kind for not using health insurance plans; (iv) dollar caps or dollar offsets elsewhere in the contract to offset higher co-pays, etc.; and, (v) rich pension plans.

They need to start living like the rest of us, the people who pay their salaries and benefits. See more here, here, and here.

In other words, Just Say No to union actions which amount to nothing but a form of legalized extortion of hard-working Americans.

Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.

It occurs to me that several buildings' worth of kindergarteners began their school experiences last week in Tiverton. What a wonderful early educational experience this would be:

The teachers union membership this evening authorized its negotiating committee to call a strike if it deemed it necessary next Tuesday.

Amy Mullen, the NEA-Tiverton teachers union president, said the members authorized the committee at a 4:30 p.m. meeting to "to take whatever action it deems necessary up to and including a strike on Tuesday."

So the negotiating committee has been authorized to commit union members to criminal activity? Can't the school request that a judge preemptively remind the teachers that striking is illegal? Perhaps the school committee should tell the union — which has declared that it "will not continue to meet with the School Committee's current configuration of negotiators" — that any empty classrooms on Tuesday will be presumed to be in need of a new teacher.

I also note that, instead of offering the public the look behind the contractual curtain that I requested from him, Pat Crowley has released quite a different document:

Crowley last night released a copy of a memo Schools Supt. William J. Rearick sent to teachers Tuesday apologizing for telling them to "sit down and shut up" at a district orientation meeting in the high school auditorium earlier that day.

“My intention was to get the meeting started in a timely manner, in retrospect I should have chosen my words more carefully,” Rearick wrote.

“I want to take this opportunity to apologize to anyone I may have offended,” the superintendent added.

Rearick last night said it happened after he'd tried to call the orientation meeting to order without success.

It's time these "professionals" — which teachers profess (and indeed ought) to be — learned that there are consequences to allowing the unions to make bullies and blackmailers of them.