Published: September 03, 2006 04:22 pm            

9/03/06 Letters to the editor

Questioning $230,000 weight room at CIS



Dear Editor:



Editor’s note: The $24,000 in the Times-Review article refers to the cost of the building structure. Other costs, raising the total to about $230,000, include furniture, teaching materials and a furnished weight room when the school is converted into another middle school for the 2007-08 school year. The facility will be furnished with equipment equal to that of the current Cleburne Middle School.



The building currently under construction at Cleburne Intermediate School is going to be a classroom to address overcrowding for the 2006-07 school year. However, it will turn into a weight room for 2007-08 as originally planned in the $36 million school bond.

On Aug. 24, a Times-Review article cited the cost for the current project when completed to be $24,000. Going over an open records request from CISD, I found my list of improvements cited in the $36 million school bond to each campus, and the weight-lifting room final cost was $230,000. A realignment of the district in 2007-08 will place sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders at this campus, making it a second middle school.

First of all, what do sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders need with a $230,000 weightlifting room? I am trying hard to understand how this will add educational value, improve our test scores, boost the district’s overall rating or meet any federal demand outlined in the No Child Left Behind Act.

After talking with a school board member, the member asked me if I was sure this was not a typo on the open records information. But that brings up some interesting scenarios for taxpayers to consider.

If this was a typo and the cost was meant to be $23,000, then we are over budget by $1,000, and we still have no money for weightlifting equipment.

If the cost is $230,000, and we subtract the $24,000 already used, then we have $206,000 to spend on equipment.

I called the reporter who wrote that article asking where he got the $24,000 figure and he said at the school board meeting. He also stated that another individual said the cost of equipment could be about $20,000. So if we now take the $206,000 from above, minus the $20,000, we get $186,000 left over for what or whom?

Of all the improvements to the intermediate school, not one of the projects, which total $1,105,000, has anything at all to do with improving education. CISD open records list the other improvements as follows: canopies — $100,000; six-lane track with concert curb — $250,000; six tennis courts — $300,000; additional driveway $225,000 and the $230,000 weight room, building and equipment. Do you see any real needs, or are they just wants?

The article also mentioned that overcrowding at the intermediate school by about 93 students was the reason for building the classroom-weight room now. So how much will it cost taxpayers to convert the classrooms back into a weight room? This has not been figured into the equation anywhere in my records. What plan is there for overcrowding in 2007-08 without adding anymore space to the main structure for classrooms?

Finally after boiling this down and putting it into perspective, I guess a $230,000 weight room for sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders is no more foolish than $3.5 million spent on a really badly needed golf course for a select few to use at everyone’s expense.

Education Inc. continues to blame their problems on money and the state. It’s not the amount of money; it’s the wasteful spending. The school district’s program, No Administrator Left Behind, is riddled with over-bloated salaries, useless positions and programs, resumé building, perks and benefits, and retirement programs that rival the biggest corporation’s CEOs. And what do parents do? Stand there with wallets fully opened hypnotized and mesmerized to the continual lulling cry of, “It’s all for the children.”



Harold Gentry

Cleburne





Troops should be removed from Iraq



Dear Editor:



The majority of American citizens are in favor of removing U.S. troops from Iraq well before the end of the Bush term. Let’s see, at 50 dead GIs per month, times 29 months, equals another 1,450 dead Americans. All for what? A pig-headed president who refuses to change course not matter what. And what will Bush tell the relatives of those 1,450 killed during the remainder of his watch — the same thing he has told Cindy Sheehan on what her son Casey died for, which is stone silence?

More to the point is what the judge in Detroit said about the illegal warrantless wiretaps. And I like what Glenn Greenwald has said in that regard. No problem George, we will impeach you. Bush is still reading the book “My Pet Goat” so he really doesn’t understand the United States belongs to the people. Maybe Tony Snow can explain the word “impeach” to him. It’s time Americans took America back from this King George. We did it before, and we can do it again.



Mrs. Holly Fisher

Cleburne





Which coat is Edwards wearing?



Dear Editor:



Who is Chet Edwards? If you follow his voting record, between 80 and 90 percent of his votes in Congress are with the Democratic Party and the likes of Eddie Bernice Johnson and Sheila Jackson Lee, both proud liberals. Edwards’ liberal voting record is a matter of fact. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which openly opposes increases in the minimum wage and so-called living wage laws “Living Wage Laws Kill Jobs” by Thomas J. Donohue, President and CEO, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Aug. 1, 2006, recently endorsed Chet Edwards.

I thought the Democratic Party favored increases in minimum wage and so-called living wage laws. Chet Edwards voted against President Bush’s tax cut packages of $550 billion and $350 billion, as well as The Tax Relief, Simplification and Equity Act of 2003.

Edwards’ campaign manager recently implied that Edwards did not vote against President Bush’s major tax relief initiatives. It would seem that Chet Edwards wears any coat that fits the occasion, depending on who is hosting the party.



Harry C. Kennemer Jr.

Burleson





Barkman wrong about Leininger



Dear Editor:



Guest columnist Patrick Barkman is flat wrong when he writes that Dr. Jim Leininger is “anti-public school.” Most school choice advocates, including Dr. Leininger, believe that competition will help inspire accelerated improvements in public schools, especially in the big cities where generations of children have already been lost. As for Mr. Barkman’s harsh criticism of Dr. Leininger’s politics, the truth is he became passionately involved in helping poor children escape the poverty cycle after having worked as an emergency room physician treating the gunshot wounds of too many children.

Dr. Leininger went on to found a medical device company that made him a very successful businessman. He has since devoted a good share of his wealth to what has now become his life-long determination to help children. To date he has personally funded more than $50 million of scholarships to private schools for low-income children in San Antonio and other Texas cities. All but a few of those who have graduated have gone on to self-financed college educations.

That Dr. Leininger believes Texas public policy should side with parents who don’t feel that they can wait for “eventual” improvements in public schools is less the political philosophy so clearly disdained by Mr. Barkman as it is simple human compassion and a willingness to stake part of his wealth — and his own reputation — on efforts to make the future better for the parents of promising children desperate to have at least some of the educational choices now only enjoyed by the wealthy.



Ken Hoagland

Houston





Everyone should vote



Dear Editor:



Recent elections have taught us an important lesson: Elections can be won or lost by just a few votes.

It is election time again, and there is a lot at stake for Americans. To ensure our voices are heard, voters must exercise their right and turn out at the polls. Think about all those who have risked their lives for that right given to us.

Would you have risked freedom, fortunes and your life to sign the Declaration of Independence?

Robert Morris died in 1806, in relative poverty, at the age of 73 after using most of his wealth to finance the war. All of the Morris property and nearly all of Lewis Morris’ wealth had been destroyed in the Revolution.

Francis Lewis lost all of his property on Long Island, N.Y., to the destruction of the Revolutionary War.

Lyman Hall’s property was burned, and he stood accused of high treason.

Carter Braxton used his wealth to sponsor shipping and privateering during the conflict, the losses from which eventually resulted in debt.

Arthur Middleton was captured by the British when Charleston was overrun in 1781 and held prisoner for more than a year. Most of his fortune was destroyed during the Revolution.

Thomas Heyward Jr. was taken prisoner by the British while in command of a militia force during the siege of Charleston.

Would you have risked everything you hold dear to you to fight for Independence?

Would you have risked imprisonment to protest during the Suffragettes Movement?

In July 1848, a political campaign began for a woman’s right to vote. After 72 years, this campaign ended with the passage of the 19th Amendment on Aug. 26, 1920.

For 86 years, women have had the right to vote. However, how many women (and men) do you know who do not practice this patriotic and civic duty?

Voting is a sacred right that many of us take for granted. Billions of people throughout the world cannot cast a meaningful ballot, but we Americans can and should.

As the November elections are coming soon, we need to start encouraging our friends to register to vote, to understand the issues facing our country, county and city, and make the time to cast that vote. You can apply for a voter registration form at the Johnson County Voter Registrar’s office, the Texas Department of Public Safety and online at www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/voter/index.shtml. You can also change your address at this Web site. In addition, the Cleburne Area Business and Professional Women have members who have been deputized as voter registrars can register prospective voters. Cleburne Area BPW will register voters in the Educational Building at Hill College from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sept. 18.

Cleburne Area BPW would like to encourage everyone to participate in this year’s election by becoming involved by attending upcoming candidate forums and debates sponsored by the League of Women Voters.

The women of Iraq have turned out in record numbers to cast their votes. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if, for once, the women (and men) of the United States, especially Johnson County, also turned out in record numbers?



Tina Pollock

Legislative Chairperson

Cleburne Area Business

and Professional Women





Local radio station should play requested music



Dear Editor:



I have been listening to a local Cleburne country radio station for years. On the morning of Aug. 17, the morning show host-program director had a young man on who had won a singer-songwriter contest the radio station had hosted. I sat there and listened to that young man sing, and it was just so pure and enjoyable I actually stopped what I was doing.

I started to call and request that they play the young man. They told me they had had many requests but the program director must approve this before they could play, so I called and talked to him. He said he had not had time to listen to his CD.

I just don’t understand how a radio station cannot listen to what their listeners want to hear. I have called back a couple of times to request to the DJs. They keep telling me they are getting lots of requests for this young man by the name of Bo McDowell, but their morning radio host program director just won’t let them play it. I hope when this young man makes it big, he does not give this station the time of day like has been showed to him.



Steven Smith

Godley

        

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