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Letter: ‘Force of Four’ school board candidates respond to editorial 

Letter to the editor paso robles daily news

To the editor,

In response to an editorial “Local leaders offer advice on voting for school board candidates,” posted on Oct. 19 by Mr. Jeff Railsback and endorsed by others, four of the twelve candidates for school board offer this alternative perspective to some of the points that were posited by Mr. Railsback and his cosigners.

1. The fiscal problems have been addressed… There are four candidates running as a slate focused on addressing past financial issues that are already under control…

Neither statement is accurate. Yes, while a COVID-19 windfall has provided at best only a temporary respite, the budget is not under control as is evidenced by the need for the current board to convene a 7-11 Committee to evaluate selling surplus school real property and to consider school consolidation. Additional cuts may have to follow. Yes, thanks to staff, millions of dollars have already been trimmed from the budget and yes, thanks to a Safe Harbor provision for ADA, we have a projected temporary budget reserve that allowed the SLO County Office of Education to recall their liaison. However, the projected budget reserve is ironically linked to the COVID-19 pandemic. Approximately $1,000,000 in cost savings occurred last year when the COVID-19 shut down our schools from March to June. Millions more came to the district in the form of state and federal grants including the CARES Act. According to Superintendent Curt Dubost on Oct. 20, this money has now been nearly fully budgeted to safety and well being, distance learning, and now hybrid learning. Millions more may have to be spent before we can safely return to and remain in in-person learning. When the grants have been exhausted, if no other grants are forthcoming, the money needed will come from a General Fund that was severely compromised by the previous board’s lack of good governance as evidenced by their block voting.

Both the current board and the newly elected board may still need to continue plans to trim at least an estimated $800,000 from the budget. Salaries, programs and services may have to be trimmed. This isn’t focusing on past issues; this is being very concerned about how the district will avoid insolvency and possibly State takeover especially in light of declining enrollment and the rapidly increasing cost of essential special education and sadly, litigation. Yes, some candidates blithely recommend spending dollars that will not be available for new programs, teachers that are more qualified, more freedom. More grants will help too but I wonder if the other candidates know how many millions of dollars the district’s current amazing grant writer brings to the budget and yet the district remains in financial instability at best and will be until California recovers its tax base lost to the COVID-19 pandemic.

2. If you include returning school board members, electing this group as a slate with such a narrow focus is dangerous for our district, and threatens the retention of key district personnel, and ignores the diversity of issues facing the district especially as it recovers from the impact of COVID-19.

There is no narrow focus. Mr. Railsback, you conducted the PREA Survey and hosted the PREA Candidate Forum. You have read our responses to the multiple surveys that have circulated by several newspapers and our advertisements including in the Paso Robles Daily News. You know and have acknowledged that the Force of Four is concerned about so much more than just “addressing past financial issues.”

What then is your evidence that the Force of Four “is dangerous for our district?” Is it because representing conservative parents, teachers and voters in a conservative city is dangerous?” If so, dangerous to whom?

What then is your evidence that the Force of Four “threatens the retention of key district personnel?” Is it perhaps of what happened in 2019 after voters replaced three incumbents in the 2018 election with three new candidates who promised to be more representative of the community we serve and not march lockstep with the previous superintendent? Yes, key district personnel felt compelled to follow their leader after he quit. Are you saying that their collective departure was a bad thing to have happened? We don’t think so and neither do most Roblans.

Today and in the future, district personnel should not feel threatened as long as they too remain committed to the values of the parents and the voters of this community. We believe our current district personnel are doing their very best to honor this commitment with their amazing service especially in light of the COVID-19 school closures, distance learning and now hybrid learning. None of us are looking to disrupt the fragile balance between the superintendent (the board’s one and only employee), the rest of our certificated, classified, administrators and staff, our classrooms, programs, and the district’s budget. To suggest otherwise is simply unfounded and untrue.

What then is your evidence that the Force of Four “ignores the diversity of issues facing the district especially as it recovers from the impact of COVID-19?”

The Force of Four has not, is not now “ignoring the diversity of issues facing our district” nor will we in the future. For the record, look at our campaign statements published in the Official Voter Guide, listen to our responses during the candidates forums, look at our ads, read our responses to the surveys that have been published. While we do not now and will never march in lockstep, we do share the common values and goals for the good of our students and district:

  1. Fiscal accountability and transparency. No deficit spending. Live within our means including putting some money aside to rebuild our soon to be once again depleted reserves.
  2. A quality curriculum based on local values with input from both parents and teachers.
  3. Enriching the student experience free from all indoctrination, intimidation, and bullying and applying the appropriate discipline for those who violate these tenets.
  4. Supporting our teachers and staff with the resources they need to best prepare our students whether they choose to start their career immediately out of high school or attend either a two-year college or four-year university, and, most importantly, life as responsible, independent and critically thinking productive citizens of the United States of America.
  5. Restoring the trust of our parents, students, teachers and staff so that the morale, pride and discipline the district used to universally enjoy can once again help propel our students to greatness.

The goals and values of the Force of Four can be summed up as replacing the current block voting with good, effective governance that, as always, takes the power of at least four of the seven trustees to reach consensus and thereby enact real, lasting and effective change. When elected, a Force of Four can make this happen.

In closing, please allow us to ask you and your co-signers where were all of you during the previous superintendent’s reign of terror? Where were your voices, questions and editorials while the district’s reserves were being drained and district employees were being intimidated and many forced out of their jobs to make room for replacements recruited from Fresno? Your collective silence was as deafening then as your inaccurate accusation is loud today. Who were you supporting then and why did you support them? Who are you supporting now and why? Why did you not call out the obvious block voting of the previous board? Why were you absent when most of the previous board approved paying a nearly $250,000 resignation bonus to former superintendent Chris Williams when his contract clearly prohibited doing so? Why does your editorial offer no other options to resolve the crisis facing not just our district but districts all over California except not to vote for the Force of Four? What are you and your co-signers suggesting needs to be done that will change the same pattern of poor governance that inevitably leads to deficit spending?

We trust the voters of Paso Robles and San Miguel and Pleasant Valley to see through your editorial’s scare tactics and rhetoric. Before, during and after November 3rd the voters who are tired of the lack of good governance will vote for the Force of Four to restore the benefits of good governance: trust, integrity, experience, fiscal responsibility, a sound curriculum based on our local values, morale, discipline and a commitment to safely reopen our schools.

Signed,

Chris Bausch, candidate for school board
Frank Triggs, candidate for school board
Dorian Baker, candidate for school board
Jim Reed, candidate for school board
–”The Force of Four”


Editor’s note: Letters to the editor are personal opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Paso Robles Daily News or its staff. We welcome letters from local residents regarding relevant local topics. To submit one, click here.

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