I used to tell Former Mayor Bucktooth & Bowlcut that just saying something is transparent doesn’t automatically make it transparent. It seems our school board suffers from the same affliction. After I grilled them about the unknowns and the lack of transparency they bragged about how transparent the process has been without answering my questions, and they were pretty simple;
• What is the final cost of this 30 year bond? The Finance Director fumbled around this question only saying the last bond was paid off early.
• Are we using super precincts and E-Poll books? No answer.
• Will the county be handling tabulation and absentee voting? No answer.
• What is the compounding affect of the tax. Super Maher said, “You will pay $2 per $185K valuation.” No answer.
• How will you fund staffing/maintenance of the schools? No answer.
• Another lady asked how many homes will be destroyed building a new Whittier? No answer except that they haven’t picked locations yet. How do you have a dollar amount of new construction when you don’t know what land you are going to purchase?
• Why was the survey sent to non-voters? They said this was for ‘educating’ purposes. Just because some has the information doesn’t mean they will vote. The survey doesn’t mean a hill of beans.
Like I said, there was a lot of back patting about how they took 18 months to get here, but little answers to the important questions.
A question I have often pondered is, “If you don’t tell someone the information to begin with, is it lying?” No. But it is incredibly deceptive.