Pickerington Area Taxpayers Alliance

I disagree with your numbers

Mr. Rigelman you need to go back and check the batteries in your calculator.

According to the county records you paid $174,400 for your home on March 1st 1991. The county now says your home is worth $247,090. That OVER $100,000 in appreciation is more like $72,690.

In 1991 the home mortgage interest rates were in the mid 7 to 8 percent range. Even if you got a deal on your interest rates at say 7% and a $35,000 down payment, you have paid around $127,620 in interest on a 30 year loan @ 7%. In addition you have paid over $51,000 in property taxes in those 15 years.

I believe the figure the county lists your property at is fairly close to what you would clear if you were to sell the property through a realtor. I have looked at comparables and your property might be put on the market for $274,000 but with the cost of selling you would only realize around 42% gain over those 15 years.

If indeed you have put the original down payment of $35,000 into an interest account of 4.5% and rented those 15 years at $1,000 per month you would now have $168,934 in the bank.

I guess I have reached a different conclusion that your home and my home were not investments over the last few years thanks to the schools and the high rate of taxation we have all experienced.

You've got me worried

Anonymous, you've got me worried. Retirement is looming, and you may be right about my finances. Also, it's very uncomfortable living in such a financial fish bowl.

Actually, I am very happy with my return on this particular investment. It certainly beats my return on the various bond and equity mutual funds in which my other retirement savings are invested, as well as my return on my substantial investment in the capital stock of my employer. In fact, though I do not have the patience right now to actually run the numbers, I'll bet it beats the Dow and the S&P 500. And I have been able to borrow against my growing equity to help put my kids through college.

I cleary owe most of my return on this investment to the fact that I live in a great community -- a community in which lots of other people want to live. And I believe that this is a great community, in major part, because of our schools. Not only do our kids receive good educations, but our schools, at least for me, have been at the heart of my social life. Virtually all of our friends are people we have met watching our kids do stuff.

And our schools have offered my kids, at least, so much great stuff to do. How many high school kids have the chance to march, with their high school bands, in the Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, Fiesta Bowl and Macy's parades? How many high school kids have a chance to appear, or to work backstage, in first-rate plays and musicals? All of this, I might add, has been at little or no cost to us taxpayers.

Our schools, of course, are not perfect. They have problems, and can always stand improvement. Most of the teachers who taught my kids appear to have been dedicated and well-qualified. Some, however, at least from my vantage point, should not have been teaching. Our schools' curriculum is also, in my judgment, targeted far too heavily at getting our kids through state-mandated tests.

I also believe that we overspent, to the tune of $5-10 million, on the North complex. And I believe that our school district's and school board's fiscal practices, especially under prior administrations, left much to be desired. Indeed, I think that both still have a good ways to go.

But, on the whole, I am convinced that our schools are a good investment for all of us, including empty-nesters such as myself. I also am convinced that we can find a way to relieve our current overcrowding at grades K-4 in a way that will not have a dire impact on anyone's pocket book. We just need to work together to run the numbers and find the most cost-effective answer.

I'm betting that the most cost-effective solution will prove to be one new elementary school with a somewhat larger enrollment capacity than the ones we already have. But I do not want to prejudge the result.

Parity NOT!!

I have been asking around for weeks now about those nice new uniforms the ''Pickerington'' Band wore in the Rose Parade.

First I understand that when Central was invited and not North the Band director at North went into a fit until he and his parent got their way. Since North had new uniforms and the elitist kids at North were too good to wear the ratty Central uniforms they decided to buy Central uniforms for BOTH bands.

I do not care if the PTA footed the entire bill or we had a donation I suspect someone and to was probably our school board paid for all of the uniforms just to please the elitist kids at North.

This is a waste of money period!

When do we sever the ties?

By Poor Central trash parent

What a joke

This posting is a waste of time, but I cannot resist the opportunity to point out what a joke these discussions have become...

Do any of you people see that this school board either has no clue or simply does not care about our schools? In one corner we have Bruce who enlists the aid of the PATA blog readers to provide him with insight as to what it will take to get a levy passed in Pickerington. Myself, Central Dad and many others offered a mountain of information to Bruce but he just sort of wanders off only to ask the same questions again to other posters on this blog. What? Huh? Bruce, did you get bored? Or were you simply not getting the answers you wanted to hear? I guess you'd rather get into a debate regarding the value of your home that discuss the best ways to save our schools. You are wasting our time.

In the other corner we have Lisa Reade. While I cannot prove it, I'm positive that Lisa is an avid reader of this blog. She took some ideas presented here and preverted them much like the district growth numbers she trumped up for the media last fall. She is quoted as saying that she wants to have buses at Central and at the bus barn when it is finally completed in November in order to save money. Again... what? Huh? Lisa, you to need to look back at the previous postings here and see that we've been talking about that same thing here for the past several weeks. MOVE HALF THE BUSES TO NORTH NOW AND YOU'LL BE SAVING MONEY NOW!!!

I am personally calling upon ALL parents of the Pickerington Local School District to attend the school board meeting tonight to ask them one question. It's what I have been preaching on this site for quite awhile... what did our school board learn at their planning meeting last week? Unless you walked out of that meeting with some new ideas, then you are wasting our time and our money. Learn, grow and lead us into the future. If you cannot do this one simple thing, than I ask that you resign and allow us to find someone that will.

Mom

By Central Mom