Pickerington Area Taxpayers Alliance

Just want to make sure I know what I am ''buying'' if I vote for the rather expensive levy. I have read that extracurriculars, busing, and gifted programs have been cut. I have read various accounts of what will be brought back if the levy passes. I have not heard mention of whether the gifted & other educational programs (foreign language, etc.) will be brought back.

To the extent possible, it would be nice to know what the School Board's priorities are in bringing back programs currently being cut. Will they all come back, or only certain ones? If only certain ones, in which order? I certainly hope educational programs come back first.

Assuming a cost savings, I also would like to see busing brought back in house (I have never been impressed with Laidlaw), and health insurance benefits brought in line with other businesses (I prefer middle to high teacher salaries to attract the best teachers here). Additionally, I find tremendous benefit in extracurriculars, but have no problem with pay-to-play -- as long as a funding mechanism is put in place to help those who can't afford it.

p.s. On a totally unrelated issue: is there a reason most people post here anonymously? I personally would never post anything here I would be ashamed to admit in public or say to anyone else. It just seems surprising that so few admit to their opinions.

Here are a couple of answers...

Gifted programs have not been cut as I understood it - the funding paid to the County for a Gifted Teacher/Administrator - not sure of the title, is gone.

Mrs. Oakes told me that they felt they had teacher's in house that could continue the gifted program.

No other academics that I know of were discussed for reinstatement.

I think in light of the State Funding cuts after the levy amount was determined - they have less money than they probably want/need & shouldn't make blanket statements of promises of what will be re-instated.

I believe that is why Mrs. Oakes voted ''no'' on the resolution on Monday evening. She wanted to make sure any promises made would be kept.

You've got it right

The only academic program we have cut is junior high foreign language classes. At last Monday's meeting, the Board committed to restore extracurricular activities and busing. However, we will be instituting play to participate fees of some sort and I believe that we will be carefully reviewing each current supplemental before restoring it. Also, we will be instituting a 2-mile rule for busing, taking certain other cost-cutting measures in this area and, I hope, beginning the process of bringing busing back in-house. The Laidlaw experiment has, in my view, been a costly failure.

Lisa is right. The levy will not allow us to return to prior practices. We will need to match the additional revenue with permanent budget cuts or it will not keep us out of the red. Thus we will not be restoring the proposed new positions that we cut, and will continue to watch building budgets very carefully. We will need to continue to implement energy-saving measures and, I believe, we also will need to begin taking a close look at our current health insurance program.

Anonymity

I cannot, of course, answer for all of the anonymous posters on this discussion page. I can, however, tell you from personal experience that the fear of harassment and intimidation that some posters may feel is genuine.