Nothing New Under the Sun

HISTORY REPEATING ITSELF

It's been a while since we took a trip in the Insider Institute's time travel capsule (our liability insurer raised some concerns after our last trip). But the Claremont Unified School District's consideration of a bond resolution caused us to cast our temporal gaze back to 2000 and the district's last bond.

In preparation of our time-tripping, we did a little research in our archival vault (pictured, right). We located a number of relevant documents from CUSD's Measure Y campaign. Now, 10 years later, we can see that the district and the Claremonsters have not only recycled old slogans for the 2010 bond, but they also misled the public when it came to the uses of the Measure Y bond money. In that instance, as in the present one, some of the erroneous claims the bond proponents made may have been misstatements, but others were blatantly manipulative.

Before we go any further, here's the text from the mailer CUSD sent out this past week. We'll need this to refer to later:

(Click Images to Enlarge)

SEEMS LIKE OLD TIMES

Back at the end of May 2000, right before the June Measure Y election, the Claremont Courier ran an opinion piece from CUSD's then-superintendent Douglas Keeler. The essay enumerated the reasons Keeler felt the bond was needed, and he touched on all of the talking points ginned up by the Claremont 400 and district's election consultant. Keeler's piece included a committee's recommendations regarding a possible bond.

Here are Keeler's comments. They appeared on 5/27/00, just before the June election:


Keeler listed the suggestions from district's Facility Advisory Committee, chaired by Jeanne Hamilton. Hamilton would later be elected to the school board in 2001. Hamilton and her committee recommended a number of things. Two things that the committee determined were that the district should:

• Modernize Claremont schools (roofs, electrical, plumbing, etc.)
• Convert the La Puerta Adult Education Site to an elementary site
  

If the Measure Y bond was supposed to modernize our schools roofs, electrical, and plumbing, why do we need to do the same repairs again only 10 years later? This week's CUSD flyer for the 2010 bond says that "The bond would improve Claremont schools by: ....Repairing and replacing old leaky roofs and plumbing....Improving student and school safety by updating fire alarms and wiring."

And the district's original resolution for the Measure Y bond included a bullet list for each Claremont school stating that the district would be replacing deteriorating roofs, replacing aging doors and windows, modernizing the district's technological and communication infrastructure systems at every school facility, and a host of other things.

Either Measure Y's $48.9 million was misspent, or the district isn't being truthful now when it claims that some of the same things need to be done 10 years later. Roofs, doors, electrical and communication wiring should last longer than 10 years.

And as for La Puerta, the district concluded they didn't need another elementary school after all. What happened to the $4.5 million from the bond that was budgeted for converting the adult school?

Let's also not forget that CUSD initially said they would use a chunk of the money to build a football stadium next to the Claremont High School. However, when residents in the neighboring Towne Ranch area became upset, imperiling the bond vote, CUSD turned around and said they had no plans at all to put the football stadium on the CHS campus. District officials said they were looking to build somewhere else. Bond opponents warned the Towne Ranch residents that the district was not being honest about its plans. But enough of them were mollified that the bond measure passed.

Drive by CHS now and take a gander at the football field, bleachers, and field lights. Sorry, Towne Ranch neighbors, you took the hit on that one.

Oh, and one last point about that electrical wiring. In 2000, the Yes on Y campaign sent out a district-wide mailer that had a photo of an electrical wiring junction box. The box had no cover, so the wires were exposed for kids to electrocute themselves.

Sound familiar?

As we noted yesterday, CUSD's mailer this week had a photo of bare wires. The wires were presumably supposed sound alarms with parents about safety in our schools and, to underscore the point, the photo appeared adjacent to a bullet point about using the proposed bond money for school safety and for updating wiring.

Here's a comparison of the two photos:

LEFT: 2000 CUSD election flier photo
CAPTION: "30-year-old wiring at Eleanor Condit Elem. School."

RIGHT: 2010 CUSD flier photo
CAPTION: "Old outdated wiring like that pictured here from Eleanor Daly Condit Elementary School must be updated to improve student safety and support classroom technology."

Hmmm, same school, same kind of photos taken 10 years apart. And the photo on the right isn't even electrical wiring! If you enlarge it, you can clearly see those are telephone wires with a telephone jack right below. Not exactly a safety hazard.

The wiring photos reminded us of the scandal-within-the-scandal involving British Petroleum and their oil spill. BP, to show how hard they have been working on the cleanup, posted on their website a photo of their crisis command center and another of a helicopter crew flying towards the flaming well. The problem was that they were both photoshopped. Some of the monitor images in the crisis center were added in, and the helicopter in the photo was actually on the ground, not flying over the Gulf of Mexico.

As we in Claremont have learned the hard way, reality in the hands of a master PR person or an election consultant is infinitely malleable.


JEFF TAKES CHARGE

It turns out that current school board member Jeff Stark, along with the aforementioned Jeanne Hamilton, were co-chairs of the Yes on Y committee. Stark is a financial advisor, so he presumably had the education and experience needed to lead the bond campaign. Stark's experience would certainly probably him to review the currently bond proposal as well.

(On the other hand, let's hope Jeff didn't inherit his financial acumen from his mother Jil Stark. Jil was a board member of the now-defunct PFF Bancorp. You'll recall that Jil made a small fortune off PFF stock shortly before it crashed.)

Jeff was the public face of the Measure Y campaign. The Yes on Y people sent out a district-wide mailer that featured the Stark family. That was the mailer with the electrical wiring. It was supposed to demonstrate the continuity of the community's (or the 400's?) vision. Here is the flyer:


















Notice the slogan: "It's hard to believe it's been 35 years..." The argument in 2000 was Claremont's schools were aging - 35 years old or older. The mailer, written as a letter from Jeff Stark to the community, said Claremont's schools desperately needed upgrading and maintenance.

This time around, the mantra is, "it's been 10 years; it's time to have another bond because Claremont schools desperately need upgrading and maintenance." At the present rate of accelerated wear, down from 35 years to 10 years, we'll need another bond in three years at twice the price. And another one year after that.

Folks, $95 million is an awful lot of money for a small school district like Claremont, especially when the district hasn't identified any specific projects requiring the money. The last time around, they at least did that much, even if they didn't complete them. The absence of such a project list may be quite intention. If they don't have concrete goals set, the district and its board cannot be held accountable. That is simply not prudent given CUSD's track record.

There are plenty of other measures that can be taken to address the district's budget problems. There are other, reasonable alternatives. The powers-that-be in Claremont, however, refuse to listen to reason, refuse to acknowledge other, less costly ways of getting through this bad patch.

The $95 million bond train left the station quite a while ago, but if you're interested in watching a slow-rolling wreck, you should consider going to watch tonight's CUSD board meeting. It all starts 6:30pm in the boardroom at the district's Richard S. Kirkendall Education Center at 170 W. San Jose Ave.

CUSD Wrestles with Budget

The Daily Bulletin reported on the Claremont Unified School District passing an interim budget at their meeting last Thursday night.

The board is facing a number of fiscal uncertainties, including a state budget may be have an unexpected deficit to the tune $8 billion despite the recent budget agreement in Sacramento. We also don't know what the outcome of the May 19th special election will be. The budget agreement's success hinges on the passage of several ballot measures, particularly 1B through 1E.

Until the May election, uncertainty will continue to reign in the CUSD and throughout California. The Bulletin noted some of the measures CUSD officials have already taken, and they quoted school board member Jeanne Hamilton, who acknowledged the board may face some unpopular choices:

There have already been 12 staff position cuts from the district in February.

The cuts and reductions are being used to address a $3 million to $4 million deficit for the district in the next school year.

"While it would be nice and certainly popular to be opposed to cuts, I don't think we have the luxury," said Hamilton. "It's tough and it may be unpopular, but every decision we make that is a cut will be unpopular."

CUSD Board President to Step Down

Wes Woods II reported in the Daily Bulletin last week that Claremont Unified School District Board President Jeanne Hamilton will not run for a third term in November.

According to Wood's article, Hamilton said, "Eight years is enough." Woods also described Hamilton's background and the board's accomplishments during Hamilton's two terms:

Besides her vice president role at Citrus, Hamilton has also served in administrative and faculty positions at Chaffey and Fullerton colleges.

She received a bachelor's degree from Baylor University, a master of science in social work from the University of Louisville and a doctorate from Claremont Graduate University.

Hamilton has served as chairwoman of the Facilities Advisory Committee and also co-chaired the 2000 Measure Y School Bond campaign for the Claremont Unified School District which was passed.

"Many of those projects got completed," Hamilton said of the bond. "The district is in much better shape physically than eight years ago."

But a regret for Hamilton is she wished all of the projects associated with the bond would have been completed but an increase in costs stopped some of the work.

Hamilton added she was proud of a renewed focus on nutrition and exercise for district children and "the thing I'm most proud of is the academic achievements."

California test scores for all district students have improved, she said, and other achievements have included enriched curriculums, the Advancement Via Individual Determination support program and an International Baccalaureate program that is getting approval, Hamilton said.

"But no one person accomplishes it. The board accomplishes it as a whole," Hamilton said.

Hamilton became a board member in November 2001. She was president from in 2003-04 and 2007-08.

The Measure Y money is a sore point among many in the community. The bond, which was passed primarily with campaign donations from school district contractors, was bound to get misspent, and it was. There were just too many favors to be called in by those generous donors. Constructions costs went up, yes, but you have to wonder if there weren't some price increases built into contracts to recoup campaign outlays.

* * *

No word yet on whether or not CUSD Board member and clerk Steven Llanusa will run for a second term. You might recall that last year Llanusa ran afoul of CUSD Superintendent David Cash and the rest of CUSD Board. The dispute resulted in Cash and the Board instituting a new censure policy aimed directly at Llanusa.

The matter continued on to the end of the year, and at a December 18th meeting, the CUSD Board voted to extend a protocol governing email contact between Llanusa and Cash. Llanusa responded with a letter to the Claremont Courier on January 10th that said, in part:

Last February the meeting script prepared by Dr. Cash stated one of the reasons for the protocol was "to retain the Superintendent." During other difficulties Dave [Cash] has said repeatedly that he doesn’t have to work in Claremont. Such statements invite neither collaboration nor negotiation.

I have met with the Superintendent many times in the past. It was Dave who unilaterally stopped mediation after only three meetings. Among other problems with previous one-on-one meetings were disagreements about what was or wasn’t said. Communication by emails provided objective data about the questions and responses.

To avoid confusion I asked Dave if I could bring a note taker or tape recorder to our meetings. He refused to meet with either condition. I am content to ask my questions during Board meetings and by getting information this way transparent governance is achieved. The School Board has a governance policy regarding the Superintendent’s duty to provide the same information to all Board Members, not that we get that information the same way.

We get the sense that Llanusa's support among the Claremont 400 may be dwindling, and those insiders (small "i") are running away from Llanusa as fast as they can. Such is the price of dissent in Clareville. This doesn't bode well for Llanusa's re-election prospects, but November's a long way off, and he may yet have time to mend some fences.

Steven Llanusa

We've always thought the election of Steven Llanusa to the Claremont Unified School District Board to be a little queer. Here was a guy, out of nowhere, who all of a sudden had the support of lots and lots of people in Claremont, seemingly centered around the remnants of Sam Pedroza's failed 2005 city council campaign.

We know that early in his campaign he had absolutely no clue about some of the sources of revenue for the district nor the financial issues facing it. His kickoff was filled with generalities, vague statements, and Apple Pie.

And yet.

As election day approached, the most popular yardsign grouping was Jeanne Hamilton, Mary Caenepeel, and...Steve Llanusa. As we recall, more money went to Llanusa (from the usual suspects) than went to either the incumbent, Hamilton, or long-time-toiler-in-the-public-school-vineyard Caenepeel. In the end, there were hundreds of votes--make that 2000 votes--of daylight between the group of Hamilton, Caenepeel, and Llanusa, and the out-of-the-money finisher Kevin Arnold.
The Claremont 400 had scored again. But who did they put on the school board in Steven Llanusa?

Apparently someone whose judgment is at least open to question.

For example, in 2006 Llanusa and one of his children seem to have scoured his Claraboya neighborhood removing American flags and tossing them into a dumpster in Fontana. Nice headline in the Courier on September 9, 2006: "DA forgoes criminal filing for Steven Llanusa" That's the kind of headline you want to see about your school board member. Well, we guess its better than, "School Board member Steven Llanusa charged in vandalism incident."

And now we read in the Daily Bulletin that Llanusa has apparently annoyed some of his handlers by the frequency and tone of his emails to Superintendent David Cash. Cash decided to be the sole conduit of information between the Board and the District Staff, and then stopped answering Llanusa's emails. The School Board had an illegal closed-session discussion of the matter on February 12. From the Bulletin article,

Board communication with the superintendent was discussed in closed session Feb. 12, Llanusa said.

Hamilton expressed concern Monday that Llanusa publicly discussed an issue that was addressed in closed session.

She said there had been no discussion of censuring Llanusa for the action, but she also said "I suppose it's possible."

We don't know that there are any heroes in this story. We do know that there are echoes of the epic McHenry-Southard battles circa 2004-5. So far, though, we are unaware of any district employee alleging hostile work environment, harassment, theft, hurt feelings, or other Bad Acts. History repeats itself, the saying goes, first as tragedy, then as farce.

Maybe this is an example of running with the other lemmings. You might go over the cliff.

And can anyone think of one positive contribution that Llanusa has made?

Coming Soon: CUSD RV Park

Will Bigham reports today in the Daily Bulletin that the Claremont Unified School District (CUSD) voted 4-0 Monday night to convert the district building on Baseline Blvd. into an RV and boat park and to move the district headquarters to a building on San Jose Ave.

This after the CUSD school board spent Measure Y bond money to upgrade the existing facility. The district feels it can get more money out of the RV park - money that can be used to generate much needed revenue to replace its squandered Measure Y dollars ($48 million or so). That way, they can build more RV parks.

Board members Steve Llanusa, Jeanne Hamilton, Jack Mills and Mary Caenepeel voted for the RV park. Board President Joan Presecan was absent.

Here is an artist's rendering of the new facility:

CUSD RV and Boat Park: Your Tax Dollars at Work

The Disappearing Demographic

What happened to our kids?

To hear Claremont Councilmembers Ellen Taylor, Sam Pedroza, Linda Elderkin and Peter Yao tell it, we have a youth population boom, one that we have to spend heavily on.

But an odd and overlooked thing occurred during the recent city council campaign. The Claremont Unified School District (CUSD) acknowledged that something on the order of 13.9% of the enrollment in CUSD schools comes from outside of the city. The school district props up its numbers by using inter-district transfers. In the 2005-2006 school year, 953 out of 6,868 CUSD students came from outside of Claremont.

(A special thanks to our readers for forwarding this information.)

And CSUD actually counts some Pomona residents in their Claremont numbers. There really isn't a Claremont kid population boom. That is one reason why the new elementary school that was supposed to go next to La Puerta Park has never been built. Remember that 2000 Measure Y bond money ($48.9 million worth)? All gone and no La Puerta school.

According to then-superintendent Douglas Keeler's 2000 open letter to the community, La Puerta Elementary was one of the eight priorities identified by a task force headed by Claremont 400 and Preserve Claremonter (a $500 donor) Jeanne Hamilton. Jeanne is on the current school board, which is entirely a Claremont 400 entity. Keeler's letter estimated $4.5 million of the bond money would be used for building La Puerta school.

We here at CI supported Measure Y. So we ask: What happened to that $48.9 million? One thing that occurred was that of the over $80,000 raised by proponents of Measure Y in 2000, the majority came from contractors who do work for school districts. Something almost guaranteed to lead to misappropriations. CUSD ended up spending all of that Measure Y money without completing all of the projects it promised to. A small oversight, but it just goes to show the 400 can mismanage the schools as much as they can the city government.

If you have any questions regarding your Measure Y money, write to the CSUD Board of Education or to current superintendent David Cash. Their contact information is here.

So, why does CUSD need its enrollment propped up anyway?

Because the number of kids relative to the population is declining. The U.S. Census Bureau shows that Claremont's population only increased by 2.9% between 1990 and 2000. At the same time, California's population increased 13.9%.

But Claremont's kid population increased right? Well, sort of. The U.S. Census figures show that in 1990, there were 7,025 kids under 18 years old. By 2000, that number had increased by six to 7,031. The number of kids under five years old actually declined by 81.

In 10 years, Claremont's total kid population increased a whopping .00085%. Huge.

In contrast, the same Census tables show between 1990 and 2000 Claremont's over 65 population increased from 4,026 to 4,966, an increase of 23.3%. And household size has declined from 2.68 people per household in 1990 to 2.56 in 2000. Households have gotten older and smaller.

What's going on? It's all tied to affordable housing. Look at your home values. They've skyrocketed in the past 17 years. As a result, families with young kids can't afford to buy a house in Claremont. Most of the new housing built in the past 10 years or so hasn't been of the starter home variety. It's been pricey, larger homes purchased by older people with older or grown kids. And older houses, even in South Claremont, have become unaffordable to many young families.

So, we should think twice when the Claremont 400 and Ellen Taylor, Linda Elderkin, Sam Pedroza, Jeanne Hamilton or Steve Llanusa tell us that we need to spend more on our kids. We need to look realistically at the population trends and allocate our resources accordingly. Instead, we've acted emotionally, foolishly, and projected trends from other parts of California onto an aging, graying Claremont.

Foolish indeed, maybe even stupid.