BuckeyeBlog

The Oakwood School Board is spending $800  per unit to buy alcohol breath testers.

Is this really necessary? Shouldn’t the board be spending its time figuring out its budget and teaching the kids math and English? Aren’t those things hard enough? How about actually disciplining the kids that 1 percent of the time they’re behaving like maniacs, instead of trying to inflate bumpers around them and treating them as if they’re incompetents?

Sixteen-year-old Leonard Brown is “surprised by the sheer size of his new school — 231,953 square feet,” and “he’s most excited about the new gym and classroom technology.”

“I’m just ready to start the new school year,” he said.

Remember that last part, Leonard. You still have to open up a math book.

The city of Toledo is halfway through its $640 million building program, with 23 new buildings of a projected 43 new buildings. As it is, Toledo taxpayers paid only 23 percent of the dough in a 2001 bond issue, with 77 percent coming from the state. Who wouldn’t take that deal? Meanwhile, how many private businesses, the ones we rely on to pay these taxes, have engaged in a similar building program, replacing its buildings willy-nilly? What percentage is 43 buildings of Toledo’s total building count? The story doesn’t tell us, but Columbus shot for one-third of its count (after an embarrassing public rejection of the initially proposed 100 percent replacement).

New schools built for security: Visitors must be buzzed in, under staff scrutiny

How nice. Rather than hold people accountable, let’s just require them to log in to a central processing center. I say we run it federally, because then we know it’ll be done right, and everyone will be safe, happy, healthy and wealthy.

Now, walk me through this.

I own a quite nice building. Historic character, maybe even historic, but let’s just say it’s a nice building.

Issue is, it needs renovating, no longer meets my needs. That’s expensive. Moreover, it’s too big. I need less than only half of it. And did I say I don’t have money to burn? I can pay only what I can afford, which is enough to meet my actual business needs.

That’s not a hard business decision. I spend what I need for my business, which in this case sure sounds like a different building. I’ll be renting, buying or building elsewhere. If I’m a rich philanthropist who wants to renovate the existing building, fine, spend my rich philanthropist money.

But I’m not a rich philanthropist, I’m a businessman, so check that option off.

Maybe I can round up some speculators to invest in my building and take a flyer that renovated buildings of historic character will be worth the investment. I hear senators McCain and Obama want to put all the oil speculators out of work, so there ought to be plenty of speculators around with pockets-full of cash and nothing else to do.

But for some reason I’m not finding them, so check that one off.

Oh, what to do, what to do. Hey! Why didn’t I think of this before? I’ll just ask the state for money–and by golly the state says yes! Except, doggone it, even the state recognizes this is a bad business decision and will still pay only the amount I actually need.

Well, that leaves just one thing: “But if granted a waiver for more time, an aggressive fund-raising campaign could be started, and leaders could hunt for building preservation grants or explore partnerships with businesses and community organizations for use of part of the building.”

And the best part is, it’s other people’s money! In fact, it’s your money.

Here’s a good story with a nice transparency angle, holding to account recipients of "taxpayer money ."

It happens to be a charter school, and charter schools indeed should be held accountable. Of $2 million, $54,000 was undocumented. That doesn’t mean anything untoward, except that the records aren’t in accord with standards.

Lots of good stuff here, albeit of the eat-your-vegetables variety. What are the applicable standards; what is the total budget; the percentage or efficiency of inadequate documentation, the "cruel commas" effect of adjectives–lots and lots of good stuff to chew on. That, and the main theme of the story, let’s hold charter schools to account.

Just one thing. Can we count on our friends in the news industry to use that nice phrase "taxpayer money" in all situations of government spending, including public district schools, or only when it fits an agenda?