District 150 BOE Candidates

My work schedule being what it is, I have not been able to attend the various forums for the candidates, relying instead on media coverage and the opinions posted on the various blogs for information. My thanks to C. J., Dennis, Emerge, Vonster, Eye in the Sky, and many others for their concise and credible reporting. Also thank you to John Sharp of the Journal Star for his unbiased views. In an age when journalism tends to follow the crowd of mudslingers and hype, John's reporting has been exceptionally well balanced and fair to all the candidates.

Just had the opportunity to view the video coverage of the District 150 BOE candidates, and I have to say that hearing their responses to the questions did not change my opinions of the candidates from before. In District #2, the clear choice is Wolfmeyer. God love Mike Mitchell, I know his heart is in the right place and he wants to make a difference, but I just don't see him being able to turn the District around or get them on track.

In District #3, the choice is not as clear. Rick Cloyd and Janice Deissler are both viable candidates with their own qualities. Rick is an Administrator and an advocate for empowering children through programs like ELITE and CHOICES (both of which I am also an advocate for), but he has no formal background in education. Janice is a skilled and well-established member of the education community in Peoria, having taught many years in the district, and has some administration experience as well. Both are passionate about the children, and passionate about District 150. Since I have to pick one, I guess my question that never got asked (at least not by me) is why the four candidates for District #3 are all write-in candidates, is a little moot at this point. But I would still like to hear the answer. If any of you care to respond, please add it to the comments section below.

I will be reviewing the video of the City Council candidates later this evening when it is posted.

Wow....I think this is one of the problems that is holding us back.

Bill Lopotko, a local citizen involved with the Transparency in Government project and a concerned citizen in Peoria, has written a letter to the Journal Star that points out one of the major problems we might have with District 150. With Bill's permission, I post it below:

Should we call Superintendent Grenita F. Lathan, Governor? Recently, I discovered that the Peoria School District #150 Superintendent out-earns all 50 of the Governors. With a base salary of $198,000, Lathan makes more base salary than every Governor of the 50 States according to The Book of States 2010.

I was stunned. How have we let this happen? The people of Peoria are principled, hard working citizens. According to Sperling’s The Best Places to Live, the average home cost in our town is $91,380. Coldwell Banker’s website lists our average household income at little more than $46,318.

Our property taxes fund our school district. With property taxes increasing each year, our homes are harder to afford. We are literally renting from our school districts.

Someone needs to tell the Governor.

 Well, Bill, those are fine statistics, but you should hear them in context with a few other facts. Like the fact that those income numbers are primarily above War Memorial drive, when the schools that are taking the hit with this latest reshuffling of students are the ones below War Memorial. Like the fact that closing schools and increasing class sizes will probably lead to a mass exodus of qualified teachers out of the Peoria area, at least out of District 150 schools, particularly below War Memorial. Like the fact that the average teacher in a District 150 School earns about 1/4 of that outrageous salary.


And the worst of this is that Grenita Lathan cannot be blamed for a bit of this. I sincerely believe the woman is a very intelligent, very dedicated person who is simply trying to do a job. Unfortunately, she is not fulfilling the duties of her job, since we are still experiencing a rapid decline in our schools. Partially, of course, because of the outrageous salaries being paid to civil servants.


Gee, what's next? A City Manager with no experience running a city for an outrageous amount of money? Oh yeah, we already have one of those.


Election time is coming up, folks, and the basic services platform is the only one we can afford to support. C. J. Summers, Beth Akeson, and Chuck Weaver have all been endorsed by the Peoria Journal Star, as well as some very astute bloggers and some local organizations as well. We need Gary Sandberg re-elected, and for the fifth seat, lets hope that either Jim Stowell, who left the BOE to run for City Council, or George Azouri, admittedly wet behind the ears, but not a part of the machine, are elected. We need people on that council who will at least try to listen to the people and Take Back Peoria.