GilfordGrok

I quoted the Citizen a while ago when the question was "School Board, will you print the SAU employee salaries in the Annual Report": 

The argument has been - hey, why make it easy for taxpayers?  They can come in and do a Right To Know anytime they want to get the information.

This proves the argument:

Blandford questioned the need to publicize the information at all, since the public has access to it through making a formal Right-to-Know request for the information.

As it stands now the district keeps track of who makes Right-to-Know requests in town and what information they are seeking.

Blandford said that should the information be printed in the town's annual report, the district would lose their monitoring "control."

Control.  Control.   Control.  And that's what it is all about.  Control.  Who has it, and who does not?  After all:

Knowledge is power

- Thomas Hobbes 

Ask yourself in light of that question: Where does that locus of power now exist? And where should it be? 

The premise, this time was this:

Promoting a limited government that is open, responsive and fully accountable to and in touch with its citizens without interfering in their personal, daily lives.

It was asked of the Town, the SAU, and the County Commission if they would consider making their websites more open and accountable by including much more information on their website.  A good 10 point measure of open and transparent can be seen at the SunShine Review.

At the last Select Board meeting, my request to get on their agenda to give a more formal presentation seemed to be favorably received (hint - be at the next meeting!).

The School Board?  I guess from the above and from their meeting yesterday, not so much. From the Citizen: 

The Gilford School Board has turned down a request by the Gilford Town Republican Committee to put a range of School District records on the Internet.

Last week the Republican Committee wrote the board to request that everything from meeting minutes and agendas to the budget and check registry be posted online. While the School District does post some of the information requested, the desire was focused on financial and other information that is not made available on the web.

"It comes down to the essential question, does government stand for the people or vice versa?" questioned Skip Murphy, chair of the Gilford Republican Committee.

There is always the fundamental question: what is the proper role of government?  Another: does government (elected, appointed, and employees) exist for the betterment of the citizenry, or is it the other way around - an entity existing at the expense of the taxpayers. Which is the servant of which? 

From the start the board was reluctant in moving forward with the request. School Board Chair Sue Allen opened by announcing the request and added: "... but the information they are requesting is available to anyone who comes into the SAU by filling out a request form."

My definition of a more open and more transparent is...

Continue reading "For a more open and transparent government..." »

Posted by Skip at 08:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last week the Select Board held a public hearing on the sale of the Potter Hill property. The Birch Knolls group has requested special conditions in an effort to purchase the land and build "affordable Senior Housing". The special condition would include a payment in place of taxes which would NOT include anything for our children's education. During the meeting last week the Select Board heard from a room full of supporters for the Birch Knoll group. Unless the Select Board hears some input from the public that oppose the special conditions then they will most likely approve them.

There will be another meeting on May 14, 2008 to hear from the public before they make their decision. I strongly recommend that anyone that is oppossed to the creation of another community that will be exempt from school taxes for all of time, should attend this meeting and voice their concern!

Posted by Terry S. at 07:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Thanks to a lot of work by Mr. Dick Campbell, I am happy to provide the following 2006 Town Assessments based on Tax Parcel, Governors Island, Belknap Mountain Road (separate sheets)

2006 Town Assessments 

This is typical of the information that SHOULD be online on the Town's website for easy searching and analysis. 

Posted by Skip at 09:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Skip at 09:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When I was first introduced to Gilford town Government, people kept asking me the same question; why do we need a Town Administrator and an Assistant Town Administrator? As I weaved my way through the process I soon learned that it was the question no one dare ask in public. This would insinuate that you are “not supportive of town employees” or causing bad morale among town employees. Every one knows these are good people and of course they are instrumental in running the town services. That sounds great but does a town this size actually need two people to do the same job that similar sized towns do with one person? I’m not convinced that this has been thoroughly investigated because, in my opinion, previous Selectmen had completely relinquished their authority to the administrators and simply supported whatever the administrators wanted. No need to disrupt “moral” or make waves. Now we have new leaders that are taking a more active role in our town’s operations. They are asking tough questions and looking for possible methods to provide quality services and reduce spending. Our newest Select Board member, Kevin Hayes, has a pretty impressive private sector resume where I’m sure he is familiar with “Lean Thinking” and “doing more with less” concepts. I’m looking forward to seeing if he can use those skills to evaluate the Administrative duties and see if they can be condensed into the one person job that all the other communities in New Hampshire have. We now have the three Selectmen that have the management experience and political will to correct this problem. As far as I’m concerned the Selectmen should drag their feet in hiring a new Administrator until they absolutely justify the need to do so.

Posted by Terry S. at 03:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Leading up to the elections in March we heard the candidates state their political platforms to the citizens of Gilford. During last year's elections we had a candidate that claimed to be a conservative and vowed to be “objective” in matters concerning the library that his wife heads. A quick review of the record clearly indicates that this Budget Committee member not only supported every increase in spending but additionally supported most of the requested increases beyond the Selectmen’s budget. This included a serious effort to add $40,000 to his wife’s library budget as well as advocating for a revote on the Warrant Article that would return an additional $110,000 to the library for the sale of public land. In politics it is common for 33% of the voters to be strongly for a particular candidate and 33% are strongly opposed to that same candidate. It’s the remaining 33% that each candidate is lobbying to win their vote.  I’ve stated to the candidate countless times that he is doing what most of his constituents elected him to do. My point here is for those voters beyond his base that voted for him because they actually believed that he was a conservative and not go out of his way to lobby for his wife’s department. He may have legitimate excuses for his actions however they are in complete contradiction to his campaign promises.

I’m hoping the newly elected officials will have a better track record of keeping their campaign promises. Here are two promises that I am going to pay close attention to this budget season.

Kevin Hayes; Recognizing that spending is a problem he stated that he has ideas on raising revenues. He believes there are ways that Gilford can raise revenues, such as recycling, to off set spending.

Kevin Roy; “I’m frugal with a buck and I too would like to keep taxes down.” “I believe that town employees should be contributing more toward their health insurance benefits.”

Each Kevin is a stand up guy however the actual process of imposing tax reduction or even slowing the growth of government is easier said than done. We’ll see how they fare when the people that are requesting the spending are giving them the finger wag and accusing them of being cheap or uncaring for the children. As I sat through this process, I never realized how many poor single mothers live in Gilford. 

I have already heard rumor that Mr. Hayes is already challenging his campaign promises by advocating giving priority status to the development of communities that would be exempt from the school portions of their tax responsibility. Labeled as a Senior housing community, their website indicates absolutely no restrictions on income levels are needed to be a resident. These types of communities will deprive our children of desperately needed dollars for all of time. Apparently Mr. Hayes is unaware of the New Hampshire law that requires cities and towns to provide tax relief to senior citizens that meet the financial requirements. Seniors do NOT need special communities to receive consideration for their limited fixed incomes. No surprise because he’s also unaware of the fact that Gilford has an ongoing recycling program that, if progressed to fast, would actually cost us more money. It appears the kind of revenue raising Mr. Hayes was discussing is your property taxes!

Posted by Terry S. at 06:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Board of Selectmen Meeting

Wednesday, April 30, 2008
7 p.m.

The time has changed - notice that it is no longer at 3pm!  This meeting is not just for those that can get away during the regular working day hours.

Will it stay that way?  It all depends on you, the townfolk of Gilford.  Show up, it may stay that.  Don't, and it may revert back to the afternoon time.

If you want to let the Selectmen know your feelings about how the town is run, now's the time to show up. 

(cross posted over GraniteGrok and GilfordGOP) 

Posted by Skip at 09:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

NRO:

On Tuesday, April 29^th, Manhattan Institute senior fellows Jay P. Greene and Marcus A. Winters released a new study, “The Effect of Special Education Vouchers on Public School Achievement: Evidence from Florida’s McKay Scholarship Program.” Contrary to those who argue that school choice harms public schools, Greene and Winters find that disabled students who remain in public schools made substantial test score improvements when their school faced greater exposure to the McKay program.

Highlights of the study include:

• Public school students with relatively mild disabilities made substantial and statistically significant test score improvements in both math and reading as more nearby private schools began to participate in the McKay program.
• The largest benefit was found for students diagnosed as having a Specific Learning Disability, a categorization that includes 61% of disabled students and 8.5% of all students in the state of Florida.
• The academic proficiency of students diagnosed with relatively severe disabilities were neither helped nor harmed by increased exposure to the McKay program.

The authors conclude that the McKay program has had a positive effect on the quality of education that public schools provide to disabled students.  

Assumption - we all want our kids to be well educated.

Question - Do we owe our kids a public education?  Or a publicly funded education?

The two are not the same. 

And I also saw this:

The Center for College Affordability and Productivity has a new study showing that North Carolina's higher-education system is costing taxpayers a bundle. At the same time, among other negative findings, the report shows that many campuses are spending only 20 to 40 percent of their revenue on instruction.

Author Richard Vedder concludes that North Carolina's colleges are neglecting their core mission, "actually teaching students," and questions the nature of the vast spending having that does not reach the classroom.

Similar reports on higher education spending in all states are needed, as well as analyses of campuses' spending priorities.

I asked a similar question this past budget season of the School Board - what is the ratio of indirect to direct labor (e.g., those not involved in student teaching to those who are).  

Never did get a straight answer.  Position and salary burden.

It will be asked...again. 

Posted by Skip at 07:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I should think not... LXXXI, LXXXII, LXXXIII.

Posted by Doug at 06:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)