Our Voices Speakin-Up And Speakin-Out

This week, we want to share another viewpoint with you. It seems as though the Florence School District 1 (FSD1) has become more political than education oriented. If one takes the time to look at what is going on around them. We believe it would be difficult for someone to make the case that buying the old library and remodeling McClenaghan fits the bill for being education oriented. But what it does is show how the school board is throwing resources into those types of purchases. As a matter of fact, if you look at the landholding the district has, it becomes more difficult to determine if they are purchasing land with education in mind. It appears there is some unspoken initiative driving their decisions to purchase land and other buildings. There seems to be no thought given to strategically locating schools to accomplish greater diversity. It all appears to revolve around their hidden agenda. One would hope that some thinking would go into the future development of our school district. Just as an example of what we are talking about, earlier on, the school board took it upon themselves to invite an overwhelming number of republicans to a graduation ceremony. Well, we know that you can say that republicans make up a preponderance of those representing the state. And that would be exactly what we would use to help you understand that graduation is not supposed to be a political vehicle, where Lindsey Graham can come and give what we considered to be a political speech that was designed to help his political campaign. But then again, the school board had no reservation, nor did they give any thought to what would have been fair. They buy land as if it is what they were elected to do. And the way they give notice of those matters leaves a lot to be desired. They will have it listed as sometimes an action item that they go into executive session and discuss and come back out and vote on. In other words, they never allow the people to know what is happening. And if you are mistaken as to what their intent is, they will simply list it as land matters. All that I am saying is that there needs to be some sunlight shined on the lack of transparency. And while we are talking about how much money is being spent, whatever happened to the over eight hundred thousand dollars a year, spent on a security system that was installed at the high schools. And maybe you should try and find out if our children are eating better, or, are we just set up for the new food service people, to bill for more food supplied. We think that what you will find is that most of the food now is being thrown into the trash can. The school board voted, lockstep, to do away with the old way in which you actually had human beings serving in service capacities. Now, what you have is a bureaucratico system in place that has all but destroyed the pride and patriotism that went into the dissemination of food. From what we are hearing, the present system is being alleged to have discriminated against the old food service workers. And lastly, we want to know if there is any validity to the accusation that FSD1 is one of the worst-performing districts in the state. I don't know, but if any part of what is being alleged is true, then maybe we have taken our eye off of more than whether they are over political or not. So, my recommendation for you this week is that you get more involved with what we have obviously left in the hands of those who have got other agendas than the quality educating of our children. FOOD FOR THOUGHT; the longer it takes for you to get involved and rain in their power, the longer it will take to get them out of control, back under control. WAKE UP!

Sincerely Yours, Hell-Bent On Control.

Elder, James W. Williams

Chairperson, Advocacy Organization, Lifelineplus