Elk Konnected Hand out at County Commissioners meeting on 4/25

[Ross]

I was not aware they would be posting the School Bond Issue count tonight.
The results have been posted on the Elk County Courthous web site at
http://elkcountyks.org/clerk.asp

[Ross]

I heard some talk today, a rumor if you will.
I'm wondering if anyone can confirm if it is true!

I was told that the Fredonia Chamber of Commerce had enough of our Elk Konnected's Public Square Communities involvement in their communities business and voted two days ago  to discontinue paying their fees. Does anyone know if this is true?

That is a major pillar of the so called Public Square of a community isn't it?

I heard it had something to do with the new swimming pool and how people are unhappy about it and unhappy with  Cultivate-Fredonia of http://www.publicsquarecommunities.com/communities/cultivate-fredonia/ .

Ayway, I checked out Fredonia's local forum and found it interesting about the new swimming pool.
Check it out for your self at http://www.topix.com/forum/city/fredonia-ks/T3PTRR0F9LR9N6P5A

Sounds like some taxpayers may be unhappy about the cost. Sounds a little bit familiar doesn't it.

So does anyone really know what is happening?

And Elk Konnected who is paying your fees to Public Squares Communities so you can continue as Accredited?

Which four pillars of your community are paying those fees?

Just curious about what's happening?

Some real answers would be appreciated. Thank you.

I really don't expect an answer from so called leaders, even though real leaders, in my opinion would answer and clear the air. Perhaps someone else has some information.

[srkruzich]

why are they still pushing for new school when two schools are sitting empty and the school population is declining.  Hasn't it declined by about 40 students now?

[Catwoman]

From what I have been told, they are worried about upkeep on the existing structures...Also, about getting rid of the portable buildings, as they will eventually wear out.  Unfortunately, even with just doing the minimum on upkeep, it all takes money.  Yes, the numbers have gone down, which means a decrease in monies coming in.  Elk County is in an unenviable position with all these concerns.

[Ross]

why are they still pushing for new school when two schools are sitting empty and the school population is declining.  Hasn't it declined by about 40 students now?

Hi Srkruzich we haven't heard from you in a long time. How ya doing?

The school business was mainly about building a new gymnasium.
They hollered about not having enough room when they have a building that was built and designed for 600 students in hoping to get that new gymnasium. They threw in the eight class rooms in order to try buffalo us into voting on a 4 million dollar bond issue. It did not work? The school board felt certain it would fail and had already planned to put it on the November ballot again. This in my opinion is simply a way of bullying the taxpayers into approving it. Also in my opinion they have wasted enough of the taxpayers money that is intended for the education of children.

To build eight classrooms simply to dispose of the eight portable class room that cost the taxpayers 500,000.00 dollars simply shows lack intelligence.

As the Catwoman in all her infinite intelligence says the portable buildings will wear out, wow, everything wears out eventually.  But we have only had them for 5 years. Those buildings with proper maintenance management should last a good 20 years.

The need for seperate gymnasium which was discussed during a board meeting, was renting the church next door to the school at 1,000.00 dollars a month. One board member said, "Let's ask the experts,  the experts.  The teachers are the experts."


So up pops a gym teacher and possibly coach and said that if they had to walk the kids over to the church for gym class that the time to do so would cut into the state required time for phys-ed and that it wasn't feasible. He also stated if they happened to get a handicapped child that would further cut into the phys-ed time. And he made reference to weather condition and having to walk through mud puddles and such. Oh and the gym teacher said things are just fine in the gymnasium and all they need to do is put up the safety net across the center of the gym to protect the little kids from balls from the big kids side hitting the little kids. They have been operating just fine for 5 years with the exception of protecting the small children with that safety net. This again in my opinion was done to provide an excuse to construct a second gymnasium.

The President of the School Board during a meeting spoke over the top of another board member who had the floor and was talking to a member clear down the table and said, I guess my children will just have to grow up and graduate with out having the opportunity of having the pleasure of playing in a new gymnasium.
I call that very rude and self serving.

If he wants to build a new gymnasium for his kids, I would suggest he build it in his back yard. Not at the expense of the taxpayer. If he can't afford to give his kids what he wants to give them, oh well.

No voting was done, but I was under the impression that the church deal was off, because they said so.

The last School Board was postponed on Monday with the excuse that the electrical system through out most of Elk County was off until 3:30 PM.   The meeting was scheduled for 6:30 p.m. personally; I think the meeting was postponed to wait until after yesterday's ballot count. Because the Church is back on the agenda and I suppose for the purpose of having the school board give in and pay 1000.00 dollars a month to
rent for something they do not need. They asked expert. Tonight I will be present at the meeting to hear how the conversation goes with the church. Will the School Board deny their expert teacher and disrespect him by doing so? Tonight's meeting will tell, won't it? Will the School Board with their collective college diplomas and intellect waffle? That remains to be answered.

Also Srkruzich in my opinion none of it is about class rooms or security as they claim because they do not use their allotted space efficiently and it is all about sports.

Srkruzich did you read any of the previous posts about the 7000.00 dollar fiasco concerning crowning the football field, so it would be more professional. No contract was involved. What a mess! The School Board failed on that job. They asked for dirt, they got dirt. The dirt was loaded with clay and big rocks and big chunks of roots. LOL All the dirt had to be picked up and trucked off, it had to be removed. They did not stipulate top soil and that would probably have probably been twice as expensive. And no written contract. Where did the learn about doing business?

The School Board President has been asked twice to put to use all that expensive computer technology and record the School Board Meetings and post the recordings on the West Elk web site. He personally said they could do that. But they won't, because they would have to clean up their act ! They would have to perform their job in a professional manner. And to the taxpayer might just know what is really going on during the meetings. And believe me I don't think they want the taxpayer to know. You see what I tell you is never in the Meeting Minutes and they don't expect you to believe me. And that is fine with me. The School Board does not want transparency or they would video  video the meetings. They do not want community involvement or they would video the meetings.

Of course nothing I post here is nothing more than what I hear and my personal opinions. And I do not ask you to accept these opinions as your own. Also I do not ask you to believe a word I post. Check it out for yourself, come to the meeting tonight. I plan to get pictures of the new table layout tonight. Yes, I feel, I shamed them into changing their lay out. I did it right here on this forum. I just wonder if I shamed them out of the rude and undignified act of eating their picnic in front of the audience. If not, I may get some undignified pictures of them shoveling the food in.  Really that may be good for a laugh on here!

Srkruzich this is not about how to make friends and influence people, it's about getting the job done properly.

Srkruzich it's good to see you back, have a great day.

[Ross]

Tonight was the West Elk USD-282
School Board of Education Meeting

It starts out with the School Board President saying the meeting was postponed until tonight due to the power outage, which caused the inability to print the necessary financial documents for the meeting.

You know waiting to the last minute to get the job done is seldom a good idea. And really those bills, payroll and treasurers reports should be prepared well in advance of the meeting and mailed to the board members, so they can look them over and study them before the meeting. These people don't have the time for the volume of information during the meeting to fully understand the information. Sure, I've watched them thumb through the information; it appears they are doing that only for show. Except the only board member that ever questions the information which is School Board Member Bellar, he seems truly concerned.

Next item was the AOG (Assembly of God Church) Lease Agreement, which ended up being tabled or postponed until another meeting.

Then the Facility Planning/Bond Issue.

Folks I'll try to get to that tomorrow, it's late and I'm very tired.
But I will tell you this, I don't like to get angry,
but tonight I did get angry,
and I did not like it one bit.

If you have ever seen one of those little cartoon characters that have their eyes pop out and they blow steam out of their ears. That's what I felt like, no kidding. I had to get up and walk out of the School Board very early. And so did another man. The attitude was simply atrocious.

Folks you really need to vote every one of them board members out of office except the only man that cares about you and your taxes. You really should encourage Mr. Bellar to run again. I have heard a rumor that Mr. Bellar may not run again in April 2015. So you have time to call him and encourage him to run.  He needs your support just like you need his support. You really do!

It's time to get a school board that respects the desires of the voters. Put some blue collar working men, some rednecks in there to get the job done by people that know respect.

I will try to continue this tomorrow.

Goodnight folks.

   

[Ross]

Tonight was the West Elk USD-282
School Board of Education Meeting
6/18/2014

The President of the Board Hilton said the School Bond Issue failed and very visibly shows he is terribly upset by that fact. (His children may just have to grow up and graduate without having the privilege of  the experience of playing in a brand new gymnasium meeting as he rudely stated at a previous school board. Awww- his poor babies.) 

School Board Member Bellar spoke up and calmly stated that the vote came in, right along the very same lines of the survey, they had mailed out.

(Yeah really, all that expense for no reason what so ever, it's just taxpayer dollars, just spend it foolishly and ignore the results, Oh, wait a minute that's educational dollars wasted, Isn't it? Kids don't need no stinking educational dollars, do they? Oh wait a minute, they want to come back and BULLY us in November, remember! Yes, the third time is BULLYING.)

School Board Member Bellar went on to say, he had talked to a lot of people, who said they would have voted for the class rooms and the reason they voted against it was because of the gymnasium. President of the Board Hilton got noticeably more agitated. His face showed considerable anger at the point of no new gymnasium.

President of the Board Hilton at this point said they need to get busy on the November Bond Issue.

School Board Member Bellar exclaimed, WHAT ? And continued on to say he thought the board should wait at least 6 months. Perhaps wait until elections in April. He said, if you go for it this soon you will piss people off.

President of the Board Hilton at this point with a lot of anger and such an angry look on his face said,
"I don't care how pissed off people get."

Yes, that is quotes that is exactly what I heard.
"I don't care how pissed off people get."

Just who the hell does he thinks he is Donald Trump, President Obama?

Well, I have news for him this is not Washington, D.C. and he is an elected official in a position of servitude to the people of the West Elk USD-282 School District.

His behavior through out this whole thing has been that of a little spoiled kid that has inherited a million dollars and with it some super power to have his demands met. Well guess what, if he is in fact that spoiled little rich kid demanding that the taxpayers pay to build a brand new gymnasium for his children, he should accept the rude wakening he has just received, like a man. Not as a spoiled child.

Then there was the attitude about raising our taxes. It was like to hell with the taxpayers!

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The Roof !

Two years ago the school had a study performed by a university and were praised that they had a million unencumbered dollars to get the roof repaired and suggested that they should make repairs a section at a time so they would not have to spend their money all at one time. At that time it was said the roof could be repaired for those one million dollars. Apparently, not now, folks. It's apparently gonna cost considerably more. Now, I'm not exactly sure what the superintendent said exactly due to his spoken voice. I thought I heard $300,000 for one section and $600,000.00 for another section and I didn't hear how many sections there are.

Two years ago it was just important to repair the roof! Well last night the School Superintendent informed the School Board we now have an URGENT need to repair the roof.

The President of the Board Hilton stated we need to raise the LOB where upon School Board Member Bellar exclaimed WHAT! I believe School Board Member Bellar is sincerely concerned with all the tax increases by the School Board. Just think about it, the County Commissioners have been providing tax cuts by using some of the wind farm money for us. But do you really notice any cut? I don't, because it is being eaten up by the School Board taxation. I wonder, what has happened to that unencumbered one million dollars?

The President of the Board Hilton was fishing for a motion and School Board Member Bellar politely stated that he made a motion last fall to start the repair on the roof and that he could not receive a second, so he would not do it now! Doing the work last fall he said would have saved the taxpayers a lot of money.
This time School Board Member Black made the very same motion Board Member Bellar made, only this time it received a second. Why? Simply because they have an URGENT situation, now! The motion passed.  They have forced themselves to operate in crisis mode, I wonder how long problems will be ignored until crisis mode is demanded?

It's more important to build eight class rooms and throw out a half a millon dollars worth of barely used portable class rooms and build a new gymnasium, that really makes sense doesn't it folks?

A point was made during the meeting that the kids will probably have to sit in class rooms breathing the fumes of the roofing material for several weeks. If they would have given School Board Member Bellar's motion a second last fall and voted to get busy on roof, the work could have been done this summer while the kids are out of school along with considerable savings. Oh, well! It's just the kids that have to suffer the fumes and the teachers, and it's just Other peoples money.

Folks in case you don't know the LOB stands for Limited Option Budget and means your property tax will increase by 4 mil for the West Elk-282 School District. I'm no accountant and don't deal with taxation and accounting on a daily basis, so I did a little googling. From what I learned 1 mil is $1 per $1000.00 of property value. Therefore 4 mil is $4 per $1000.00 of property value.  If I am wrong somebody please correct me.

I think we should prepare ourselves for a 4 mil West Elk USD-282 property tax increase every year for the next several years. Thanks to piss poor planning and spending by today's present School Board. What was it 30-40 thousand dollars and possibly more wasted on architects?

How many thousands on professional looking sports facilities? And we can't afford to repair the roof to protect the children from the elements without raising property taxes?

The President of the Board Hilton, tried to blame the roof problem on the School Bond Issue failing. Now how lame is that? See how badly he wants you to build a new gymnasium for his children? He was corrected by Board Member Bellar. Thank you

April 2015 can't get here soon enough for me.

Five seats on the West Elk USD-282 School Board will be up for vote.

Time to clean house isn't it? 

Again I would suggest keeping the level headed School Board Member Bellar, that is if you can convince him to run again.

I did attempt to record part of this School Board meeting with my cell phone, but it did not turn out, well enough to post, far to much back ground noise and the only person speaking up man like was School Board Member Bellar.
   
I had hoped so hard for that recording to back up what I am posting here today. I'm sorry, I can't provide the recording

So please take this post strictly as my personal opinion, my personal editorial. In other words take it with a grain of salt or don't take it at all. Your choice of course.

In my opinion, IT IS A SAD STATE OF AFFAIRS.

Thank you for indulging me.

[Ross]

I expected some rebutal! I was hoping for some rebutal!

Or at least some one to add to what I have posted.

Some chatter about what is happening in and to Elk County.

I guess I didn't say that the school Board for the last number of years in their infinite wisdom backed by college degrees has placed West Elk USD-282 in such a financial quandary that they will have no choice but to raise our property taxes for the next several years.

But you know what, we should be grateful we voted against the School Bond Issue because the Bond would not have covered the full cost of what they wanted to do and there would have been more tax hikes to complete the job.
   
And it was about nothing more than about building a new gymnasium. The rest was thrown in as a smoke screen.

We would have gained nothing by building eight class rooms and throwing away a half million dollars worth of eight class rooms --- except more debt and more property tax.
 
And the School Board President doesn't care if he pisses off the voters and taxpayers and wants to continue the charade and come after you / us again. How very intelligent of him!

Let's show him how grateful we are for his attitude in April 2014. Let's vote him out of office, if he gives us a chance. By that, I mean if he has the audacity to run again.

But you know the School Board has accomplished something Elk Konnected could not accomplish.

Remember Elk Konnected's big plans on page one of this thread? Here is a reminder, okay.

Unified Gov't (w/in the county) to save money and become more unified (do away with city gov't, councils­
(cont.) all centrally located-one managing body) (Big Ideas's)

Well, the West Elk School Board of Education accomplished exactly that by shutting down the Severy Grade School and the Moline Grade School accomplishing one Unified West Elk USD-282 Campus Centrally Located School near Howard and at great expense to the taxpayers and the communities. But none of that manners does it? I believe we can be thankful for the Konnected School Board Members for all the chaos by following the above (Big Idea) for our school district. I do believe that follows along with the big plan of Economic Development for Howard. You know build a "Taj Mahal" and they will come.

Oh, doesn't it hurt? Follows that plan to, of the Konnected Kounty Kommissioners during thier time in control of the County Board, yes the Neighborhood Revitalization Program of free property taxes for five years for new comers and those that have plenty of money to build a new barn.

All those great plans were to benefit who? It sure wasn't me or you or Moline or Severy or Elk Falls was it? Just cut everyone out except for a few.

Hey, it's something to think about, isn't it?

Isn't it time to come back to our senses?

Vote out all of the progressive liberals that could care less about you and how much they tax you!

Do it. Get-R-Done.

Give that some thought.

The August primaries are coming quickly. Keep Mr. Ritz in office and Keep Konnected folks out.

And let's use some of that Critical thinking that the School Board President use to push at School Board Meetings that he wanted to teach our students. After all, it doesn't appear that he is using it, does it.

Just my thoughts and opinions.

[Ross]

With all the talk about the West Elk Bond Issue and taxation, I decided to make a trip to the Elk County Court House to see what I could learn? And I was kindly provided with a great deal of Property Tax Information that covers the County Property Tax, the various Community Property Taxes and the various Township Property Taxes.

There is also information includes School Districts, Cemeteries, Fire District, Water Sheds and other items in Elk County.

This is a thee page document uploaded in PDF form to https://app.box.com/s/qij0j4lod8zwk11fkubj .

You may either just view the document on line or you may download it to your computer for reading or printing.

Elk County and Communities Property Taxes Information
https://app.box.com/s/qij0j4lod8zwk11fkubj

My main page at Box.com
showing all files and folders are readily available to you
concerning USD And County information is:

https://app.box.com/files/0/f/0

[Ross]

"We don't need charts when we go out," said former senator Alan Simpson, R-Wyo. "We just say if you spend more than you earn you lose your butt. And if you spend a buck and borrow 42 cents of it, you've got to be stupid."

What if you borrow all of it and ridiculously increase property taxes?

Huh, what then?