we have 'legal' out of county kids? Please explain.

or Flat Rock. They don't park down the street, they flaunt it. This has been brought up many times and nothing has been done, but given the statement that some of the schools have empty seats in the classroom and that they need to fill them for federal funding, it fits together very well.

We have kids going to school with thugs, because their parents want to teach us who is boss and that they can do it. People in this area have it rubbed in their face. It makes a mockery of everyone who moved here and pay taxes for the kids to have a better life. Why bother? I am sick to death of this attitude. Why it hasn't been fixed, now seems perfectly clear.

that there are Federal Govt. contracts that are available to state and local governments that provide a wide selection of goods and services?

Did you know that the local BOE can purchase school busses from Federal Govt. contracts?

Did you know that the Federal Govt. donates 1,000's of computers to state and local agency's annually?

Please don't profess to know what Federal funds can and can't be used for as you obviously don't.

"Outsourcing" has worked to save Federal agencies and private sector companies $100's of millions over the past few years.

Having someone with Mr. Houston's 'outsourcing' experience on the BOE could save "WE THE TAX PAYERS" tremendous amounts of money. Why don't we give him the benefit of the doubt?

I can't say any of the current BOE members have had any better ideas. If they did they’ve been keeping it to themselves.

Maybe the BOE won't have to raise the millage rate as often or as much.

on July 15th, 2008. You just can't help yourself can you? Stop spewing garbage as if it were truth. You are mean & bitter...just step away from the fight...you can't win.. You've been exposed!

Dave Houston is very qualified... that is why you are afraid and you bash him and the other honest candidates...

the FACTS Are the FACTS and the TRUTH IS the TRUTH!!!

Buck you and your Tyronne buddies are really starting to lose it. You want facts let's talk facts.

1 ) Dave Houston took a stand on an issue, right or wrong he made a decision. He did not want to answer the questions as posed. Cal Beverley stomps his feet and holds his breath and Dave folds his cards and does what he is told. Can you imagine what will happen when the NAACP comes calling when we deny transfers to Clayton students. Even Obama holds his opinion for 2 days.

2 ) Mr. Houston is a consultant to Fortune 100 companies. Having spent a fair amount of time in similar type positions, how is Mr. Houston going to have the time to support our schools? Client deadlines are inflexible, how much time does he really have to invest in our schools. Several board members have said that the job takes over 40 hours a month. A highpowered consulting job, 40 + hours a month on school board, plus a family life, sorry it doesn't add up to success for everyone and many have tried.

3 ) Mr. Houston's experience is in outsourcing and converting high paying jobs into lower paying jobs, how does he translate that into an educational setting. Will our kids watch a teacher in India on the TV? Or will he make the school job so bad that higher paid veterans leave to be replaced with newer and cheaper teachers? That is what consultants do, just ask our neighbors who are or were at Delta.

4 ) Fayette County schools are some of the highest performing in the state, what can Mr. Houston do to make them better? Our entire board has had a great record of success.

5 ) Mr. Houston's neighbors are unhappy about the two recent redistrictings where the results were less than they had hoped. Mr. Houston's answer on redistricting is tepid and does not specify how he feels on the subject. It's ok, we already know. Fayette County needs school board members who will look out for the entire county and not just an exclusive few.

6 ) Janet Smola is involved with numerous civic groups and is always visable in the community. Whether or not you think she was amiable, she is available to the public. What will Mr. Houston do?

Last... This environment is exactly how Clayton County started down hill. Inexperienced people ran on change and the change wasn't good. People voted based on criteria such as personal vendettas and really did not care about the schools, and look what happened.

Think that if you will research the CCBOE, you will find that a 'for profit union' was at the front of getting individuals voted on the board. (The AJC chronicled the effort if you wish to check it out). Do not place Mr. Houston in that category. He had to have a way above average IQ to get into West Point; he served his Country in uniform, and as a minimum, learned to multi-task with a very diverse population; he was held to a standard to accomplish the assigned task in a defined timeframe, at least cost to the taxpayer, and to do it right the first time after ANALYSIS! Would not think that Mr. Houston has a
'vendetta' as you suggest.

The more anxiety one reads, the more one could get the notion that Mr. Houston IS THE MAN FOR THE JOB!!

The for profit union MACE is owned and run by a guy named Trotter. Lived around the corner from him so I saw it all. My point about the vendetta was aimed more about some of his vocal supporters like Buck and Beachbear who are obsessed with hating on Smola/ Smith without considering if there is a better alternative. The signs in Clayton said "it's our tun now" and never considered expereicne our view point. Now we see the reseult. My point was some of his supporters not him. My apologies for not being clear.

But the point is still valid. Mr. Houston put his name on the letter and changed the next day. He blames a novice mistake. However, he will be a novice for his first term. He can make lots of mistakes in that time.

I admire both candiates for putting themselves out there, I wanted to but the time was not there to do the rest of my life well ( Family + work ). God bless both them for doing this and lets talk facts

Take Care

we aren't obsessed with hating the Smola Smith bunch....you started this ugly tirade against Houston and Marion Key. You asked the other guys not to blog, then threw yourselves an online party. Anyone reading these blogs would agree. You are a joke

Appalled by School Board’s ‘ignorance or incompetence,’ a candidate is born
Tue, 11/21/2006 - 5:16pmBy: Letters to the ...
From what I can tell the situation is as simple as this: the Board of Education built a middle school that we do not need, in a location where it is not needed, and they are trying to fill it up to justify the irresponsible decisions that were made to build it in the first place.

I am sincerely appalled at the board’s actions and struggling to determine whether they are the result of ignorance or incompetence. As if the board needed another reason to demonstrate this, after the rushed vote on boundaries, they immediately turned their attention to building more schools, again without any due diligence or analysis. This must be an embarrassment for the state school superintendent who is also from this community.

Do you really like to redraw school boundaries every five years? Mark my word, that’s exactly what you will be doing by not performing some simple analysis of student demographics over the next three, five and 10 years.

After observing the board’s actions over the last few weeks, I am sure that my words and the concerns of the citizens in this part of the county are falling on deaf ears. I realize that the citizens of Peachtree City do not have a voice on the Fayette County Board of Education; therefore, I will be submitting my name to run for the school board and I suspect there will be many neighbors of mine do the same.

Dave Houston
Peachtree City, Ga.

than count me in.

People that have a "vendetta" against someone or something usually go the extra mile to see it righted. If Mr. Houston has a 'vendetta' against the current BOE WAISTING MY TAX MONEY then he has a new ally in the fight.

Question: Are we just supposed to sit here and take all of the "out of county" kids into our school system?

Marion Key spilled the beans and one of the things was, in my eyes, why the blind eye to the out of county kids. this was from this morning.

Submitted by oldbeachbear on Wed, 07/02/2008 - 10:03am.
Thank you Marion Key for letting the cat out of the bag and many are grateful. You will get my vote.

“Answer: 1. I, Marion Key, have been asking for an assessment of program costs and effectiveness for some time. I will support requiring the superintendent to provide this data to the board prior to the FY 2010 budget process with specific recommendations for cuts and revisions to the budget. It is the superintendent’s responsibility to make those recommendations and I will insist to my fellow board members that this process be followed.
Why did the BOE buy an extra 100 acres at Inman? This bond money is now tied up in land we cannot use. Why did we buy the Kiwanis property? To build a bus facility?
There were no plans for such a facility and there are no plans nor money now to build such a facility. I voted against both of these acquisitions.
We had to build Inman at 600 capacity instead of the usual 800 capacity because our bond money is tied up in land. Rivers [Elementary] is also being constructed at the smaller capacity for the same reason.”

Looks like the BOE went into the land developing/speculating/ business. Now who would benefit from that ?

The picture is getting clearer as to who didn’t want the
‘bloging war’ and why. Marion is now getting a chance to tell all.
I bet we can all guess now who was behind the ‘let’s not get in a bloging war’.

“Answer: 8. Since I did not vote for the last two redistrictings , I would give the Board an F. We have more space system wide than we need, yet after redistricting, we are still using trailers. We are paying twice for utilities at schools with empty space and the trailers.
My position in the redistricting process was for all schools to have enough students to receive full state funding for their administrative overhead. The consultant and the committee had developed a plan to meet that criteria.
The board chose to change the recommended boundaries over my objections. This is the reason we have trailers in some schools while other schools do not meet the state’s minimum enrollment requirements to receive full funding for administrative costs. This leaves Fayette County’s taxpayers to make up the shortfall”

And now the dirty little secret has hit the air. The reason the blind eye has been turned to out of county students….

“The board chose to change the recommended boundaries over my objections. This is the reason we have trailers in some schools while other schools do not meet the state’s minimum enrollment requirements to receive full funding for administrative costs. This leaves Fayette County’s taxpayers to make up the shortfall.

Thank you for re-posting it.

The BOE did the same thing with the land it purchased for the Stars Mill complex.

I'm hoping they got lucky when they sold it to a developer and actually made some money from it.

which developer did the FCBOE sell it to? The next question might be...do any school board members have development companies? And then you should ask...Do any school board members have family business ties to companies that do business with developers?

HMMMMMM....I wonder?

Ok, we have an overcrowded school, so we build a new one out in the middle of no where, then we sell the extra land to a developer, who then fills it up. What has this done for the kids in the overcrowded area? Did I miss something? I'm sure it would make people happy that have companies with ties to developers, but where is the help for the overcrowded schools and our kids? The dots are connected, it just doesn't paint a picture of anything helping the taxpayers.

You said it all.

sort of a field of dreams idea don't you think? And I wonder who the lucky developer would have been this time?

on a developer, but what was it suppose to do for our overcrowed schools? The same areas overcrowded, but with the extra land sold to a developer, who then fills up the new school, where do we and our kids come out ahead? The old schools still overcrowed, the land sold to a developer who then uses the school as a selling tool. Folks, this sounds like a very self defeating plan at best. Were they really that stupid?

Maybe they are that stupid...or just trying to be smarter than the rest of us.

I think certain people took advantage of their positions and didn't care about getting caught or the mess that has been made. Our kids and the taxpayers have to pay the price for the misdeeds of a few.

So here is your chance Fayette County...make your voice heard. Vote these people off the board. If you'd like more info on who owns what, I'd do a corporations search through the secretary of state ...Karen Handel. You might try searching by listing agents or even by officers...

It should be some enlightening reading! Enjoy!

"Looks like the BOE went into the land developing/speculating/ business. Now who would benefit from that ?"

...And who was behind this? Are there records of board meetings describing who said what, and when, and why, and the costs associated?

Would this pass the Georgia Sunset Laws if they were requested? Wonder how much this is all going to cost the taxpayers?

read this, it will make you sick. It seems she was out voted and is now telling all.

Responses by Marion Key, Fayette County Board of Education Post 3 incumbent
Tue, 07/01/2008 - 5:44pmBy: Marion Key

Question: 1. The school board is faced with the likelihood of having to increase the millage rate from 18.569 to 19.35, a rate just .65 mills under the maximum allowed. If negative conditions such as Fayette’s economic downturn have not improved significantly by mid-2009, the board might be faced with deciding to either cut programs or expenses, increase the millage again or all the above. How will you handle those decisions? Are you prepared to cut people and programs if necessary? Be specific. (And please explain — if you don’t have any definite position on this, why should anybody vote for you?)

Answer: 1. I, Marion Key, have been asking for an assessment of program costs and effectiveness for some time. I will support requiring the superintendent to provide this data to the board prior to the FY 2010 budget process with specific recommendations for cuts and revisions to the budget. It is the superintendent’s responsibility to make those recommendations and I will insist to my fellow board members that this process be followed.

Why did the BOE buy an extra 100 acres at Inman? This bond money is now tied up in land we cannot use. Why did we buy the Kiwanis property? To build a bus facility?

There were no plans for such a facility and there are no plans nor money now to build such a facility. I voted against both of these acquisitions.

We had to build Inman at 600 capacity instead of the usual 800 capacity because our bond money is tied up in land. Rivers [Elementary] is also being constructed at the smaller capacity for the same reason.

Question: 2. A number of students attending Fayette schools actually live out of county, yet not a single criminal case has been carried to trial or resulted in a plea of guilty in the past two years. Some allege that school authorities turn a blind eye to illegal students because those out-of-county students bulk up the attendance numbers, resulting in maintaining state funding even while actual Fayette student numbers decline. Why hasn’t more been done about this problem and what specifically will you do to get illegal students out of Fayette schools?

Answer: 2. As a board member I have insisted that out of county students be removed from our schools. It would make no sense to get extra state dollars for out of county students when those funds pay only half the costs Fayette incurs to educate its pupil population. Fayette taxpayers would have to make up the balance of the funds. We have removed many students over the past two years, paying off-duty police officers to verify the residences of new enrollees.

Question: 3. Recent CRCT results indicate that even when teachers teach the test, a lot of students still don’t do well. What local policies will you strive to change or to implement that will change this downward trend?

Answer: 3. The CRCT problems occur because there is little match between what teachers are teaching in the state-mandated curriculum and what the test measures. The state needs to create tests that measure what the curriculum requires. I support the state using technology to allow schools to test later in the term and still get the data back to the school system in a timely manner.

Question: 4. Why shouldn’t school board meetings be videotaped and uploaded to the BOE website in a timely manner for viewing by those who cannot attend the meetings? What will you do about that?

Answer: 4. There is no reason why board meetings cannot be videotaped. Also the board minutes need to be revised to be sure that the major issues are detailed with the pro and con discussions noted. The minutes should also include how each board member voted.

Question: 5. The Fayette school budget is nearly $200 million a year. What experience do you have in either making payroll in a small business on a regular basis or in managing and overseeing budgets containing more than five zeroes in the expense line?

Question: 6. In a similar vein, what makes you competent to oversee a nearly $200 million budget?

Answers: 5 & 6. I have 12 years experience on the board, providing oversight on the system budget.

Question: 7. It looks like we built too many classrooms for declining student numbers. That’s a lot of local tax dollars. Who should be held accountable for that miscalculation?

Answer: 7. I voted against constructing Inman and Rivers elementary schools because enrollment projections clearly indicated the schools were not needed at this time. Prior to the construction of Inman, we had space for 10,000 elementary students and about 9,200 enrolled.

Question: 8. Few people like redrawing school district attendance lines. This year, several candidates seem to focus on that process. Give the current board a grade from A to F for the most recent redistricting plan adopted. And, by the way, should voters elect a single-issue candidate, even if that issue is redistricting?

Answer: 8. Since I did not vote for the last two redistrictings , I would give the Board an F. We have more space system wide than we need, yet after redistricting, we are still using trailers. We are paying twice for utilities at schools with empty space and the trailers.

My position in the redistricting process was for all schools to have enough students to receive full state funding for their administrative overhead. The consultant and the committee had developed a plan to meet that criteria.

The board chose to change the recommended boundaries over my objections. This is the reason we have trailers in some schools while other schools do not meet the state’s minimum enrollment requirements to receive full funding for administrative costs. This leaves Fayette County’s taxpayers to make up the shortfall.

Question: 9. With respect, do you know what you are doing? Can we trust you with our money and our children?

Answer: 9. I have been the lone voice on the board on some of our property acquisitions and school constructions. The decisions are coming back to haunt us in this time of budget constraints. I will always work for fiscally responsible decisions. You can trust me to look out for the welfare of your children. What is best for our children is always my guiding philosophy. My 40-plus years of experience in education, some of it overlapping, makes me well-qualified to watch over the education of all of Fayette’s children.

but not a surprise. When some people have approached MS Smola about out of county kids, she has sneered at them and called them racist rather than address the problem. The problem is black or white, we paid for our kids to go here. Getting no serious response, many families have moved on. That has left more open spaces to fill with out of county kids.

By not addressing the problem, it has made the schools next to the county lines reflect an enrollment that has nothing to do with who lives there. It is also eroding the county as a whole, because as I stated, the parents in these areas just move. Now the last bastion of what is really living in Fayette is McIntosh. Don't you think because of this flagrant disregard of the problem, it will crumble too?

Sure do not see Mr. Houston's comments as a 'vendetta'. He saw something that he did not agree with; he commented on it; he explained why he did not agree with it; and then offered himself up to fix it for like minded citizens. Do not see that as a 'vendetta' -- running against an 'incumbent'. On the contrary, believe that he is calling for serious analysis before you commit taxpayer's dollars -- especially with the growth fluctuations and demographic shifts we are seeing. (Wouldn't it be just great if all politicians were to follow that azimuth????)

On the other point of comparing Fayette to Clayton, will save you some time doing the research -- see the following from the LA Times -- yep -- they made the big time! This has not happened in Fayette -- we hope, or if it has, all incumbents should be thrown out!

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/mar/14/nation/na-clayton14

??

1. Did Dave really not answer the questions or were peolpe trying to put words in his mouth...that is what I suspect anyway... How has he folded...by speaking for himself and letting his thoughts and answers be known? Why are you assuming all the kids from Clayton County are going to try to come here? Why are you implying they are all minority and that the NAACP will need to intervene?

2.I would think if this had been an issue for Mr. Houston he would not have thrown his hat in the ring...to my knowledge, he has never lead anyone to believe he didn't have time for a job, the FCBOE andhis family. Doesn't Lee Wright work for Delta? How does he manage? How about Ms. Smola she has several other jobs? I think this is a moot point.

3.My answer to that would be...vote for him and let's just see what he does. You are trying to get the people that work for the school system to be afraid he is going to cut jobs to save money and that is called fear mongering. The FCBOE is the biggest employer here in Fayette County...are you trying to scare the employees into voting for Smola to save their jobs? This is just a ridiulus little game you are playing and I hope the people see right through it.

4. Yes, Fayette county does have some of the best schools in the state. No argument there. I also think that the current board is not entirely able to take credit for this. The Kudos belongs to the teachers that are in the classrooms, the ones who spend countless hours and $ of their own to give the kids in this county a great opportunity to learn. In reality, school board members don't have much to do with student success. They are there to oversee the system as a whole. You also need to remember that parents in this county are a big part of student success.

5. I don't think you should put words out here on Mr. Houston's behalf of how he feels. Again, that seems like a jab at Mr. Houston. He does not appear to be a single issue guy. Read his answers.

6. How has Mr. Houston not been available to the public? Just because Janet has been involved in civic groups and visable to the public does not mean that she qualified to hold office. Traditionally people step forward like Mr. Houston to serve their community. I guess that you could make the case that Mr. Houston has already done this seeing as he served his country in Desert Storm.

Again, fear mongering is not acceptable.

It is really strange that these people keep taking swipes at Marion Key and Houston. Do you suppose YonY/dorthea/Citizenblogger think this is their only hope to win? I bet so.

Don't throw stones when you and your buddies have a pathological hatred for the Smolas and select others. Asking questions about our candidates is only fair.

You have your say and others have theirs. For someone who has had their fill of swiping at others you would think that you would come up with something better

Not swipes at Houston only fair questions like Cal.

It is funny that you try to get these guys to sign a letter not to come on and smear each other, then you think the coast is clear and try to have a hatchet party.

Does anyone else find it humorous that so many of the bloggers who supported the boycott of the Internet Forum (essentially blogs -- responding to questions) have been burning the site today with their own NEGATIVE BLOGS!

Do we see a little bit of 'DON'T DO AS I DO, DO AS I SAY DO!' Some may sense that their time in office is coming to an end, or that their 'dog may have lost its sense of smell.'

I think the new candidates by now know they were had by agreeing to the letter, that is why they are stepping forward and saying what they think. They seemed very sincere in wanting to run an honest above board campaign but didn't know how dirty some people can be. The new candidates never had anything to lose. Only the ones who hatched the letter did.

I met Dave Houston once. He was a good upstanding kind of man. I am happy to see that he answered the questions, and he did it well. I think he is a fine candidate and will make a super board member. Fayette County is lucky to have Dave!!!