Sunday, June 14, 2009
Let’s MoveOn beyond
faceless hucksters
By RON BROCHU
Put the squeeze on Rep. Jim Oberstar, the e-mail says; pressure him to strengthen the energy bill. Why?
“Because Big Oil and Coal have teamed up with conservatives in both parties, and they've been successful in weakening the bill,” said the message, which was selectively e-mailed to his constituents by MoveOn.Org, a political action group that considers 4 million Americans to be members.
“Can you sign this petition to Representative James Oberstar today? Eighty thousand MoveOn members have already signed. We need to double the number of signatures by Wednesday — that means we need 25 more signatures in Duluth. MoveOn members will personally deliver this petition to many congressional offices the next day. Click here to add your name,” said the author, Anna Galland, which may or may not be her real name, if indeed she is a real person.
With the presidential election now part of history, MoveOn sends similar e-mails addressing virtually every issue bound for Congress. Hardly a day passes when the group isn’t urging faceless recipients to hit some hot button, adding their name to an impassioned plea that will be hand delivered throughout the Congressional Office Building.
But MoveOn e-mails more than just a plea for political support. The group’s hot button sends recipients to a pop-up window that unveils its real message: “Thanks for signing. Now can you donate to help save Obama’s plan from Big Oil and Coal?”
Give us your money
That was MoveOn’s message throughout the presidential campaign. Donate by Tuesday and we can out-gun the Conservative Bastards! We can change America! And even before Tuesday arrived, MoveOn was pimping another money plea – because screwing the Filthy Republicans was getting more expensive every day.
One can only guess about these things, but MoveOn seemed to find my personal mailbox soon after I clicked a hot button to receive a free Obama campaign button.
Not sure where the offer originated, but the crappy little button didn’t arrive until long after election day. But it didn’t take nearly that long for MoveOn to adopt me like a long-lost brother – a long-lost brother who was anxious to send his hard-earned money to a liberal fundraising machine that would flood my mailbox with constant propaganda. To hear them tell it, President Barack Obama cannot succeed without an ongoing cash tsunami – not in an era when Big Oil, Big Banks and Big Business in General manipulate every Republican.
Quite a scenario, but it must be true. After all, MoveOn has 4 million members. Or does it? Can’t help but wonder how many of its “members” just thought they were getting an Obama campaign button.
Be that as it may, it spotlights how money and special interests have twisted the American political process. We elect a president. We elect senators. We elect representatives. Theoretically, they represent their constituents. They read our letters. They respond to our needs.
But MoveOn and its conservative counterparts take the process a step further. They want to be an unelected middle man. Bad enough we have to pay elected officials; now, we have to pay intermediaries to represent our interests to the very people who should already be well versed in our needs.
It’s a great scam if you can pull it off. Political action groups, no doubt, employ thousands of parasites who otherwise would be lunching off their parents or peddling religion.
A weird scene
So imagine this – you are Jim Oberstar, sitting in your office one fine morning reading La Monde and eating French toast. Suddenly, an emissary from MoveOn.org walks in with a petition that says:
“We need a stronger energy bill to fulfill Obama's vision of a clean energy economy. Congress should strengthen the clean energy standards and restore Obama's authority to crack down on dirty coal plants."
In the first place, they would never get beyond your handlers, but that’s another story. So we’ll have to pretend. What would Minnesota’s senior Congressman be thinking:
A) To hell with Minnesota Power. I won’t be duped by Big Coal, Big Energy and Big Business or
B) To hell with MoveOn.org. They don’t sign anyone’s paycheck in northern Minnesota, and they don’t have to seek reelection every two years.
And that’s that, so let’s MoveOn to another topic.
When the music's over
Bad enough that Duluth has lousy weather – it also has lousy radio.
What’s the deal when every rock station plays and replays the same 50 songs by Bob Seeger, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, CSN and Alice in Chains? Over and over and over.
Sometimes, they don’t even play the whole song. Chunks are hacked out with the precision of Josef Mengele. Funnier yet is the lame attempt to disguise obvious bad language. Take a listen to “Man in a box” as Layne Staley sings “Shove my nose in schlipxtc.”
Huh?
TV networks at least offer a disclaimer when they hack a piece of art by squeezing it into a square screen or remove offensive material. On radio, they just let some pencil-necked geek hack at the art on a software screen, neutering it like an overworked veterinarian.
This article first appeared in the June 12, 2009 Reader Weekly.
Friday, May 29, 2009
Forum’s new strategy:
slash, burn & panic?
By RON BROCHU
The forced exit of Superior Telegram publisher Leslee LeRoux has enhanced speculation that the community newspaper is destined to be absorbed by the Duluth News Tribune (DNT), despite official denials.
LeRoux, a Superior native, had no inkling of her fate when she strolled into the Telegram's downtown office May 21. Ad sales for the twice-weekly broadsheet exceeded budget, allowing the upcoming Friday edition to be larger than usual 24 pages in addition to a 20-page TV tab. Despite industry trends, advertisers were showing faith in the 118-year-old publication, which until last year was published daily, excluding Sundays.
LeRoux's only peeve was an afternoon meeting with Duluth News Tribune Executive Editor Rob Karwath. He had dropped the appointment into her calendar without explanation and declined to reschedule even though his timing would interrupt the Telegram's layout. In most cases, however, that would only suggest DNT arrogance again had reared its head. News Tribune execs care little about inconveniencing colleagues at affiliated publications, all of which they consider inferior.
Only later did LeRoux discover why Karwath wouldn't modify his plans. He intended to permanently erase her name from the masthead. Karwath told LeRoux that Forum Communications, owner of both the Telegram and DNT, no longer employs publishers a corporate cost-cutting move. He asked LeRoux to pack her belongings and vacate her office without saying goodbye to co-workers a policy usually employed by large companies that fear the outgoing employee will stage a scene or sabotage their computers.
"They treated her like an embezzler," said Wisconsin Public Radio reporter Mike Simonson, who has known LeRoux for two decades. "She did not deserve that at all. She should have been given two weeks notice to say goodbye to her staff and her readers. She would have been classy about it."
As LeRoux exited the building with her makeshift cardboard luggage, employees stared in disbelief. For the second time in two weeks, a top-level exec was leaving. Just days earlier, Forum had moved advertising director Randy Johnson to the Duluth News Tribune office, where he was given a new assignment managing the automobile advertising sales effort. Telegram employees were yet to digest that decision when their publisher was eliminated.
In a DNT story, Karwath said "We certainly have every intention to keep the Telegram strong in print and online." Some didn't find his comment very convincing, especially those who witnessed the staff drop from about 40 a year ago to less than 20 today. Said one disheartened staffer: "It's just a matter of time before they get rid of each of us."
The ugly side of bliss
On Fox 21 News, Karwath reports for the DNT as the affable news partner, the soft-spoken boyish editor who reads stories generated by underlings who shun TV. But inside the organization, he's become the Hand of Caesar, doling out disciplinary actions and cutting jobs inside and outside of the newsroom.
Earlier this month, he descended upon the Lake County News-Chronicle in Two Harbors to sack long-time editor Forrest Johnson. Simple math would say Johnson's demise left the newspaper with just 3.5 positions. But in reality, the loss was much greater. Like all small-town newspaper editors, Johnson clocked far more than 40 hours each week.
In protest, 65 people gathered outside the News-Chronicle to support Johnson, who had been with the newspaper for nearly 20 years. But he wasn't universally popular. Some in the local business community felt Johnson was too negative about a waterfront housing plan proposed by developer Sam Cave, and they took their concerns all the way to Forum board chair Bill Marcil. The controversy seemed to die down, but once under the corporate microscope, Johnson was unable to escape.
Forum has not revealed the reason for his release, and Johnson has not been available for comment. But Karwath clearly felt the action was insignificant. Unlike the News Tribune's three front page stories about Lew Latto¹s radio plight, Johnson¹s turn of fortune generated no buzz in the Duluth paper, although the Lake County weekly ran a photo of the protest.
Last September, Karwath also was the messenger who axed DNT managing editor Andrea Novel Buck, a 19-year DNT employee. Facing orders to chop about $300,000 from his newsroom budget, Karwath and other DNT execs decided Buck was among editors who were expendable. Most of them were women. Once the managing editor was axed, opinion page editor Robin Washington was promoted to the newly created position of news director a highly unusual title in the print world.
Clearly, however, cuts by the Fargo-based publisher extend beyond the Northland and may even suggest a degree of panic has gripped the organization. In recent months, Forum has eliminated veteran employees at numerous properties, including:
· Mike Burke, who was general manager at the New Richmond News. He had 28 years of experience
· Michael Kuehn, general manager at the Red Wing Republican Eagle, eight years
· Brady Bautch, Internet Publisher of Forum's RiverTown Newspaper Group in southwest Wisconsin, eight years
· Robin Kruse, Pierce County Herald advertising sales rep for 26 years
· Sandy Burdine, Hastings Star Gazette sales clerk for 28 years
· Melissa Kinneman, classified sales rep at the RiverTown Newspaper
Group
· Jo Erickson, advertising assistant and receptionist, Red Wing Republican Eagle
Why would any organization boot so much experience out the door? Some believe it's not Forum's decision at all. Instead, they suspect some shots are being called by the consortium of banks that borrowed Forum enough money to buy the Duluth and Grand Forks newspaper groups at a price said to exceed $100 million.
Times are changing
When Forum purchased the DNT, Telegram, News-Chronicle and Cloquet Pine Journal, Marcil assured employees that his family-owned company has never shuttered an acquired newspaper. That¹s no longer the case. On May 7, Forum closed the Stillwater Courier and one of its rare startup properties, the Lake Elmo Leader. Employees received two days' notice, according to a story published in the competing Stillwater Gazette.
Lake Elmo suffered a slow, painful death. In 2006, the paper closed its Lake
Elmo office and operated from the Courier's Stillwater office. Then in April 2008, Forum cut its only Lake Elmo reporter and stretched its Stillwater Courier staff to cover both communities.
In closing the two newspapers, Forum eliminated Yvonne Klinnert, who was editor of the Stillwater Courier and Lake Elmo Leader; Mark Brower, a Stillwater Courier/Lake Elmo Leader reporter, and Andy Blenkenship, reporter/photographer at the two publications.
Cuts continued last week, when Forum closed its North Dakota capitol bureau and released Scott Wente from the staff of its Minnesota capitol bureau.
Not important?
By eliminating veteran employees, Forum also is losing institutional memory and community relationships that most newspapers strive to develop.
"It's a great loss to the community to the newspaper," Simonson noted.
That loss is particularly difficult for the Telegram, where the newsroom and advertising sales staff have seen several cuts. When LeRoux took over approximately nine months ago, most considered her a breath of fresh air. Ken Browall, her predecessor, spent much of his time analyzing spreadsheets and union contracts. Unlike most publishers, he seldom ventured into the community, and during his tenure, Browall began to spend more time at the DNT than at the Telegram, even though he claimed to dislike the DNT's culture, particularly in the newsroom.
LeRoux, however, was an extrovert who loved Superior and enjoyed community relations.
Her Telegram tenure began in 1983 as a reporter. After a stint reporting in Galveston, Texas, she returned home and became Telegram editor, then was transferred by Murphy McGinnis Media to expand the Duluth Budgeteer, raising distribution to twice-weekly. During that time, she hired Rick Lubbers, who went on to become DNT sports editor, and Kyle Eller, now editor of The Northern Cross, published by the Duluth Catholic Diocese. Eventually, she was given editorial oversight for all Murphy McGinnis properties.
After an ownership change, Forum hired her in a marketing capacity at Living North Magazine. Then she advanced to become Telegram publisher. In addition to her PR role, LeRoux also worked side-by-side with newsroom staffers, coaching writers and assisting with pagination.
"Her loss will not only be felt by the newspaper and the city of Superior, but by the talented, emerging reporters throughout the region," said freelance writer Joan Farnam, a former colleague at the Budgeteer. "By firing her, they've clearly shown that they are not interested in owning a newspaper that communicates well and is a lively 'forum' for the community. Instead, their focus seems to be their profit margin, which is undoubtedly shrinking because of decisions like these."
In his own story about LeRoux, Simonson also used the term "firing." Karwath objected and sought a correction, saying the term unfairly besmirched his former colleague. Pointing to the way LeRoux was ushered out the door, Simonson refused, then asked Karwath why he employed the tactic. The DNT newsroom exec took a corporate stance, refusing to answer.
While Forum's growing list of terminations is reducing corporate costs, it's also flooding the market with a wide array of talented journalists and sales people. At least three Northland organizations currently are discussing plans to launch an internet alternative to the News Tribune, similar to the MinnPost.com venture launched by former Twin Cities mainstream journalists. So far, however, none of the local efforts have gone into publication. And even tenured start-ups like MinnPost are yet to turn a profit.
Ron Brochu formerly was Telegram executive editor.
This article first appeared in the May 29, 2009 Reader Weekly.
The forced exit of Superior Telegram publisher Leslee LeRoux has enhanced speculation that the community newspaper is destined to be absorbed by the Duluth News Tribune (DNT), despite official denials.
LeRoux, a Superior native, had no inkling of her fate when she strolled into the Telegram's downtown office May 21. Ad sales for the twice-weekly broadsheet exceeded budget, allowing the upcoming Friday edition to be larger than usual 24 pages in addition to a 20-page TV tab. Despite industry trends, advertisers were showing faith in the 118-year-old publication, which until last year was published daily, excluding Sundays.
LeRoux's only peeve was an afternoon meeting with Duluth News Tribune Executive Editor Rob Karwath. He had dropped the appointment into her calendar without explanation and declined to reschedule even though his timing would interrupt the Telegram's layout. In most cases, however, that would only suggest DNT arrogance again had reared its head. News Tribune execs care little about inconveniencing colleagues at affiliated publications, all of which they consider inferior.
Only later did LeRoux discover why Karwath wouldn't modify his plans. He intended to permanently erase her name from the masthead. Karwath told LeRoux that Forum Communications, owner of both the Telegram and DNT, no longer employs publishers a corporate cost-cutting move. He asked LeRoux to pack her belongings and vacate her office without saying goodbye to co-workers a policy usually employed by large companies that fear the outgoing employee will stage a scene or sabotage their computers.
"They treated her like an embezzler," said Wisconsin Public Radio reporter Mike Simonson, who has known LeRoux for two decades. "She did not deserve that at all. She should have been given two weeks notice to say goodbye to her staff and her readers. She would have been classy about it."
As LeRoux exited the building with her makeshift cardboard luggage, employees stared in disbelief. For the second time in two weeks, a top-level exec was leaving. Just days earlier, Forum had moved advertising director Randy Johnson to the Duluth News Tribune office, where he was given a new assignment managing the automobile advertising sales effort. Telegram employees were yet to digest that decision when their publisher was eliminated.
In a DNT story, Karwath said "We certainly have every intention to keep the Telegram strong in print and online." Some didn't find his comment very convincing, especially those who witnessed the staff drop from about 40 a year ago to less than 20 today. Said one disheartened staffer: "It's just a matter of time before they get rid of each of us."
The ugly side of bliss
On Fox 21 News, Karwath reports for the DNT as the affable news partner, the soft-spoken boyish editor who reads stories generated by underlings who shun TV. But inside the organization, he's become the Hand of Caesar, doling out disciplinary actions and cutting jobs inside and outside of the newsroom.
Earlier this month, he descended upon the Lake County News-Chronicle in Two Harbors to sack long-time editor Forrest Johnson. Simple math would say Johnson's demise left the newspaper with just 3.5 positions. But in reality, the loss was much greater. Like all small-town newspaper editors, Johnson clocked far more than 40 hours each week.
In protest, 65 people gathered outside the News-Chronicle to support Johnson, who had been with the newspaper for nearly 20 years. But he wasn't universally popular. Some in the local business community felt Johnson was too negative about a waterfront housing plan proposed by developer Sam Cave, and they took their concerns all the way to Forum board chair Bill Marcil. The controversy seemed to die down, but once under the corporate microscope, Johnson was unable to escape.
Forum has not revealed the reason for his release, and Johnson has not been available for comment. But Karwath clearly felt the action was insignificant. Unlike the News Tribune's three front page stories about Lew Latto¹s radio plight, Johnson¹s turn of fortune generated no buzz in the Duluth paper, although the Lake County weekly ran a photo of the protest.
Last September, Karwath also was the messenger who axed DNT managing editor Andrea Novel Buck, a 19-year DNT employee. Facing orders to chop about $300,000 from his newsroom budget, Karwath and other DNT execs decided Buck was among editors who were expendable. Most of them were women. Once the managing editor was axed, opinion page editor Robin Washington was promoted to the newly created position of news director a highly unusual title in the print world.
Clearly, however, cuts by the Fargo-based publisher extend beyond the Northland and may even suggest a degree of panic has gripped the organization. In recent months, Forum has eliminated veteran employees at numerous properties, including:
· Mike Burke, who was general manager at the New Richmond News. He had 28 years of experience
· Michael Kuehn, general manager at the Red Wing Republican Eagle, eight years
· Brady Bautch, Internet Publisher of Forum's RiverTown Newspaper Group in southwest Wisconsin, eight years
· Robin Kruse, Pierce County Herald advertising sales rep for 26 years
· Sandy Burdine, Hastings Star Gazette sales clerk for 28 years
· Melissa Kinneman, classified sales rep at the RiverTown Newspaper
Group
· Jo Erickson, advertising assistant and receptionist, Red Wing Republican Eagle
Why would any organization boot so much experience out the door? Some believe it's not Forum's decision at all. Instead, they suspect some shots are being called by the consortium of banks that borrowed Forum enough money to buy the Duluth and Grand Forks newspaper groups at a price said to exceed $100 million.
Times are changing
When Forum purchased the DNT, Telegram, News-Chronicle and Cloquet Pine Journal, Marcil assured employees that his family-owned company has never shuttered an acquired newspaper. That¹s no longer the case. On May 7, Forum closed the Stillwater Courier and one of its rare startup properties, the Lake Elmo Leader. Employees received two days' notice, according to a story published in the competing Stillwater Gazette.
Lake Elmo suffered a slow, painful death. In 2006, the paper closed its Lake
Elmo office and operated from the Courier's Stillwater office. Then in April 2008, Forum cut its only Lake Elmo reporter and stretched its Stillwater Courier staff to cover both communities.
In closing the two newspapers, Forum eliminated Yvonne Klinnert, who was editor of the Stillwater Courier and Lake Elmo Leader; Mark Brower, a Stillwater Courier/Lake Elmo Leader reporter, and Andy Blenkenship, reporter/photographer at the two publications.
Cuts continued last week, when Forum closed its North Dakota capitol bureau and released Scott Wente from the staff of its Minnesota capitol bureau.
Not important?
By eliminating veteran employees, Forum also is losing institutional memory and community relationships that most newspapers strive to develop.
"It's a great loss to the community to the newspaper," Simonson noted.
That loss is particularly difficult for the Telegram, where the newsroom and advertising sales staff have seen several cuts. When LeRoux took over approximately nine months ago, most considered her a breath of fresh air. Ken Browall, her predecessor, spent much of his time analyzing spreadsheets and union contracts. Unlike most publishers, he seldom ventured into the community, and during his tenure, Browall began to spend more time at the DNT than at the Telegram, even though he claimed to dislike the DNT's culture, particularly in the newsroom.
LeRoux, however, was an extrovert who loved Superior and enjoyed community relations.
Her Telegram tenure began in 1983 as a reporter. After a stint reporting in Galveston, Texas, she returned home and became Telegram editor, then was transferred by Murphy McGinnis Media to expand the Duluth Budgeteer, raising distribution to twice-weekly. During that time, she hired Rick Lubbers, who went on to become DNT sports editor, and Kyle Eller, now editor of The Northern Cross, published by the Duluth Catholic Diocese. Eventually, she was given editorial oversight for all Murphy McGinnis properties.
After an ownership change, Forum hired her in a marketing capacity at Living North Magazine. Then she advanced to become Telegram publisher. In addition to her PR role, LeRoux also worked side-by-side with newsroom staffers, coaching writers and assisting with pagination.
"Her loss will not only be felt by the newspaper and the city of Superior, but by the talented, emerging reporters throughout the region," said freelance writer Joan Farnam, a former colleague at the Budgeteer. "By firing her, they've clearly shown that they are not interested in owning a newspaper that communicates well and is a lively 'forum' for the community. Instead, their focus seems to be their profit margin, which is undoubtedly shrinking because of decisions like these."
In his own story about LeRoux, Simonson also used the term "firing." Karwath objected and sought a correction, saying the term unfairly besmirched his former colleague. Pointing to the way LeRoux was ushered out the door, Simonson refused, then asked Karwath why he employed the tactic. The DNT newsroom exec took a corporate stance, refusing to answer.
While Forum's growing list of terminations is reducing corporate costs, it's also flooding the market with a wide array of talented journalists and sales people. At least three Northland organizations currently are discussing plans to launch an internet alternative to the News Tribune, similar to the MinnPost.com venture launched by former Twin Cities mainstream journalists. So far, however, none of the local efforts have gone into publication. And even tenured start-ups like MinnPost are yet to turn a profit.
Ron Brochu formerly was Telegram executive editor.
This article first appeared in the May 29, 2009 Reader Weekly.
Friday, May 15, 2009
School board aims shovels at pristine green field
By RON BROCHU
The destruction of green space once elicited angry cries in Duluth, but a new plan that will uproot a square mile of undisturbed land is barely raising eyebrows.
Why? The parcel is hidden in a far corner of West End, where residents lack the political clout and financial resources to fight the massive development.
The project, known as Wheeler North, would position a middle school just above the DM&IR corridor on a green field that runs from Chestnut to Wellington Streets. Just a few blocks uphill from the A& Dubbs drive-in restaurant lies a pristine site where backhoes soon could rip up wild strawberry fields and former pastures that helped feed generations of Germans, Poles and Italians who settled the neighborhood a hundred years ago.
Most of those families – such as the Stammens, Gimples, Scheers and Stockmans – are long gone. The neighborhood and its old houses have largely morphed into transient housing for low-income renters who’ve managed to escape the Central Hillside. These aren’t monied socialites who can afford to sue the Duluth School District every time an eagle craps on their porch.
That dubious tale generated headlines when the School Board proposed to stuff East High onto the Ordean site. Unhappy neighbors managed to pull an eagle’s nest out of their pocket with hopes of milking the rare bird.
Those who reside near Wheeler North, however, haven’t been nearly as clever. So far, raping the western hillside has generated neither discussion nor lawsuits. Beyond the crumbling pavement on Chestnut Street, where the school district hopes to demolish several homes to accommodate a newly paved entrance road, the ambitious West End school plan is nearly a secret.
The lack of news coverage is troubling but not unexpected. Few local reporters reside east of Lake Avenue, so they’re seldom familiar with western neighborhoods or their problems. Many are simply incapable of preparing a story that’s not spoon fed at a news conference or public meeting.
For sure, the lack of media scrutiny is helping to squelch discussion about alternative school sites, such as the existing Central High or Lincoln properties. Assisted by this knowledge vacuum, the School Board can spew nonsense about the high cost of rebuilding Central without anyone questioning the high cost of extending utilities and building roads into the Wheeler North site, where the dominant geological feature is solid rock.
Environmentally unsound?
Unearthing wild raspberries, strawberries and lichen-covered boulders is merely one concern about the Wheeler North site. It doesn’t take a passel of clever attorneys to uproot others. Simple observation from hillside outcroppings provide a quick education.
The DM&IR rail corridor, where taconite-filled trains speed from Iron Range mines to the Ore Docks, is located between the proposed school and Wheeler Field.
There’s only one way to quickly walk from the proposed school site to the athletic complex and West Duluth residential area: Dart across a dozen railroad tracks like an overcharged bunny.
But that’s not the only safety issue. The other is air pollution.
Sixty years ago, nearby residents pulled clean linens off their clothes line each time a steam locomotive flew down the tracks, spewing coal soot in every direction. Those days are long gone, but airborne dust particles continue to be a concern, and prevailing winds blow toward the school site.
On numerous occasions, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency has fined DM&IR for dust emissions created when taconite pellets are moved and stockpiled. Although most of the emissions occur near the Ore Docks, a quick walk along the rail corridor unveils a virtual treasure trove of pellets that have dropped from speeding rail cars. In addition to fueling local slingshots, the pellets create dust as they bounce along the tracks.
Those who reside in the neighborhood also are familiar with blue clouds that billow from brake pads as locomotive engineers slow their trains during the quick descent between Proctor and the working waterfront. The smell of hot brakes, which is evident for blocks, and particulates from the brake pads will heighten the sickly ambiance at the Wheeler North outdoor athletic field, recess field and hiking trail.
How can this be?
Superintendent of Schools Keith Dixon has suggested the Red Plan arose from discussions held at numerous public meetings. Citizens who participated in those sessions, however, say they were poorly attended, often by fewer than two dozen people, and certainly didn’t generate a community-wide consensus. In any event, it’s hard to imagine that a local participant suggested bulldozing an undisturbed green field instead of reusing convenient sites that already are equipped with water, sewer and power lines.
Unfortunately, Dixon and his heavy-handed minions are hell-bent on initiating every aspect of the plan before the fall school board elections, when voters will tell board members what they really think. By then, however, it will be far too late to halt the expensive madness; the environmental damage will be irreversible.
Author Ron Brochu refuses to lighten up and hopes more Duluthians will do the same.
This story was first published in the May 15 Reader Weekly
The destruction of green space once elicited angry cries in Duluth, but a new plan that will uproot a square mile of undisturbed land is barely raising eyebrows.
Why? The parcel is hidden in a far corner of West End, where residents lack the political clout and financial resources to fight the massive development.
The project, known as Wheeler North, would position a middle school just above the DM&IR corridor on a green field that runs from Chestnut to Wellington Streets. Just a few blocks uphill from the A& Dubbs drive-in restaurant lies a pristine site where backhoes soon could rip up wild strawberry fields and former pastures that helped feed generations of Germans, Poles and Italians who settled the neighborhood a hundred years ago.
Most of those families – such as the Stammens, Gimples, Scheers and Stockmans – are long gone. The neighborhood and its old houses have largely morphed into transient housing for low-income renters who’ve managed to escape the Central Hillside. These aren’t monied socialites who can afford to sue the Duluth School District every time an eagle craps on their porch.
That dubious tale generated headlines when the School Board proposed to stuff East High onto the Ordean site. Unhappy neighbors managed to pull an eagle’s nest out of their pocket with hopes of milking the rare bird.
Those who reside near Wheeler North, however, haven’t been nearly as clever. So far, raping the western hillside has generated neither discussion nor lawsuits. Beyond the crumbling pavement on Chestnut Street, where the school district hopes to demolish several homes to accommodate a newly paved entrance road, the ambitious West End school plan is nearly a secret.
The lack of news coverage is troubling but not unexpected. Few local reporters reside east of Lake Avenue, so they’re seldom familiar with western neighborhoods or their problems. Many are simply incapable of preparing a story that’s not spoon fed at a news conference or public meeting.
For sure, the lack of media scrutiny is helping to squelch discussion about alternative school sites, such as the existing Central High or Lincoln properties. Assisted by this knowledge vacuum, the School Board can spew nonsense about the high cost of rebuilding Central without anyone questioning the high cost of extending utilities and building roads into the Wheeler North site, where the dominant geological feature is solid rock.
Environmentally unsound?
Unearthing wild raspberries, strawberries and lichen-covered boulders is merely one concern about the Wheeler North site. It doesn’t take a passel of clever attorneys to uproot others. Simple observation from hillside outcroppings provide a quick education.
The DM&IR rail corridor, where taconite-filled trains speed from Iron Range mines to the Ore Docks, is located between the proposed school and Wheeler Field.
There’s only one way to quickly walk from the proposed school site to the athletic complex and West Duluth residential area: Dart across a dozen railroad tracks like an overcharged bunny.
But that’s not the only safety issue. The other is air pollution.
Sixty years ago, nearby residents pulled clean linens off their clothes line each time a steam locomotive flew down the tracks, spewing coal soot in every direction. Those days are long gone, but airborne dust particles continue to be a concern, and prevailing winds blow toward the school site.
On numerous occasions, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency has fined DM&IR for dust emissions created when taconite pellets are moved and stockpiled. Although most of the emissions occur near the Ore Docks, a quick walk along the rail corridor unveils a virtual treasure trove of pellets that have dropped from speeding rail cars. In addition to fueling local slingshots, the pellets create dust as they bounce along the tracks.
Those who reside in the neighborhood also are familiar with blue clouds that billow from brake pads as locomotive engineers slow their trains during the quick descent between Proctor and the working waterfront. The smell of hot brakes, which is evident for blocks, and particulates from the brake pads will heighten the sickly ambiance at the Wheeler North outdoor athletic field, recess field and hiking trail.
How can this be?
Superintendent of Schools Keith Dixon has suggested the Red Plan arose from discussions held at numerous public meetings. Citizens who participated in those sessions, however, say they were poorly attended, often by fewer than two dozen people, and certainly didn’t generate a community-wide consensus. In any event, it’s hard to imagine that a local participant suggested bulldozing an undisturbed green field instead of reusing convenient sites that already are equipped with water, sewer and power lines.
Unfortunately, Dixon and his heavy-handed minions are hell-bent on initiating every aspect of the plan before the fall school board elections, when voters will tell board members what they really think. By then, however, it will be far too late to halt the expensive madness; the environmental damage will be irreversible.
Author Ron Brochu refuses to lighten up and hopes more Duluthians will do the same.
This story was first published in the May 15 Reader Weekly
The Fifth Estate is one too many
By RON BROCHU
If journalism is the Fourth Estate, then legislative lobbyists are the fifth, which is one too many – according to Gov. Tim Pawlenty.
About $35 million in taxpayer money was paid by local units of government between 2003 and 2007 to pros who wander the capitol promoting parochial needs – everything from publicly financed civic projects to aid for cities, counties, colleges and school districts..
Facing budget deficits, Pawlenty believes, local government could save a lot of money by firing their lobbyists, Minnesota Public Radio reported April 20. He even has support from some Democrats.
"We just think it's an expense that doesn't have to be there," DFL State Rep. Michael Paymar of St. Paul told MPR. Paymar, a former Duluth city councilor, also would prohibit state agencies and departments from spending tax money to lobby the legislature.
His opinion differs sharply from DFL Rep. Thomas Huntley, who once served with Paymar on the Duluth city council. Huntley told KBJR-TV “When we're down here, we don't talk to senators, we don't have time, yet we have to coordinate our actions and it's basically the lobbyists that run back and fourth and keep us informed by what the other body's doing."
Did Huntley really intend to suggest taxpayers should pay lobbyists to function as couriers between the House and Senate? Hopefully not, for it would be difficult to find more expensive labor to shuttle notes among lawmakers.
But that’s a minor issue, and so is the taxpayer cost to hire lobbyists. At issue is the role of state legislators. Don’t taxpayers elect them to lobby local interests? Aren’t they paid rather well to seek aid for cities, counties and schools – to get funding for aquariums, theaters and other non-profits that live up to that description? The real question is why taxpayers must pay twice to get the same service.
Like a three-eyed toad, the political system has been poisoned, morphing into a troubling monster that would rattle our founding fathers. That’s not to say lobbyists are corrupt. After all, Duluth city lobbyist Kevin Walli is a Denfeld grad who carried the pigskin alongside good ‘ole West Duluth boys like Mark Bibeau and Ernie Conito. But he’s among the expensive professionals who essentially have added another layer of costs and complications to democracy.
Where does it end?
Throughout the winter, education lobbyists pleaded their case in a related by slightly different venue. Education Minnesota, which represents 70,000 educators, purchased television ads suggesting viewers should tell their legislators that their top priority should be to fund public schools.
The union-funded ads didn’t cost taxpayers a nickel – or did they?
Giving top priority to public schools, of course, would push some other entity down the funding ladder. One example might be cities, or law enforcement, which is funded by cities. Facing competition from the massive educators’ union, cities feel the need to hire their own lobbyists. After all, voters aren’t happy when crime rises, which tends to happen when police funding is reduced.
On another level, county board commissioners also have a stake in the game. For if state aid is reduced, who will pick up the tab for ever-growing social service costs? So counties also need their own lobbyist.
The University of Minnesota is a sprawling animal that affects every corner of Minnesota. It can’t afford to watch while scarce state money is allocated to other entities. So it sends chancellors and others to St. Paul to represent its interests.
And so on. Without some legislative restraint, the system will feed on itself and spread like wildfire.
High development costs
Don’t expect Pawlenty to address a parallel situation that also wastes taxpayer dollars. It’s unlikely a Republican would condemn the massive amount of public money that’s spent to lure companies from one community to another, one state to another, even one country to another.
The original intent of publicly funded business incentives was to create jobs in America’s worst poverty pockets. But over the years, every community has painted itself as developmentally impaired, in an economic sense. As a result, public economic development has become an industry, and it’s a sinkhole for tax money. Every time a city hands out tax breaks, tax credits, TIF financing and the like, taxpayers pick up the tab.
Today, every city and every state plays the game – even though private investors at times haven’t even sought assistance. It happened last year in Superior. To create a new TIF district, the first occupant was given TIF assistance it didn’t need and hadn’t requested.
Economic development agencies, however, have become the darling of mayors, governors and legislators. Every time politicians use tax breaks to lure private development or redevelopment, they use the occasion to pose before cameras with private executives and union officials – and later with contractors and trade union reps – claiming credit for creating jobs. Yet reporters seldom provide critical analysis of the tax incentives, even though the devil is in the details.
Essentially, they allow politicians to paint themselves as heros and perpetuate incumbancy – all on your dime.
This story first appeared in the May 1 Reader Weekly.
If journalism is the Fourth Estate, then legislative lobbyists are the fifth, which is one too many – according to Gov. Tim Pawlenty.
About $35 million in taxpayer money was paid by local units of government between 2003 and 2007 to pros who wander the capitol promoting parochial needs – everything from publicly financed civic projects to aid for cities, counties, colleges and school districts..
Facing budget deficits, Pawlenty believes, local government could save a lot of money by firing their lobbyists, Minnesota Public Radio reported April 20. He even has support from some Democrats.
"We just think it's an expense that doesn't have to be there," DFL State Rep. Michael Paymar of St. Paul told MPR. Paymar, a former Duluth city councilor, also would prohibit state agencies and departments from spending tax money to lobby the legislature.
His opinion differs sharply from DFL Rep. Thomas Huntley, who once served with Paymar on the Duluth city council. Huntley told KBJR-TV “When we're down here, we don't talk to senators, we don't have time, yet we have to coordinate our actions and it's basically the lobbyists that run back and fourth and keep us informed by what the other body's doing."
Did Huntley really intend to suggest taxpayers should pay lobbyists to function as couriers between the House and Senate? Hopefully not, for it would be difficult to find more expensive labor to shuttle notes among lawmakers.
But that’s a minor issue, and so is the taxpayer cost to hire lobbyists. At issue is the role of state legislators. Don’t taxpayers elect them to lobby local interests? Aren’t they paid rather well to seek aid for cities, counties and schools – to get funding for aquariums, theaters and other non-profits that live up to that description? The real question is why taxpayers must pay twice to get the same service.
Like a three-eyed toad, the political system has been poisoned, morphing into a troubling monster that would rattle our founding fathers. That’s not to say lobbyists are corrupt. After all, Duluth city lobbyist Kevin Walli is a Denfeld grad who carried the pigskin alongside good ‘ole West Duluth boys like Mark Bibeau and Ernie Conito. But he’s among the expensive professionals who essentially have added another layer of costs and complications to democracy.
Where does it end?
Throughout the winter, education lobbyists pleaded their case in a related by slightly different venue. Education Minnesota, which represents 70,000 educators, purchased television ads suggesting viewers should tell their legislators that their top priority should be to fund public schools.
The union-funded ads didn’t cost taxpayers a nickel – or did they?
Giving top priority to public schools, of course, would push some other entity down the funding ladder. One example might be cities, or law enforcement, which is funded by cities. Facing competition from the massive educators’ union, cities feel the need to hire their own lobbyists. After all, voters aren’t happy when crime rises, which tends to happen when police funding is reduced.
On another level, county board commissioners also have a stake in the game. For if state aid is reduced, who will pick up the tab for ever-growing social service costs? So counties also need their own lobbyist.
The University of Minnesota is a sprawling animal that affects every corner of Minnesota. It can’t afford to watch while scarce state money is allocated to other entities. So it sends chancellors and others to St. Paul to represent its interests.
And so on. Without some legislative restraint, the system will feed on itself and spread like wildfire.
High development costs
Don’t expect Pawlenty to address a parallel situation that also wastes taxpayer dollars. It’s unlikely a Republican would condemn the massive amount of public money that’s spent to lure companies from one community to another, one state to another, even one country to another.
The original intent of publicly funded business incentives was to create jobs in America’s worst poverty pockets. But over the years, every community has painted itself as developmentally impaired, in an economic sense. As a result, public economic development has become an industry, and it’s a sinkhole for tax money. Every time a city hands out tax breaks, tax credits, TIF financing and the like, taxpayers pick up the tab.
Today, every city and every state plays the game – even though private investors at times haven’t even sought assistance. It happened last year in Superior. To create a new TIF district, the first occupant was given TIF assistance it didn’t need and hadn’t requested.
Economic development agencies, however, have become the darling of mayors, governors and legislators. Every time politicians use tax breaks to lure private development or redevelopment, they use the occasion to pose before cameras with private executives and union officials – and later with contractors and trade union reps – claiming credit for creating jobs. Yet reporters seldom provide critical analysis of the tax incentives, even though the devil is in the details.
Essentially, they allow politicians to paint themselves as heros and perpetuate incumbancy – all on your dime.
This story first appeared in the May 1 Reader Weekly.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Stories only good as the reporters who write them
By RON BROCHU
The Technology Village, Great Lakes Aquarium, OmniMax Theatre, a high-speed train to Minneapolis and the infamous Red Plan. Why do so many high-risk, costly public projects take flight in Duluth despite great odds for failure?
First and foremost, they’re funded by government money, which flows like water here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. So if a project isn’t successful, losses are simply covered by more government money, or tucked into a line item that escapes public attention.
But there’s also insufficient media scrutiny, and a tendency by media to partner up with project sponsors to gain a slice of the action –contractor-funded advertising spreads that typically accompany open houses.
One gut reaction would be to conclude editors, publishers and producers are telling reporters to back away from popular civic projects, but it doesn’t happen that way. The truth is that many journalists lack the skill and background to adequately report complicated financial stories. They’ll deny it, but it’s the unfortunate truth.
But don’t blame reporters. The problem runs all the way back to the institutions of higher learning that fail to provide them a broad educational background.
Journalism schools spend far too much time focusing on the glory and grandeur of reporting while failing to ensure students know the difference between an income statement and balance sheet, revenue and profit.
Math skills are equally weak, no matter the reporter’s pedigree. The number who can’t calculate the percent of change (for instance, the decrease in attendance from 2007-2008 at Great Lakes Aquarium) is astounding. Many journalists also graduate with no background in spreadsheets – the most basic software tool used in public and private accounting.
How many would know the difference between equity and commercial financing? Who would be able to analyze cash flow? How many could name Duluth’s top angel investors, and in which projects they hold a stake?
Such details would bore the hell out of most reporters, and probably baffle many of their supervisors. So it’s not surprising that few stories provide deep financial analysis of even the biggest, costliest projects.
Meanwhile, Duluth’s large collection of young novice reporters doesn’t have a pony in the race. They’ve never owned homes, so they haven’t experienced the joy of paying property taxes. They don’t have kids in school, so they don’t recognize the hassle of driving from downtown to Morgan Park to pick up an ill child, then back home to Duluth Heights in a mad dash that can last far more than a hour.
As an alternative, reporters interview project sponsors, who are all too aware of the media’s limitations. People like Superintendent of Schools Keith Dixon hold all the trump cards in most every discussion of the Red Plan – even though the project will cost nearly a half-billion dollars. He fully understands complicated financial plans; reporters can’t even navigate the index.
Psychological factors
Despite numerous accusations, editors seldom if ever tell reporters they can’t write about stories favored by civic leaders. But reporters face psychological barriers.
What Duluth News Tribune reporter in her right mind, for example, would propose to pen a critical analysis of the high-speed rail plan – for which DNT News Director Robin Washington has been the lead cheerleader? Looking back a few years, the same question could have been asked when Dean Jacobus was a Technology Village consultant while his wife was DNT publisher. Or later when DNT Publisher Marti Buscaglia chaired a task force to save the aquarium.
It’s unlikely News Tribune reporters would admit to such intimidation, but they raised concerns internally about relationships between company execs and project sponsors – and were consistently ignored.
Today, of course, there are fewer reporters than in the past to chase stories of high community interest, and the numbers keep declining.
On the TV side, streamlining is most evident in the KBJR-KDLH newsroom. It would take a high-power microscope to unveil any difference between news coverage provided on one channel versus the other.
In print, the News Tribune continues to cut, and the most recent layoff proved embarrassing. Days after it occurred, Forum Communications’ CEO Bill Marcil was credited in USA Today for saying his company is having “one of our best years ever” after making some necessary staff reductions. But in an April 10 internal memo, Forum President Lloyd Case said Marcil was misquoted. If true, Marcil was misquoted by the best. The USA Today column was written by Al Neuharth, who founded the nationwide newspaper. Marcil, by the way, married into the Forum fortune.
This story was published in the April 24 Reader Weekly
The Technology Village, Great Lakes Aquarium, OmniMax Theatre, a high-speed train to Minneapolis and the infamous Red Plan. Why do so many high-risk, costly public projects take flight in Duluth despite great odds for failure?
First and foremost, they’re funded by government money, which flows like water here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. So if a project isn’t successful, losses are simply covered by more government money, or tucked into a line item that escapes public attention.
But there’s also insufficient media scrutiny, and a tendency by media to partner up with project sponsors to gain a slice of the action –contractor-funded advertising spreads that typically accompany open houses.
One gut reaction would be to conclude editors, publishers and producers are telling reporters to back away from popular civic projects, but it doesn’t happen that way. The truth is that many journalists lack the skill and background to adequately report complicated financial stories. They’ll deny it, but it’s the unfortunate truth.
But don’t blame reporters. The problem runs all the way back to the institutions of higher learning that fail to provide them a broad educational background.
Journalism schools spend far too much time focusing on the glory and grandeur of reporting while failing to ensure students know the difference between an income statement and balance sheet, revenue and profit.
Math skills are equally weak, no matter the reporter’s pedigree. The number who can’t calculate the percent of change (for instance, the decrease in attendance from 2007-2008 at Great Lakes Aquarium) is astounding. Many journalists also graduate with no background in spreadsheets – the most basic software tool used in public and private accounting.
How many would know the difference between equity and commercial financing? Who would be able to analyze cash flow? How many could name Duluth’s top angel investors, and in which projects they hold a stake?
Such details would bore the hell out of most reporters, and probably baffle many of their supervisors. So it’s not surprising that few stories provide deep financial analysis of even the biggest, costliest projects.
Meanwhile, Duluth’s large collection of young novice reporters doesn’t have a pony in the race. They’ve never owned homes, so they haven’t experienced the joy of paying property taxes. They don’t have kids in school, so they don’t recognize the hassle of driving from downtown to Morgan Park to pick up an ill child, then back home to Duluth Heights in a mad dash that can last far more than a hour.
As an alternative, reporters interview project sponsors, who are all too aware of the media’s limitations. People like Superintendent of Schools Keith Dixon hold all the trump cards in most every discussion of the Red Plan – even though the project will cost nearly a half-billion dollars. He fully understands complicated financial plans; reporters can’t even navigate the index.
Psychological factors
Despite numerous accusations, editors seldom if ever tell reporters they can’t write about stories favored by civic leaders. But reporters face psychological barriers.
What Duluth News Tribune reporter in her right mind, for example, would propose to pen a critical analysis of the high-speed rail plan – for which DNT News Director Robin Washington has been the lead cheerleader? Looking back a few years, the same question could have been asked when Dean Jacobus was a Technology Village consultant while his wife was DNT publisher. Or later when DNT Publisher Marti Buscaglia chaired a task force to save the aquarium.
It’s unlikely News Tribune reporters would admit to such intimidation, but they raised concerns internally about relationships between company execs and project sponsors – and were consistently ignored.
Today, of course, there are fewer reporters than in the past to chase stories of high community interest, and the numbers keep declining.
On the TV side, streamlining is most evident in the KBJR-KDLH newsroom. It would take a high-power microscope to unveil any difference between news coverage provided on one channel versus the other.
In print, the News Tribune continues to cut, and the most recent layoff proved embarrassing. Days after it occurred, Forum Communications’ CEO Bill Marcil was credited in USA Today for saying his company is having “one of our best years ever” after making some necessary staff reductions. But in an April 10 internal memo, Forum President Lloyd Case said Marcil was misquoted. If true, Marcil was misquoted by the best. The USA Today column was written by Al Neuharth, who founded the nationwide newspaper. Marcil, by the way, married into the Forum fortune.
This story was published in the April 24 Reader Weekly
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Red plan angst spreads into business community
By RON BROCHU
A Duluth real estate broker rang her hands last week when discussing the housing market. Bad enough that home sales have slowed to a trickle, but the school district’s Red Plan has many potential buyers wondering if they want their kids in Duluth public schools at all.
“Everyone is checking out private and parochial schools,” because they don’t like what ISD 709 proposes to offer," the broker said. People don’t want their kids bused across town, and they don’t want them bouncing between different schools each time Superintendent Keith Dixon tries to expedite Red Plan implementation. Those factors have made it more difficult to market homes in neighborhoods that traditionally had nearby schools.
“The board knows they have to push the plan forward now, because they’ll all be voted out of office at election time. People are livid!” the broker lamented.
Quite possibly, a court decision also could force district officials to rethink their strategy, which in essence has been to sidestep their own bidding rules and derail public input, opponents say. In a civil court action, Harry Welty, Laurence Burda, Dean Davidson, Robert Sershon and Art Johnston are challenging the school district’s right to give Johnson Controls Inc. a no-bid contract to provide professional services to implement the construction. Case law suggests such arrangements are illegal, Welty said.
According to a Dec. 14, 2006, letter from Johnson Controls to school district property and risk manager Kerry Leider, Johnson will receive 18.8 percent of construction costs as a management fee.
This is the plan Budgeteer columnist Ralph Doty on Sunday deemed “visionary.” In his column, he argued it will stimulate Duluth’s economy by creating construction jobs, even suggesting opponents would stall local economic progress while in the depths of an economic abyss – as if the Red Plan wasn’t divisive enough without adding fear-mongering to the equation. Fortunately, most people understand an alternative plan also would stimulate the construction industry.
In the same column, Doty also suggested Duluthians support the Red Plan three-to-one. If that were true, of course, board members wouldn’t fear submitting the $400+ million project to referendum, as the school district’s own hand-picked citizens’ panel recommended. But Dixon refused, alienating even staunch supporters. He knows the Red Plan doesn’t offer what people want at a price they can afford.
It promotes just the opposite, in fact. Under former Superintendent Julio Almanza, the school district hosted a weekend-long session to solicit community input. Smaller schools topped the priority list.
Today’s plan, however, is to build larger buildings and transport more kids than ever at a time when fuel costs are destined to climb. Moving forward, a growing share of taxpayer dollars will go toward busing instead of teaching.
There are numerous other flaws:
• The biggest mistake is dumping the Central High School-Secondary Technical Center complex and its surrounding fields. The site has space for parking, for athletics, and it’s centrally located. Best of all, it’s isolated from homes. Constant traffic and student frolicking pose no problem.
• Conversely, the miniature footprint at Ordean, the district’s next high school site, promises to disappoint. If developed as proposed, neighbors will display the same angst as those who formerly resided across West Fourth Street from Denfeld. For decades, they screamed about students disrespecting their property, which was sandwiched between the school and a Grand Avenue fast food joint. For years, wimpy Denfeld administrators refused to acknowledge the problem, much less address it.
• Stuffing 1,100 kids into each of two proposed middle schools creates an unruly situation when kids are at a volatile age. Parents whose children have attended Woodland, for example, heard constant talk about fights at the school, which for years has been packed like a can of sardines.
The fatal flaw, however, is the district’s relationship with Johnson Controls, opponents argue. Like many consultant deals, it encourages the contractor to find “problems,” real or imagined, Welty said.
Despite legal and other concerns, Dixon and school board supporters are digging in their heels, refusing to acknowledge the growing heap of concerns.
Lawsuit plaintiffs have called for an expedited trial schedule, arguing “…between now and the time of trial, untold amounts of taxpayer money may be spent on an unlawful contract.”
Author Ron Brochu archives his stories at www.ronbrochublog.com.
Story was originally published in the March 28 Northland Reader.
A Duluth real estate broker rang her hands last week when discussing the housing market. Bad enough that home sales have slowed to a trickle, but the school district’s Red Plan has many potential buyers wondering if they want their kids in Duluth public schools at all.
“Everyone is checking out private and parochial schools,” because they don’t like what ISD 709 proposes to offer," the broker said. People don’t want their kids bused across town, and they don’t want them bouncing between different schools each time Superintendent Keith Dixon tries to expedite Red Plan implementation. Those factors have made it more difficult to market homes in neighborhoods that traditionally had nearby schools.
“The board knows they have to push the plan forward now, because they’ll all be voted out of office at election time. People are livid!” the broker lamented.
Quite possibly, a court decision also could force district officials to rethink their strategy, which in essence has been to sidestep their own bidding rules and derail public input, opponents say. In a civil court action, Harry Welty, Laurence Burda, Dean Davidson, Robert Sershon and Art Johnston are challenging the school district’s right to give Johnson Controls Inc. a no-bid contract to provide professional services to implement the construction. Case law suggests such arrangements are illegal, Welty said.
According to a Dec. 14, 2006, letter from Johnson Controls to school district property and risk manager Kerry Leider, Johnson will receive 18.8 percent of construction costs as a management fee.
This is the plan Budgeteer columnist Ralph Doty on Sunday deemed “visionary.” In his column, he argued it will stimulate Duluth’s economy by creating construction jobs, even suggesting opponents would stall local economic progress while in the depths of an economic abyss – as if the Red Plan wasn’t divisive enough without adding fear-mongering to the equation. Fortunately, most people understand an alternative plan also would stimulate the construction industry.
In the same column, Doty also suggested Duluthians support the Red Plan three-to-one. If that were true, of course, board members wouldn’t fear submitting the $400+ million project to referendum, as the school district’s own hand-picked citizens’ panel recommended. But Dixon refused, alienating even staunch supporters. He knows the Red Plan doesn’t offer what people want at a price they can afford.
It promotes just the opposite, in fact. Under former Superintendent Julio Almanza, the school district hosted a weekend-long session to solicit community input. Smaller schools topped the priority list.
Today’s plan, however, is to build larger buildings and transport more kids than ever at a time when fuel costs are destined to climb. Moving forward, a growing share of taxpayer dollars will go toward busing instead of teaching.
There are numerous other flaws:
• The biggest mistake is dumping the Central High School-Secondary Technical Center complex and its surrounding fields. The site has space for parking, for athletics, and it’s centrally located. Best of all, it’s isolated from homes. Constant traffic and student frolicking pose no problem.
• Conversely, the miniature footprint at Ordean, the district’s next high school site, promises to disappoint. If developed as proposed, neighbors will display the same angst as those who formerly resided across West Fourth Street from Denfeld. For decades, they screamed about students disrespecting their property, which was sandwiched between the school and a Grand Avenue fast food joint. For years, wimpy Denfeld administrators refused to acknowledge the problem, much less address it.
• Stuffing 1,100 kids into each of two proposed middle schools creates an unruly situation when kids are at a volatile age. Parents whose children have attended Woodland, for example, heard constant talk about fights at the school, which for years has been packed like a can of sardines.
The fatal flaw, however, is the district’s relationship with Johnson Controls, opponents argue. Like many consultant deals, it encourages the contractor to find “problems,” real or imagined, Welty said.
Despite legal and other concerns, Dixon and school board supporters are digging in their heels, refusing to acknowledge the growing heap of concerns.
Lawsuit plaintiffs have called for an expedited trial schedule, arguing “…between now and the time of trial, untold amounts of taxpayer money may be spent on an unlawful contract.”
Author Ron Brochu archives his stories at www.ronbrochublog.com.
Story was originally published in the March 28 Northland Reader.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Rolex revolutionaries buy freedom at bike store
By RON BROCHU
Four decades after their movement failed, former hippies are trying to recreate their past aboard loud, fast Hogs.
That thought emerged a thousand times at the Feb. 14 International Motorcycle Show in Minneapolis. The event was jammed with aging throwbacks who, after raising a passel of kids, are donning leather and straddling Harleys.
It’s not always a pretty picture. Come look: There’s Bill Clinton in a head wrap sizing up a Road King, and Hillary checking out leather vests in the apparel booth. By impersonating Sonny Barger, the legendary Hell’s Angels figurehead, aging Americans are searching for a counterculture Nirvana, that mythical place nobody quite found Back In The Day, when it became easier to drop out and turn on than to redefine the American Dream.
A $20,000 bike, of course, is just an expensive symbol. Like a Stratocaster, it’s worthless in the wrong hands. And face it: Most Harleys are in the hands of overstuffed execs who trailer their bikes to Sturgis behind Escalades, riding them just the last few miles – after they swap their monogrammed shirts for brand-name leather costumes. If confronted by real bikers, they wouldn’t survive the first blow to their capped teeth.
Nonetheless, prosperous suburbanites don’t embarrass easily. They’re cool with buying freedom at a bike store, hideously resembling Fred and Ethel Mertz wrapped in cowhide.
It’s just the latest form of escapism in a society hell-bent on having fun while Washington burns. Earlier came snowmobiles and ATVs – machines well suited for a society awash in cheap fuel and environmental disregard. Ignored were loftier goals, such as being good citizens by monitoring the political process, running for office and forcing incumbents into early retirement.
Our disregard has been our downfall. It’s been a fine party, but let’s be clear: While we played, our country putrefied.
Tardy or too late?
Real freedom can’t be purchased, nor can respect. You have to fight for both, but at some point, Americans stopped fighting for anything that didn’t involve personal pleasure or amusement.
Duluthians, for instance, have spent more time haggling over the Lakewalk extension than street repair, expended more effort to saving Lake Superior Zoo than ridding the harbor of invasive species. Our priorities are completely whacked.
On a broader front, the American Dream ran amok, with a majority of people refusing to accept personal responsibility for our collective plight. Instead, we’ve sought pleasure through role play, whether aboard a lightning-fast sport bike, playing Guitar Hero or mindlessly gaming on cell phones. Sure as sunrise, we disregarded all need to sacrifice for the common good.
Just one question: Is it too late to change? Can decades of high life and cheap decadence be reversed? Is America ready?
Hell no.
• Higher state and federal taxes? You’ve got to be kidding! We want to pay less and complain more.
• Reduced public employee benefits? Go fish! Public employee unions control City Hall and care less about taxpayers, despite looming deficits.
• Mainstream media owned and operated by locals rather than carpetbaggers? Much needed, but it ain’t gonna happen.
• Muffled Harleys? Don’t bet your sweet earplugs! The stairway to badass heaven will remain surrounded by thunder.
Yet, we’re at a tipping point. Something must change. Even cheap Nirvana is too costly as the country teeters on bankruptcy. And the worst is yet to come.
• The next shock will appear on our first quarter 401(k) statements. As If December results weren’t bad enough, the markets have dived every time President Obama unveiled new bailout initiatives. Pensions are dwindling faster than hope.
• As unemployment soars, millions inch closer to credit card default. That could be the final straw for big banks that already are destined to topple. How many bailouts can our great grandchildren afford?
• Domestic automakers are destined to fail without a significant infusion of public money. While Detroit seems far away, it’s the major consumer of Minnesota’s iron ore. If one of the big three go under, the regional economy will be slapped hard.
Where do we ride now? Have you heard of the dreaded high-side crash? Hope you wore a helmet and chaps.
FULL DISCLOSURE:Author Ron Brochu rides a 1990 Harley XL1200, which spends more time in repair than on the road, thanks to hideously poor design. But it’s cheap transportation and easy to fix. Brochu archives his articles at www.ronbrochublog.com.
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