American Editorial

The contentious debate about the appropriateness of hiring a private business restructuring firm to address the challenges of a dysfunctional bureaucracy and lagging scholastic achievement in the St. Louis public schools has been sobered by the announcement that the district is insolvent.
It is reality time. Interim Superintendent William V. Roberti says that without money from restricted settlement funds from a federal desegregation lawsuit, there will be no available dollars to cover general operating costs of the city's public schools including salaries and summer school that are due immediately.

The school board agreed on Tuesday to a brokered deal between Roberti and Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon that would inject up to $30 million or more of these restricted federal funds. This agreement is highly unusual and may not withstand a legal challenge. The district's federal crisis (mandated reserves for the district have been depleted) should temper some of the criticisms as the board desperately seeks to avoid a complete financial meltdown. Although final details are still not available, a variety of factors have contributed to the current financial crisis that is far worse than anyone anticipated. But this is no time for trying to establish blame.

The previous administration warned that there would be a budget deficit of more than $50 million. We are now told that that figure is likely to be up to $90 million. If that estimate is correct, the budget shortfall is 25 percent of the operating budget of approximately $360 million (the remaining revenues are restricted).

There is an obvious need for a broader public discussion about an ongoing strategy to improve operations and classroom instructional quality of the city's public schools. But, there is a need for reasonableness and forbearance to fashion the optimum response to the ominous threat to the educational futures of tens of thousands of our children. There are many stakeholders in the future of the public schools, but the threat is most serious for the students.

Any discussion will be largely moot if the district is unable to forestall bankruptcy, so the community must understand and accept the urgency of the current situation. The anxiety of parents and employees of the district is understandable, but the real difficulties, including the impending financial crash, that face public schools are deep and there will be no solutions without radical change.

Please, No Whining About How Poorly the City is Run

SLPS Lawsuit Filed

The Air and the Irony is Thick Enough to Cut With a Knife

A bumper sticker on an office door reads "A bad day at the lake is better than a good day at work." Inside that office, which was empty late Wednesday morning, are about 30 pictures of women in bikinis and other revealing garb, circa 1985. Above the photos, a magazine cutout reads "Black Starlets."

A floor below, where thousands of textbooks are stored, someone has scrawled "Book Worm Department." Over the bathroom, another sign: "Jimmy's Office."

The ancient freight elevator - which rumbles like a giant clearing his throat - has its own prose. "Clean me sometime?" one scribble suggests. On a faded sign describing workers' compensation rules, one word - "JOKE."

The problem though, Lanier said, is that it is not organized. Most warehouses, he said, assign inventory numbers which are arranged in sequential order. But at the warehouse, Lanier said, stack "4981" is next to "5175" which is next to "5269."

"Just in time" delivery, where supplies arrive just before they are needed rather than being stored.

Contracting with a distribution company.

Setting up a computer-based system that sends supplies right to the schools.

Armstead knows he is likely to lose his job if the management team shuts down the warehouse, perhaps as early as next week. Armstead doesn't hold that against the team members, though. They have a job, too, he says.

"But if your job affects other people," he said, "maybe you should get another job."

Lizz Brown's Cozy Relationship with the Old SLPS Board

The contract to promote the city district through on-air plugs and interviews ran from last fall to Jan. 31.

Financial Genius

The $91 million figure bandied about in other press reports is the estimated
operating deficit in December, before property tax receipts roll in in
January and February. An estimated payment of $22 million is due to the
pension fund in December. George said the board cannot pay December's bills with money it does not get until January, but according to pension fund trustees, board has done just that in the past: it would take out a short term bank loan in December and pay it back in February.

Errr Bill Roberti forgets about the Settlement Agreement

Do NOT CALL ME!

99 Salmonella Cases at Children's

Speaking of the CCC

Haas files an ethics complaint

SLPS Gadfly Olympics: Send Lithium

Every one of Moore's actions has been precipitated by the dysfunctional, unlawful, self-righteous, sanctimonious, hypocritical and self-serving actions of the four new board Nazis, whom you have a vested interest in defending. I don't see you writing scathing, foaming-at-the-mouth hyperbolic, disingenuous editorials criticizing them or asking them to resign.

Thank you Bill. Thank you for speaking up for me and supporting me after all the Post-Dispatch, the Danforth Foundation and Robert Koff, Mayor Francis Slay, the Hilgemanns and BJC have done to me.

As I said before, I believe in prayer, and since the Post-Dispatch and Christine Bertelson have attacked me, not only will I pray, but I call upon my colleagues and fellow believers all over this nation to pray for me.

SLPS Financial Crisis

"If all the spending had resulted in dramatic increases in student achievement, more pay and better working conditions for well-trained teachers, I would better understand. I'm not surprised or disappointed. Those words are too mild. I'm angry.

"To say that they spent money like drunken sailors is an insult to drunken sailors everywhere. At least drunken sailors spend money that they already have."

But interim Superintendent William V. Roberti said the district has gone through reserves of $51 million in three years and is now in a "liquidity crisis." The district may not even be able to meet its normal payroll, he said.

He says the management team's figure is misleading because its looks at spending month to month, rather than annually.

Ding-Dong the Ding Dong is retiring

Hammonds said the turnaround team is engaging in "psychological warfare," with tactics such as suspending all travel, even those trips paid for by outside sources such as federal grants.

Another CCC