VOICES June '08 Issue is out - State College School Board Interviews

Voices,

Nice job not adding hype or bs to the report!!!!  Love it.  It highlights that Mr. Hutchinson actually thinks that the new board is "hiding something."  Where did this idea of "developer interests" originate?  

Geez.....Okay - I read it wrong.  It should have read "it is hiding something" to be more accurate.  A district is not a "they," it is an "it."  The sentence was a little confusing.  The subject is "the new school board" so when he said later "or they are hiding something" I thought he was referring back to the subject.  I'm not instigating anything.  Maybe I'm just used to being part of a general group of people who have been repeatedly falsely accused of having terrible hidden motives and just thought this was more of the same.

When I read the campaign finance reports, I saw developers on both sides.  I saw at least three or four that I know of on the team of the future side - yet, this fact was not highlighted in any article.  So, I still don't know why it is only the change side that is presumed to have developer interests.

Oh, please...... 

"That Dog Don't Hunt!" 

That was a rumor started by the old board to rationalize the public opposition to their ill-conceived plans for renovating the high school.  It's feels better to believe you are fighting a highly organized, well financed pressure group backed by Republican developers with questional motives than to accept the fact that your plans and your behaviors are unacceptable to the parents and taxpayers in the community.  Soccer Moms don't make as compelling adversaries.

The takeaway I got from the latest Voices article is that the new board members all expressed a desire to work cooperatively for the good of the school district.  The old board members don't seem to express a similar commitment to teamwork. 

I thought Bob Heisse was the only one around here with that low of an opinion of his readers.

Dear Suzan,

Here is what you wrote in your "money talks" post yesterday:

"First of all, I spent a ridiculous amount of my own time studying those campaign finance reports and the last thing Mimi did was pour money into the campaign! Putting one's name to a committee doesn't pay for mailings and push polls."

Here is what you published in your October 2007 article:

"The financial winner on the incumbents' side is Mimi Barash coopersmith, honorary chairwoman of Team for the Future.  Her company, the Barash Group, had pulled in $7571 of the $9914 spent by the campaign as of the June reporting deadline."

Any clue about how both of these statements could be true?  Before you get all indignant over my terrible "assumption" that Mimi donated money, maybe you should go and re-read your own article - which is where I got that information!

I don't mean to instigate anything or make you waste any more of your valuable time.  I just want to point out that maybe some of us are only "misinformed" because we read Voices.

This is a really great cover! I think one thing that sticks out for me at least about this cover, what makes it different and "attention grabbing" is that this is a picture of people with the whole rift theme and even a rip running through the page (thanks to Anne Marie).

In a way, this cover says to me "action", without there being explicit physical action in the photo, which is way cool.

Now, I'm not saying that pictures of people on the cover of Voices is unusual - not at all. And I wouldn't really be able to comment on that, because I've only been aware of Voices, having volunteered for them, for the last 12 months, so I wouldn't know about the covers before that.

Anyway, this is a great shot, and great photo shopping work here.

I know that the paper perhaps can't always find "action" shots like this - in recent months, the paper has had cows on the front, for the milk labeling story, which was a great cover (with the caption - too cool) for that issue. But, in other issues, we've had horses on the front, or a stream, or, I think fireworks, and several months ago, it was a Back to School type banner running across a store in a picture - and that particular cover didn't do it for me.

I still say one of my favorite recent covers was the shot of the painting with a bloody Jesus -- awesome.

The paper is only getting better, and in a way, edgier.

I'm all about getting people's attention, and stirrin' them up - a great cover helps to do this - and, covers like this and the Jesus one, and the cow one, are controversial, yes, and that's what is going to get even younger people, in their early to mid twenties to [hopefully] pick up a copy of this paper for the first time in their lives.

I periodically hope that Voices will be the newspaper in the community where we can get good news - news that is served up objectively and without an agenda.  When I continue to read that people with money are bad and their motives are suspect ESPECIALLY if they vote Republican, it is just more of the same that I can read at the CDT.  What this community needs is even and balanced coverage of local issues without the spin of any viewpoint - liberal or conservative.  Both sides of the school board election had money backing it or had people making money off of it.  The CDT made a profit on feeding the controversy. The major difference between the campaigns was that those without money voted for change whereas only those with money or ties to the Borough voted for the incumbents.   Why do people want to ignore that?

You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away men's initiative and
 independence.
You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should
do for themselves.

 ---Abraham Lincoln

YYY, thanks for making my point for me. It is precisely that Mimi's company MADE money off the campaign - she didn't DONATE money TO the campaign (well, she did but it was something miniscule like $200 I think). And for everyone who claims that report was biased, no one until now at least has ever pointed out that we reported that. 

So that's the difference - she may have lent her name, but her financial support was effectively nil. Compare that, as we did, to the stack of $700 checks the PAC supporting the "change" candidates collected.  

Susan,    

     I agree with some of your points but you forget one thing. “We” did not win anything. The community won by the abortion of an ill fated plan and the removal of five board members who forgot that they were elected by and reported to a whole community (outside the Borough). By the “you won” statement, it once again becomes a binary position (black/white, good/bad, Republican/Democrat, etc.) The difference in the board today (4/5) is that they hold conflicting philosophies from what I can tell.

1) Changing old business practices and following the documented procedures – The old board members are slow to change (actions, policies, ideas, etc.) for several reasons and then only seem to follow procedures when it “fits the bill”.

2) The role of a board member - The old board members seem to rarely question actions by the administration or the CACs. As a board member, one should not abdicate responsibility.

3) How to value the community - The community was mostly ignored by the old board unless the people speaking were part of the correct group.     

     I thought that this month’s article was quite good but it is hard to make up for the October issue when your opening statement was: “If money talks, a handful of very wealthy Centre Countians will soon be running the State College Area school board. But to what end?” This was the same issue where you printed a nice opinion piece by Rick Madore but neglected to ask/interview/tell the Change candidates about the lead article where you presented a position that they were under the control of developers. You argued that you did not need to ask the candidates as the article was not about them and I argued the opposite. I am still not sure how you can write an article about the motives of five individuals, state that they are under the control of others and then say that the article is not about them. Your article prompted me to draft my opinion piece which you printed (Thank You).

     As the campaign manager for Mr. Madore, I too followed the money. Let us look at some of the highlights from the reports filed in October:

Challengers:

1) The Challengers (individual campaigns) each raised funds ranging form $1,540 to $6,207 for a total of $17,502.

2) The Citizens for Better Solutions PAC raised $36,663

Incumbents:

1) The Incumbents did not raise any funds by themselves as everything was run via the PACs

a) The Citizens for Constructive Progress PAC raised $873

b) The Team of the Future PAC raised $20,627

c) The Save Our Schools PAC raised $6360

     The Incumbents raised $27,860 and the Challengers raised $54,165. The largest entities that received funds were the Barash Group and State Street Strategies (both paid for by PACs and both large marketing entities). The difference in funding was mostly by the donations of 18 donors who gave from $1000-$3000 to the Citizens for Better Solutions (CBS) PAC.    

The Challengers did run a campaign separate from the PAC (unlike the Incumbents). The candidates did not agree with all of the decisions by CBS and we had limited insight into most of their functions. Did we take direct funding from CBS, yes…for the yard signs (~$1300 as I remember but would need to check my files). We benefited from some of their independent actions (big road signs) and were damaged by others (a silly phone poll). Like many political parties and campaigns, I think we agreed about the outcome (winning five seats) but disagreed on the route to take. I am not here to defend/explain CBS’s actions but I can offer my position. As a former candidate and a manager, Mr. Zaborney (State Street) approached us to offer his support and was rejected. His track record was not solid, he did not pass the smell test in my opinion and his services were way overpriced. He found a home with the PAC who wanted to employ his services. A PAC can support or attack with/without the “approval” of a candidate. I am sure that none of this will matter to you or some of your readers but it is the truth. If I did not know the details, I too might make the same judgment.

     In summary, the election is over but your initial article was a key piece of marketing that the Incumbents/SOS Campaign used as gospel. Just as Bill stated that he supported Dr. Hendrickson/Jim Leous and he wished that Voices had invited the Challengers to speak (after the fact of them winning the election), I supported the Challengers and wished that your article had gotten a bit more of the facts from the other side (i.e. the people whose reputation you attacked). Your article propagated a myth that has proven not to be true and will continue so.

     As a reader, I am just wondering when the retraction will be printed as this has nothing to do with winning or losing but rather being ethical and running a paper according to standards? I am not attempting to attack you or the paper but this is my belief on this matter. To date, this is the only issue that I have experienced with Voices. All of my other interactions have proven your paper to be open and responsive.

Eric

Eric - we stand by that story - every word of it. We checked our facts; we did the math. I personally interviewed the people and I stand by what they told me and what my notes reflect. Could we have done more? Yes, always the answer with us is yes...if we'd had more time. If we had more resources. If we had full time reporters. We could have interviewed many more people...and I wish we had, though the candidates, once again, were not at the top of that list for me. I do wish I had interviewed some of the donors, even if all they were to tell me was "no, we had no intention whatsoever to sway anyone's vote. No we have no stake in this...we just want to be a part of the proces..." and all that other stuff I'm used to hearing in similar situations. but again, the clock was ticking and working against me in a big way that week. I remember it, and trust me, it wasn't a pleasant sight...but we had a story, based on the contributions, and that's what we printed.

But the truth is the paper HAS a system in place for readers who believe stories we print are incomplete, wrong, misleading etc. That is the Opinion section. We have never turned down anyone in the school board debate and in fact have bent over backwards to reach out and invite them to write. Some of your folks misguidedly believe we make money off the debate so would not write to the paper. Some just decided to walk off and sulk, or make their charges, innuendo and insults anonymously on these Web pages. That's their choice, but the paper's pages have been open to them to do just what you did here, and you did at the time. They could've all descended on those pages (though truth to tell, at some point we have to deal with the cost of printing a larger paper, but we never had to deal with that problem, so no telling how it would have turned out).

So please don't throw "ethical standards" at me. people start crying "ethics" and "check your facts" when they disagree with what the facts tell us, when we choose to state facts they wish just didn't exist and when we choose to focus on a part of the picture they wish would remain fuzzy. you're not the only one. talk to the folks over at PSU about the milk story we ran. Talk to Clearwater about the Spring Creek manure spreading agreement fact that we ran.

Thank you for your compliments over time, and for your level-headedness. While we disagree on most things, most if not all of our dealings have been civil, and that goes a long way in my book. But you will not get a retraction from Voices for that story or anything in it, and you (well, not you because you've moved out of town) but local folks are always welcomed to write to the paper, with their real names and addresses, and we'll print their responses to our stories so long as we've got the room (aka resources) to do so. And if we don't we'll be sure they go up here.

First, I appreciate Voices having this forum. We should all encourage participation by others here and support this paper.  Thank you, Voices.

Suzan, about the election, you are right to say that the Change side won.  However, unlike the situation that would be in place if the Team of the Future had won, the new members do not constitute a voting block. The new members appear to be voting on their own understanding of what is best for the community.  Proof of that would be the BB gun issue and our waste of $100,000 for a suspect concession stand, issues where only one person needs to be the swing vote.  In contrast, the behavior, mantras and voting records of the old members is remarkably in unison.  So far, the  "developer interests" have been nowhere to be seen, at least not from the new board members.  

About your call to move on, I would be thrilled to do so and focus our attention on the issues that currently face our school district, but as long as some continue to imply sinister motives by anyone associated with the Change movement or any of the new board members, that cannot happen.  Those inaccurate and offensive comments should be challenged with fact at every turn.  The reason, quite simply, is that the old board is gearing up for the next election.  There have been numerous attempts by the old board members and their supporters to belittle and make the new members look bad, all with an eye on the next election.  Their idea is to harass this board and place the blame on the “newbies”.  The never-ending game of “gotcha” is being played by the old members, but not by the new members.  (Roll tape on the "Sunshine Act" comments or the Grimes replacement process.  It goes well beyond the issue being discussed)  Supporting the new members are those who aggressively question the behavior of the old board members,  who for the most part they use more facts and less rumors in their their statements.  Sometimes the comments are a little more harsh than what I would say, but they do have the right to say what they want.  Hutch and his supporters have the opportunity to address those facts, Hutch in his very own in his "forum for dialogue".   They have largely refused to do so.  That is also their right, but Hutch's choice to ignore simple questions leads to further suspicion.  And when it is a topic such as not questioning the identity(ies) of the donors to whom you just matched $100,000 of taxpayer money, I would assume that he must be welcoming the abuse that is heaped upon him.

About the election itself, the public was outraged at the "Old Board' board prior to the election.  You could see that at the board meetings, public meetings and the Act 34 forum.  You couldn't miss the frustration.  With over 80% of the population wanting “change” (small “c”), why would it surprise anyone that that opponents would raise more money that those supported by very few?  You stated that the Change people raised significantly great amounts of money that the incumbents.  By looking at the electorate, it should have been much more than that, taking into consideration the outrage felt by many in the community and the sheer numbers of those looking for a new direction.  Clearly these numbers were not as disproportionate as some seem to think.  Also, if I were treated as poorly in public as those who dared question the absolute authority of the board were treated, I would have given more much money and worked even harder than I actually did to get them out.  Personal?  Sure.  Unlawful or unethical?  No.  To say or imply that the new members were somehow bought, or the donors who wanted change had evil motives, or that this community is filled with easily led sheep or pawns who can be swayed by a flyer or a phone call is unbelievably insulting.  This is a smarter and more informed community than that.  

Suzan, I agree that it’s time to move on to the present and future.  But as long as some are misstating or misunderstanding the past, it is a difficult thing to do.  

Regards,

D6