DPS Bond Mileage is Proposal S

Detroit Public Schools $500.5 million bond mileage proposal was be on the ballot this November as Proposal S. While the proposal won’t increase the taxes of the city, don’t be fooled residents into thinking this won’t cost us nothing because it will cost something. All the money will not be paid for by stimulus and bonds because a part of it will come from us the tax payers. Still eighteen Detroit Public Schools will be revamped or renovated within three years under a $500.5 million bond proposal the district will ask voters to approve in November. State appointed Emergency Financial Manager Robert said among the construction plans: tear down and rebuild Martin Luther King Jr. Senior High School for $54.5 million; demolish and rebuild Chadsey High School for $41.5 million; and tear down and rebuild Finney High School for $53.4 million. The construction overhaul is possible under the federal stimulus act, which will allow the district to borrow a portion of the money at no interest and with no tax increase to voters, according to the district. If approved, the tax rate would remain at 13 mills.

"The opportunity to modernize and secure our buildings, provided through federal stimulus funds, will help us continue the academic transformation taking place in the Detroit Public Schools," said Emergency Financial Manager Robert C. Bobb. The district's Aug. 13 application to the state for the bond program was approved. Under state law, district voters must approve any school bonds. If voters turn down the proposal, the district would lose its stimulus allocation from the federal government, the sixth highest amount among school districts in the country, Bobb said. However that shouldn’t be believed because that stimulus money was slated to go to DPS regardless of how this bond mileage turns out. So Detroit shouldn’t be tricked into scare tactics such as us losing stimulus allocation from the federal government if we turn down Proposal S.

The construction proposal is central to the district's academic vision to modernize school buildings with the most up-to-date technology, Bobb said. It will also support the district's effort to transform high schools to smaller learning communities. The plan calls for $314.9 million in new construction; $165.2 million in renovation; and $19.9 million for decommission and demolition. The projects would generate at least 3,725 direct jobs and 7,000 indirect jobs, according to the district. Community meetings will be held after the start of the school year to allow for input in neighborhoods where schools would be recommended for closure for the following school year. Bobb will establish an oversight committee to review every aspect of the ongoing construction and funding to ensure accountability, something that was lacking in the district's 1994 $1.5 billion bond issue, he said.

"Because we believe this project is so important to enhancing learning environments for Detroit's schoolchildren, we want to give voters full confidence in it," Bobb said. "That means making the process fully transparent and open to review. An oversight committee will ensure that." The combination of new schools, closures and renovations will allow a net reduction in overall capacity of the school district of nearly 1 million square feet and more than 10,000 seats through the start of the fall 2013 school term, according to the district. Then, DPS would operate 19 fewer schools than it presently does. Annual fixed operating costs would be reduced by $12 million.

However what isn’t clear from the 10 page PowerPoint that Robert Bobb released to the media is what the actual academic master plan of the district is for at least the next 3 to 5 years. While building new state of the art buildings with laptops for every student and computers in the classroom with white boards and projectors is nice. It still is means nothing without a vision for what our youth will be taught and how the district will increase test scores. Speaking about increasing graduation rates and decreasing the drop-out rate is good to say but what is the vision and plan to do such things besides renovating old buildings or creating newer ones. Also what is unclear is how will the district determine which 60 schools will be decommissioned? These are the questions and concerns that need to be answered regarding the bond mileage proposal as well as what mechanisms will be put in place to prevention corruption and thief within the district as well as the city withholding previous bond money to pay off the city’s financial debts.

Thus for Detroiters to go to the polls on Tuesday, November 3 and vote yes on Proposal S would be malpractice when we as a district don’t have a vision or a plan for who will be in control of DPS after Bobb’s tenure ends next March as well as the academic plan for the district as well as how the district will decide which 60 schools will be closed and decommissioned within the next 5 years. These are the issues that need to be addressed before we the voters of the city of Detroit sit up here and pass a bond mileage that sounds good but the future of the plan is the unclear part that could lead to the district being in even more chaos than it is now. While everyone wants newer and better schools in Detroit but we can’t do it without knowing the mechanism of how to prevent fraud, corruption and thief as well as the delaying of the city of Detroit from giving the school district its bond money to fix, improve and maintain a stable a functional educational environment for the youth of Detroit.

These are the issues put before us the residents of Detroit and while would want to think that if we vote no to Proposal S that DPS would lose federal dollars but that is so far from the truth that it is shameful for Bobb or the news media to say such a thing. Also the fact that interest rate on the Build America bonds will be determined by our current bond rating which is negative should make Detroiter’s worried because we could be paying off this bond passage for at least 20 years due to the fact our district is not on good footing to begin with. Then again, the Qualified School Construction Bonds would have to be paid back by us the residents of Detroit so for the news media to report that Proposal S won’t cost us the residents of Detroit nothing is media spin.

Detroit, we can’t be misinformed and uneducated on Proposal S because the truth is that there are too many questions regarding this proposal. Detroit, we can’t allow another bond mileage to get passed that has too many gaps and flaws in it that could result in more money being tossed toward a problem that won’t solve the academic issues plaguing the district. Money alone won’t fix Detroit Public Schools but money along with an academic plan rather than a vision that is unclear in terms of what academics will be taught and what programs will be implemented is what Detroit’s school children need. DPS needs leadership and an academic plan to accompany the bond mileage but at this current time Detroit has neither, thus why should we invest in spending more money on new schools and renovating old ones without knowing who will be here to oversee how the money will be spent yet alone how the district will go about decommissioning 60 schools of the 171 schools that still exist in the district. Until these answers are given in a clear and concise format than let’s say “NO” to Proposal S.

Funding for the program:
• The federal government has allocated $246.5 million under the Qualified School Construction Bonds directly to the district for 2009 and 2010. Detroit residents will be asked to vote to take advantage of the opportunity. DPS will only have to pay back the principal on this zero-interest bond, Bobb said.
• Another stimulus opportunity available only in 2009 and 2010 is Build America Bonds, allowing $254 million to be issued. The federal government would pay 35 percent of the interest on these loans, according to the state. The interest rate will be based not on the district's bond rating, but on the state's school bond loan program which as AA negative bond rating, according to a treasury department spokesman

Construction projects
Bethune Academy, $8,605,811, renovated facility
Brightmoor PK-8, $32,180,556, new facility
Chadsey High School, $41,488,148, new facility
Cooley High, $8,306,132, renovated facility
Denby High School, $24,819,339, renovated and/or new facility
Duffield, PK-8 $8,578,108, renovated facility
Finney High School, $53,467,428, new facility
Ford High School, $20,594,893, renovated and/or new facility
JR King PK-8, $15,896,250, renovated facility
Marcus Garvey PK-8, $11,271,996, renovated facility
Mark Twain PK-8, $8,597,281, renovated facility
Martin Luther King, Jr. High School, $54,469,031, new facility
Maybury PK-8, $37,406,135, new facility
McNair PK-8, $21,979,291, new facility
Mumford High School, $54,746,160, new facility
Munger PK-8, $18,374,295, new facility
Northwestern High School, $26,870,380, renovated and/or new facility
Western International High School, $28,610,966, renovated and/or new facility
Source: DPS