Shady Spartanburg Election
BOND REFERENDUM RAISES MANY QUESTIONS … SCANT MEDIA FOCUS There’s a bond referendum on tYou must Subscribe or log in to read the rest of this content.
BOND REFERENDUM RAISES MANY QUESTIONS … SCANT MEDIA FOCUS There’s a bond referendum on tYou must Subscribe or log in to read the rest of this content.
35 comments
That’s right … they used public tax money to install a putting green at the bureaucrats’ private country club.
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What is wrong with that? If the Black school board members want entry to the club, they can always serve as caddies.
There will be a new polling place open in Spartanburg for this election.
The new polling station will be for males only and will be located deep in the confines of “The Loving Touch Massage Parlor and Grille,” next to Spartanburg Republican headquarters.
“The purpose of these new ballot boxes is not to limit voting, but to suck you in for new voting experience.” said one official.
“but to suck you in for new voting experience.” I saw what you did there!
Unlike the Democrats, the Republicans are offering new and inventive ways to “get the men out to vote.”
And the girls will even “pull” your lever.
It’s nice to have help at times.
As I understand it they are financing their annual maintenance cost. They are financing computers and other such technology for 15 or 20 years.
People, this is like financing your house on a credit card. Vote NO!
Just in at 2300 hrs.:
The referendum passed………….and not a single word on the Spartanburg Tea Party website……….that alone speaks volumes………..
They’re not about to report that they got their butts kicked. Note also that Barry Hull’s unsubstantiated rant has now disappeared from the internet. Can’t imagine why. ;-)
Whoever told you this lied to you.
Money is cheap so we are being urged by builders, bankers and lawyers to borrow. We don’t really need the money, but it is cheap. And beside, we want special interest to get rich.
The property was rezoned ten years ago for a significant development but the bad economy killed the project. Another example of how choice real estate in Spartanburg gets removed from the tax rolls by non-profits (Spartanburg Regional, Wofford, big churches, etc) and placing more burden on taxpayers. Back room arrangements typify “progress” in Spartanburg County. Local elected officials at various levels get in bed with investors, developers, architects, engineers and other people of influence. Not a new phenomenon, but the game continues to get more expensive and the taxpayers continue to take it in the shorts. The Dorman High School saga was the start of the Spartanburg County educational arms race in the late 1990’s and the price continues to escalate…
Only thing about Dorman “University” is that it was totally paid off within 5 years due to the sale of the “old” Dorman HS property which Walmart and others paid BIG bucks for…..
True, and the entire transaction was done in secret with significant payoffs to certain parties. Public input was ignored and suppressed. A perfectly useful facility was demolished instead of building another facility to accommodate growth. Now, there is a monolith where many students fall through the cracks but educators can take undue credit for accomplishments. Oh, and there is also a football stadium…
My question to any “educrats” would be: How can you quantify the quality of education with brick and mortar?
Get real, with all the growth surrounding the “old” Dorman I don’t blame District 6 a bit for selling the property.
Can you imagine what it would be like at the intersection of Blackstock Road and US 29/I-26 today if the “old” Dorman was still there?????
I used to live on that side of town and I don’t recall anyone being opposed to selling the property (except for sentimental reasons and even that was no big deal).
It was a win-win as far as I’m concerned
My kids got an excellent education at SHS and both attended a top 20 national university afterwards and did well. SHS is competing with Dorman for students. A few years ago they “spruced” up the high school but putting up a new facade and a fountain, yes a freaking fountain, in the main lobby. They also built a new athletic field that is too short and narrow to play any sport on. When asked about it, the district claimed it was only a practice field. Why then does the field have concession stands and ticket booths?
What else is not mentioned is that the demographics of District 7 are such that it now is an inner city school. For years they have wanted to merge with District 3 which is predominately white. A new school large enough for both high school populations is the one being planned.
What really pisses me off is that for years, teachers who left the district or retired were not replaced. Tommy White, the superintendent before Russel Booker, is still on the payroll at full salary. Want to be there for the kids and to improve their education? Hire more teachers to lower class sizes. I’ve never voted against a bond issue in my life, but I am now.
Among the many, many false statements in this post is one of the first. The New York Times hasn’t owned the Spartanburg Herald Journal since 2012.
What does the ownership of the newspaper have to do with anything? They still published extremely one sided views which any respectable news entity should avoid. What else do you challenge? This referendum is dishonest from the top down.
And who cares about what the staff of the dinosaur known as The Herald-Journal thinks anyway. The entity only serves as a vehicle to deliver last week’s news with grocery and fast food coupons. The website is loaded with so many ads that it is difficult to view. Real journalism is essentially dead, at least that genre is…
That’s just plain bullshit.
You think you’re going to get what happened in Spartanburg on WORD or that useless WSPA???
Oh I know, FITS can report what happened two months ago or maybe you can start your own blog and use the SHJ as a news source like FITS does with newspapers all the damn time…….
Soooo… You rely on the H-J for timely accurate news?
Name another source for in-depth coverage of local events, sports and news since you know so fucking much.
That 30 second burp on WORD talk radio or the crackerjack dime a dozen TV news “journalists” on WSPA, WYFF or WHNS-Fox that don’t know shit from shinola?
How about your average blog on the internet for non-partisan objective 100% accurate news????
Fuck, FITs couldn’t even get that the Spartanburg Herald Journal
has not been owned by the NYT for years!!!!!
Does your mother know you use that kind of language?
What else?
The mysterious unnamed board members with “direct financial conflicts”? Who would that be, exactly? The real estate agent on the board’s company GAVE UP the listing after learning of that the subject property might be in play to avoid any appearance of a conflict. The board member whose family had a construction business recused herself on the record and her family’s company didn’t get the contract anyway. So many lies. But FITSnews is happy to report them without any verification.
Will,
Thank you for giving this monstrosity of a boondoggle coverage. The current education environment in Spartanburg county is one of jealousy, corruption, and ineptitude.
Regarding district 7, it is a district on the downhill slide in terms of attendance demographics. The upper class students largely attend Spartanburg Day School (private) which is right in the center of the district, and very close to the traditionally wealthy area of Converse Heights. They have seen what is left of the upper middle class white population flee to districts 5 (Byrnes), 6 (Dorman), and to a lesser extent district 2 (Boiling Springs) if the family is athletically focused, or to districts 1 (Inman/Campobello) & 4 (Woodruff) if they wish to be in a “small town feel” district. Pretty much no one wants anything to do with district 3, ie: the redneck district.
Enter the corrupt school board. They are holding this election on a special election date. They have spent considerable resources lobbying the low income folks, and the district employees to vote in favor of the plan, and largely tried to keep everyone else blind to the existence of the special election. Goal being to have those that would benefit from the plant to be all for it, and those that would have to pay for it, blind to its existence.
District 5 tried to pull this same thing off a few years ago, and was fortunately shut down.
The big takeaway to me is that we need the state legislatures to pass a law forbidding such votes to take place any time other than a major election date, in November, on years when either the Governor or President is elected. Also, Spartanburg County needs a great deal of consolidation. I do not wish to see a single district setup like Greenville uses, as the local population looses much control over day to day operations, however going from 7 districts to 3-4 is more than feasible, and would save millions/year in administrative overhead.
Don’t count on any of the superintendents losing their jobs.
Your side lost tonight
Which districts do you want to merge? District 1 with #2?
Since Woodruff (district 4) borders 5 & 6 merge Woodruff?? Yeah, I’d like to see that!!!!!
How about 5 & 6 (Byrnes & Dorman)??? talk about fireworks!!!!!!!!!
I also take offense to you attitude about the good people of District 3 (Broome) – you know, the “redneck” district? Broome started off on the right foot back in 1980 and is a good school but since you are showing your superior side in looking down at them maybe you ought to run as District Superintendent since you know so fucking much…
I don’t think that any specific districts need to be merged outright. What needs to occur is to eliminate the current school district lines all together, and redraw them in such a way that makes sense geographically, without even considering “tradition.” The current lines are the educational equivalent of gerrymandering. There are folks (and school buses) driving from John Dodd Road, all the way to Dorman, all in the name of Tradition. At a minimum, districts 1 and 3 need to be absorbed into a combination of 2, 5, and 7, and Woodruff 4 probably would be best served being split between 5 & 6.
Regarding district 3, I am speaking more to the perception from everyone in the county other than those who go to Broome. It is no doubt a great school, but is very much known around the county as the rednecks, simply because that is where folks from cowpens & pacolet are zoned ( even thought hey have to drive right past district 7 schools to get there).
Right off the top, even if you don’t redraw any lines, and just administratively merge a few districts, the district 6 administration could easily absorb Woodruff, District 7 could absorb district 3 (this one IMO makes the most sense out of all the possibilities), and either 2 or 5 could absorb district 1. This would save millions/year in administrative payroll.
Some of the upper crust do send their kids to the white flight schools. But, the smartest kids are still at Spartan High.
Some of the upper crust do send their kids to the white flight schools. But, the smartest kids are still at Spartan High.
As far as the district lobbying the low income folks, you need to check the vote totals. The turnout was biggest in the middle and upper income areas. Those are the same areas where the referendum passed by the largest margins. In fact, 27 out of 33 precincts voted in favor of the referendum. Most of the precincts that voted against it were smaller boxes in lower income areas. The only middle/upper income box that voted against it only did so by 10 votes.
Also, the turnout was 23.8 percent. Not bad for any election in this area. Only 27 percent voted in the Republican presidential primary.
to compare it to a primary for a single party (especially republican) is off base, especially in district 7. What is the typical turnout for a presidential/governor’s race? This should be the target, and can easily be achieved by just holding the referendum on the general election ballot.
To get back to the main point at hand, was there any reason this vote needed to take place via special election, rather than waiting until November? Given the overall scope/proposed schedule for the project, moving it up 6 months rather than waiting on the general election, makes little sense, and would not have any real impact on the construction schedule. Not to mention, doing so would have saved the cost of running a special election. At a minimum, figure 3 pole workers per precinct, at $120.00/ea, and this is a completely unnecessary expenditure of $11,880.00 of taxpayer money, and in an effort to get more taxpayer money.
We can agree to disagree as to the merits of the bond itself. I personally feel that some sort of plan was needed, but this particular one was not the correct one, and there was simply no reason that voting needed to take place in March.
The vote should have been held in November. Period. There is no reason – other than suppressing votes – to hold the vote in March. It’s $180M. Despite dubious claims that construction costs may skyrocket, the city should have waited six months if it meant more voices would be heard. And though people may claim there’s nothing shady with the March vote, the school board should be above suspicion. Pompeia would likely agree.
Get your facts straight Will. N.Y. Times hasn’t owned the Spartanburg paper for a good number of years.
That’s what happens when you don’t have an editor!!!!