{"id":3048,"date":"2013-11-11T16:40:00","date_gmt":"2013-11-11T21:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=3048"},"modified":"2013-11-11T16:40:00","modified_gmt":"2013-11-11T21:40:00","slug":"why-is-the-casd-rushing-to-buy-a-building","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=3048","title":{"rendered":"Why is the CASD rushing to buy a building?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Special meeting just weeks before new board members take office has rightly angered community<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h1>\n
\n

By Mike McGann<\/strong><\/span>,\u00a0Editor, The Times<\/span><\/em>
\n\"UTMikeColLogo-250x300\"<\/a>CALN \u2014 Elections, they say, have consequences.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why it\u2019s a little disturbing to see the Coatesville Area School District Board of Education in a seeming rush to buy a building for new administration offices.<\/p>\n

You see, in little more than a couple of weeks at least three new school board members will be sworn in to office, so it seems a little strange that a deal that locks those folks into paying millions for a new building over the next few years won\u2019t give them the opportunity to vote on the matter.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a whole host of reasons why you could argue against the purchase, from the state of the district\u2019s finances to reasonably questioning whether the district really has the managerial wherewithal to get into the health care business, when it is evident over the last few months, that this board and administration can\u2019t manage education or even their own personal conduct, let alone new ventures totally outside of their expertise.<\/p>\n

In their defense, they\u2019ll tell you that the Benner Administration Building \u2014 the old high school \u2014 is a money pit. And that health care costs \u2014 which by the way, in neighboring districts have either held fairly steady or slightly decreased in the last year or so \u2014 are bankrupting the district. And yes, standing outside of the building Monday, it seems like a very nice building, not far from the high school campus.<\/p>\n

Maybe that\u2019s all true. And I have to say \u201cmaybe\u201d because this board has slightly less credibility than the guy who makes the \u201cShamwow\u201d commercials. Of course, that\u2019s how it goes when you have a grand jury looking into your conduct.<\/p>\n

And even with giving the board the benefit of the doubt that all these are legitimate issues, why the rush?<\/p>\n

If this is the obviously right move, the new board members would \u2014 if shown the reasoning behind the deal \u2014 immediately jump at the chance, right? It\u2019s not like commercial real estate is really selling right now \u2014 and Thorndale has been kind of a particularly struggling area \u2014 so it\u2019s not like this building is going to be sold tomorrow if the district doesn\u2019t leap. An extra downside: buying the building cuts the tax base of the district (and Caln Township), and it seems unlikely that Benner, if ever sold, will come close to replacing it, meaning a permanent loss of real estate tax income for the township, school district and county, some of which will have to be made up for with higher taxes.<\/p>\n

This is an educated guess, but, I\u2019m thinking that there aren\u2019t five votes among the new board members to support this little venture, which makes the purchase highly suspect \u2014 and has already led to new expressions of public anger at this board.<\/p>\n

Residents and parents have asked, rightly, how the district expects to pay for this building at a time when education programs are being cut \u2014 and the district faces a spike in pension costs in the coming years, without even the wiggle room to raise taxes much, thanks to the Act 1 Index.<\/p>\n

We keep being told that capital expense money is different from operating expense money, which is more than a little disingenuous. Even if the money were sitting in an account from a previous bond issue, maybe it makes more sense to use it to pay down the ongoing debt service, rather than max out the credit card.<\/p>\n

Whatever this is \u2014 and it\u2019s not entirely clear \u2014 it is the exact opposite of being fiscally conservative. Or responsible. Or transparent.<\/p>\n

It also strikes me (among others) as odd that a district that needed a tax anticipation note to open the 2013-14 school year (the school district equivalent of a payday loan) has the cash lying around to buy a building. And just out of curiosity: we\u2019ve been looking for payments on that tax anticipation note, which comes due to PNC Bank on Dec. 15, and haven\u2019t seen any in the check registry, which is a little worrisome.<\/p>\n

As bad as things are, having the district run out of money in April \u2014 under the terms of the tax anticipation note, state funds automatically go to the bank until the note is repaid \u2014 and a state takeover of the school district would be an unmitigated disaster.<\/p>\n

Add in the fact that starting its own health care facility is a spectacularly bad idea \u2014 partnering with any number of local providers who actually know what they\u2019re doing would have been a smarter course \u2014 and once again it sure seems like the whole venture makes no sense whatsoever.<\/p>\n

Combined with the rushed nature of this move and it\u2019s hard to blame residents and parents for feeling like they\u2019re being dumped on again, with no accountability from their elected officials.<\/p>\n

This Board of Education needs to slow down, let its newly elected members take office, and start being frank about the financial shape of the district with residents, parents and taxpayers.<\/p>\n

Tabling this purchase Tuesday night would be a good start.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Special meeting just weeks before new board members take office has rightly angered community By Mike McGann,\u00a0Editor, The Times CALN \u2014 Elections, they say, have consequences. That\u2019s why it\u2019s a little disturbing to see the Coatesville Area School District Board of Education in a seeming rush to buy a building for new administration offices. You […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,14],"tags":[2166,100,945,2167,1147],"class_list":["post-3048","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-columns","tag-benner-administration-building","tag-board-of-education","tag-caln","tag-coatesville-area-school-district-casd","tag-thorndale"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3048","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3048"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3048\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}