What's this "Annual Meeting" all about?

...only the best kept secret within the school district!
The school board TALKS about Community Engagement. Check that. Has anybody heard the board say ANYTHING about community engagement in the past 12 months except that they want to better engage the community?

What better way to "engage" the community, than to actively get residents to attend the annual meeting? In fact. When one sets a goal, they usually establish a benchmark and then a means of measuring whether or not they see improvement. One measure could be attendance at the annual meeting. Since right now it's at about a pitiful ONE TENTH of 1% of the voting age community.

So...what happens at an annual meeting?

1. The attendees vote to Elect a Chairperson to conduct the budget hearing and the annual meeting

2. Phil Frei, Deputy District Administrator – Business and Operations presents his Summary of the Budget.

3. Open the public hearing for discussion/review/ questions about the 2009 – 2010 budget.

4. Vote on what amount the electors want to set as annual salaries of School Board members for 2009-10. Currently at $3200 for board members and $3500 for the President.

5. Vote on the annual proposal to acquire and sell of real estate for the home construction program.

6. Entertain a motion and vote on the amount of property tax levy to be assessed by the school board for 2009-10 (they want to tax us about $46M, up 12.2% from last year, and adding about $1.28 to the mill rate).

There are a couple of other minor "2-minute" agenda items, but that is the meat and potatoes.

That's right. IF you attend, YOU (not the school board) get to:

• Decide how much to pay school board members. (How much have their efforts been worth?)
• Decide whether or not to purchase a specific lot for the school construction program.
• Decide HOW MUCH the school district is able to spend (set the tax levy). (Yeah...YOU decide that. This is YOUR ONE chance. If you don't approve the amount the district wants, the board must then go back and direct cuts to be made.)

But you have to attend to vote.
Monday October 12, 2009
7:00 pm
Sun prairie High School Auditorium

But the board and the district administration would rather you NOT come.
They'd rather you stay apathetic and don't attend meetings. You can grumble all you want about:
--- increasing property taxes,
---ridiculous raises for administration,
---lack of solid leadership within the school district,
---a school board that rubber stamps whatever Tim Culver wants rather than vote what the community wants,
---where the heck does all the money go?

As long as you do your grumbling privately in your home and don't vote at the annual meeting. The board and Culver will be sure that they have about 25 puppets on hand that will vote for whatever they want.

And historically....that's all they need to continue the status quo.

Did you know...
... that about 3-4 years ago, a special "elector's meeting" was held to have the "electors" (YOU) vote on whether or not to enter into a long term contract with the Y to use their new pool (Smith's Crossing) for the swim teams?

Over 110 voting residents attended that meeting.

How come 110 or more folks came out to vote on something that would cost THOUSANDS of dollars, yet only about 30 or so peoploe attend the annual meeting where over $46 MILLION DOLLARS of spending is approved?

That's kind of embarrasing. And sad.