Letter: While Waiting for the April 17th Bond Results

I’d like to express my sincere appreciation to the  School Board, 21st Century Facility Planning Committee (21CFPC), and in particular to the Committee for Mercer Island Public Schools (CMIPS) volunteers for their work on the school bond measure. All these people have very generously volunteered their time, effort, and other resources based on their desire to improve our schools and community. Thank you!

If this Bond passes on April 17th, I hope that many of our community members who have expertise in architecture, project planning, engineering, education, science and technology, etc. will answer the District’s call out for volunteers to serve on school planning committees.

If this Bond fails to get the 60% support, I hope the community recognizes this has been an important part of a process and that the work the volunteers have already performed can set the stage for a more successful follow-on Bond Measure.  I believe there are some specific things we should do better next time there is a bond put before the voters:

• A bond measure should have the unanimous support of the MISD Board. The Board should only present a measure that it fully supports.
• Fully explore all alternative solutions. All alternatives should be fully considered, studied and analyzed. To achieve a successful result, MISD must enter into the process with no preconceived outcome, the process must be transparent and there must be opportunities for meaningful public input at milestones as well as willingness to share data with the public during the vote. Almost all of the “vote no” arguments are based on a feeling that the analysis has been incomplete.
• Engage the in the process. MISD Superintendent Plano has made it very clear that the City has been unwilling to entertain any use of any City land (including 300+ acres of commercial, open space and park land) to address school overcrowding (March 7th, 2012 Town Hall Meeting). I’m disheartened that the City Council was unwilling to support Mercer Island’s schools with this overcrowding crisis.

These are not my ideas. They are, in fact, top recommendations of a book entitled “School Bond Success – A Strategy for Building America’s Schools” [1].  By implementing these recommendations, I am hopeful we can generate the best outcome for the Mercer Island community. 

Respectfully,

Ralph C. Jorgenson

8040 84^th Ave. SE 

1. Page 30 of “School Bond Success – A Strategy for Building America’s Schools”, 3^rd. Edition, Carleton Holt, Rowman & Littlefield Education, New York, 2009.

Note 1^st Chapter is publicly available at Google Books:

http://books.google.com/books?id=eTYzFV5HLH0C&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_atb#v=onepage&q&f=false