Stimulus Bill Stiffs Lakewood

[Bill Call]

Lakewood schools "might" get a pitifull $6 million over a two year period.

http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/ ... imulus.pdf

[Ryan Patrick Demro]

Don't count on it. The Senate stripped out funding for state and local governments in its version. I think we are likely to see pretty big cuts at the state level unless that funding is restored in the conference committee. Strickland's budget depends on several billion from the feds. They also removed dollars for school consruction.

[Dee Martinez]

The federal govt by and large only does funding for "title" (disadvantaged) or "IDEA" (speical needs) students.
An affluent district will get next to nothing.
Look at Beachwood.

If anything it just looks like Lakewoods timing was bad since we already did our construction. Theres less to be done so Lakewood will get less from Washington.

[Roy Pitchford]

I'd rather see across the board tax cuts than adding to the country's debt.

[Grace O'Malley]

I'd rather see across the board tax cuts than adding to the country's debt.

Unless there are corresponding CUTS in current levels of spending, tax cuts WILL add to the debt our children will inherit.

[Jim O'Bryan]

I'd rather see across the board tax cuts than adding to the country's debt.

Unless there are corresponding CUTS in current levels of spending, tax cuts WILL add to the debt our children will inherit.

Grace/Roy

Without a Lakewood slant we could move this to global.

Tax cuts have simply never worked, and would love to discuss this in Global/


.

[Jim O'Bryan]

Lakewood schools "might" get a pitifull $6 million over a two year period.

http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/ ... imulus.pdf

Bill

President Obama is speaking now about his stimulus package, and how that
schools might be allocated. I would have to agree that we will loose out big as we have invested recently in our schools, and I voted and supported the rebuild.

I was wondering as you are much better at this than I. Do you remember why or who came up with the new school program? I remember a realtor asking me why we are knocking down 200 year buildings, for 75 year Bic buildings. His point was, that old schools like McKinley could be built and rebuilt for 200 years because of their virgin steel and bricks, as opposed to new structures, that rely heavily on recycled steel with some rust content. They did a marvelous job at Emerson.

At first I was told, for wiring, but with everything moving to WiFi and now WiMax, it would seem like that made no sense. I had heard that there was money available for air conditioning, but again...

On a good note I got a call from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh that would love to get their hands on McKinley, son in the end it might be good.

Bill do you know any of this stuff?


.

[Bill Call]

Do you remember why or who came up with the new school program? I remember a realtor asking me why we are knocking down 200 year buildings, for 75 year Bic buildings.

I was told that the State of Ohio said if the cost of rehabing an old building is 50% or more of the cost of the new building then a new building must be built. If not then the State would cut off funding. I was told it was a State decision.

I didn't realize how stupid the State's decision was until just now. We could get a great building like Emerson for 50% of the cost of a new building and thereby save 50%. But if the cost of rehab is 51% then we must spend 49% more to build a new building that won't last 30 years.

What I do know is that our congressmen and senators still don't get it. There job isn't to talk about accountablity or responsiblity or budget deficits or waste, fraud and corruption. Their job is to get us a bigger piece of the action.

[Donald Farris]

Hi,
One thing I hear over and over again regarding this stimulus package is to focus on shovel-ready projects.

Does Lakewood have any? What are they? Can we get any into this state quickly?

[Bill Grulich]

Don,

Lakewood has $51,075,000 in shovel-ready infrastructure projects according to the U.S. Conference of Mayors. These projects have to be "ready-to-start" within 60 days of the awards.

Whether or not these projects will be awarded has yet to be determined. Here is the article from The Plain Dealer.
http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/02 ... _list.html

Here is the pdf of the "wish list" for Lakewood and other northeast Ohio cities.

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/02 ... HFINAL.pdf

Bill Grulich

[Jim DeVito]

Thanks Bill that is good stuff.

I think Bunts repair is good. But what is up with a 2 mil for a "Lake Erie Recreation Peer"? What the heck is that? Why not a nice beach? Is that not why they call them earth movers?

[Charlie Page]

Lakewood has $51,075,000 in shovel-ready infrastructure projects according to the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

Wow...the number jumped from $16,250,000 in only two months The US Conference of Mayors has been busy!

http://lakewoodobserver.com/forum/viewt ... 9&start=30

Lakewood should have added another 40 million for the Detroit Avenue Streetscape program

[Dee Martinez]

Anyone who thinks Lakewood should have spent its money repairing rather than rebuilding probably never was in the basement of the old Garfield school. The place was held together with duck tape and chewing gum. Layers of paint from over 100 years were on the brick. There was barely room to stand up. And that was after millions of tax dollars being spent over the years on the duck tape and chewing gum.
Our kids not only needed modern facilities, they needed to be safe.
Schools shouldnt be quaint romantic cuiorisites like the Oldest Stone House or Nicholson House. They have to be places capable of peforming the functions theyre charged with.

Garfield wasnt a "100 year" building. It was a "75 year" building that was kept on life support at taxpayer expense for 25 years.

[David Anderson]

Do you remember why or who came up with the new school program? I remember a realtor asking me why we are knocking down 200 year buildings, for 75 year Bic buildings.

I was told that the State of Ohio said if the cost of rehabing an old building is 50% or more of the cost of the new building then a new building must be built. If not then the State would cut off funding. I was told it was a State decision.

I didn't realize how stupid the State's decision was until just now. We could get a great building like Emerson for 50% of the cost of a new building and thereby save 50%. But if the cost of rehab is 51% then we must spend 49% more to build a new building that won't last 30 years.

What I do know is that our congressmen and senators still don't get it. There job isn't to talk about accountablity or responsiblity or budget deficits or waste, fraud and corruption. Their job is to get us a bigger piece of the action.

Bill - I believe the Ohio School Facilities Commission employs a 2/3rds, or 66%, "guideline."

From the OSFC Web site (http://osfc.ohio.gov/Library/Glossary/t ... fault.aspx) - 2/3 Guideline: The guideline that sets the replace versus renovate standard for school facilities at two thirds of the cost of a new building.

I guess this means that if a new replacement school costs $100 and renovation $67 then the state would put money in to rebuild not renovate.

[Danielle Masters]

Anyone who thinks Lakewood should have spent its money repairing rather than rebuilding probably never was in the basement of the old Garfield school. The place was held together with duck tape and chewing gum. Layers of paint from over 100 years were on the brick. There was barely room to stand up. And that was after millions of tax dollars being spent over the years on the duck tape and chewing gum.
Our kids not only needed modern facilities, they needed to be safe.
Schools shouldnt be quaint romantic cuiorisites like the Oldest Stone House or Nicholson House. They have to be places capable of peforming the functions theyre charged with.

Garfield wasnt a "100 year" building. It was a "75 year" building that was kept on life support at taxpayer expense for 25 years.

I love that the new schools have enough bathrooms where the kids don't have to walk down several floors to the basement just to use one. And I love that they don't have to eat lunch in damp basements and they can actually see the sun. Many of the older buildings were not big enough to house the amount of students that the state requires for funding so new buildings were necessary. While I love the quaintness of old homes, I think our children deserve what works best for their current educational needs. The district has done a good job of renovating the schools that could be renovated like Horace Mann and Emerson but even while those building are large enough to house the required number of students they ran into structural issues while renovating that they didn't expect.