New Woodburn Community School

And that must not be.

REDISTRICTING LIES

Through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request of the West Virginia School Building Authority (SBA) we learn that Monongalia County Schools states on the SBA green school grant compliance checklist “Compliance With SBA Requirements Proposed New Project” under the section “Adequate Space For Projected Student Enrollment”:

“There is adequate space for enrollment projections. Once this facility [green school] is completed [Fall 2012], redistricting will occur in the North and Cheat Lake Elementary areas due to overcrowding.”

Publicly, the Monongalia County Board of Education has been denying such redistricting plans. Board President Barbara Parsons denied it again in a July email:

“As a Board, we have had no discussion, whatsoever, regarding any changes to North Elementary attendance area and the new school. I can see how it might appear to be a logical consideration, but the Board is extremely sensitive to any issue involving redistricting because we had these discussions prior to building a new University High School. At that time we said there would be no redistricting and we have vigorously maintained that position. … Any future consideration of redistricting will be at the initiative of the public.”

Once more with emphasis:

“…no redistricting and we have vigorously maintained that position … no discussion, whatsoever, regarding any changes to North Elementary attendance area and the new school. …we said there would be no redistricting and we have vigorously maintained that position. … Any future consideration of redistricting will be at the initiative of the public.“

President Parsons, you might want to pick up Mon Schools’ green school grant compliance checklist:

“Once this facility [green school] is completed [Fall 2012], redistricting will occur in the North and Cheat Lake Elementary areas due to overcrowding.”

In other words, the idea in the green school grant proposal is that North Elementary overflow students will go down route 705 to the new school when the green “facility is completed” just as the FOIAed emails outright state and otherwise indicate: “Confidentially, the overflow from North will be placed in this [green] school.” Mundell to Weese. Devono “was originally looking [to build the green school] at the area” far down 705, directly toward North.

That, folks, is redistricting. It is redistricting with a thump, with a real “see ya later” wave to Woodburn area and Easton area. “See ya…. Wouldn’t want to be ya….”

What is kept from public eyes and ears is entirely consistent. And it completely contradicts what is stated to the public by the Board, the Board President, and by Superintendent Devono himself. In a July email to a questioning member of the public, Devono states:

“I am not recommending any attendance area from North being included into the new [green] school.”

Oh, really? And how again does that square with the grant compliance statement? and the FOIAed emails from WVU? and the Superintendent’s original preferred site rather near North (which has never once been publicly acknowledged)?

“Once this facility [green school] is completed [Fall 2012], redistricting will occur in the North and Cheat Lake Elementary areas due to overcrowding.”

“…we said there would be no redistricting and we have vigorously maintained that position. … Any future consideration of redistricting will be at the initiative of the public.“

Why is the Mon Schools administration operating underground?

One of many “kickers” in all this for the “small” (not per FOIA) green school is that the Easton and Woodburn teachers are planning for Easton/Woodburn student get-togethers to help the children from those two schools get to know one another as future classmates, as Devono and the board have been stating publicly is going to happen.

But they also said it was going to still be a small school, and at a good location, and that the public was going to be meaningfully (which includes truthfully) involved and none of that has turned out to be the case.

In fact, it looks more and more like a mix of both fraud and negligence: malfeasance, misfeasance, nonfeasance. Breach of duty. A kind of “honest services fraud.” And a sort of public nuisance.

What a site they picked. Quite a site, indeed. A plaintiff’s dream.

And why did they pick it? Is it a site for a small community school of Easton area and Woodburn area students?

Or is it a site for a large commuter and commercial strip school of Woodburn/Easton/North/Suncrest/Cheat Lake students?

Publicly, the BoE has said what it has said.

Privately, Mon Schools has done what it has done.

One contradicts the other. How can that be? Who bears the responsibility?

What kind of crap has it produced? What will it yet?

And the WVU Board of Governors is going to sell land to this outfit? At that intersection? For a school for small children?

It’s not clear that anyone officially involved in this is fit to run an abandoned barn.

On the other hand, they all seem to know how to pile it higher and deeper.

Let the resignations commence.