Ludington School Board Meetings, April 18, 2022: Closed Session and Closed Bidding

[XLFD]

On April 18th, the Ludington School Board held two meetings:  a special meeting to field a student disciplinary issue and their regularly scheduled meeting to conduct the rest of their business.  I arrived at the former later than I planned at 4:59 PM according to my cell phone to find the board moving to go into the closed session.  Their own clock on the wall was showing 4:58 PM, so after a couple of exasperated glances at my cell phone and the wall clock, they rolled back their vote and allowed for citizen participation, which I accepted.

I opened my folder and explained that I had no idea what this day's disciplinary hearing was about, stated that the agenda should describe the infraction, but told them that I had reviewed in detail the one that was held in December which had raised a few questions on my part.  I extracted the page and change of the school's investigation and pointed out that the investigation featured a witness that changed his story, a complete lack of any threat and the complete absence of any kind of weapon on campus, even a definitely non-lethal airsoft gun.

I then flashed a memo from Principal Mike Hart to the board to the superintendent to be used at the December disciplinary hearing which indicated threats had been made, indicated that the student was in violation for possessing a dangerous weapon while on campus, and failed to indicate why the witness changed his story and why the boy persecuted had testimony that matched independently his father's assertions that the boy had no airsoft gun in the first place but was hoping to get one for Christmas and would have never planned to take it to school.    

I wondered out loud how could a school board hearing the facts of this situation (not to mention the flagrant perjury on the search warrant affidavit of School Resource Officer Austin Morris) could suspend a student and feel that justice has been served, at which point my three minutes was up.  And without much of a pause they voted to go into closed session, stressing the student's parents in this instance requested it closed, and voted to do so. 

They actually adjourned themselves from the board room so as to go to a more private room in the administrative building so as to preserve the anonymity of the accused.  At about 5:50 they came back into the board room and made a simple unanimous vote to suspend the student involved for the rest of the year.  I have already sent out a FOIA request for the information about this disciplinary incident; I will not silently let the school board abuse their power and authority again at the expense of a student and/or their parents, especially since they don't want to address their December mistakes.

And I will continue working through the summer to get disciplinary action where it is aptly deserved, on the LPD officer who serves as school resource officer who committed perjury and has got nothing but praise from the LPD and the LASD.  An SRO should lose his position for such a blatant act of perjury, for he will be energized by this to perjure himself on future affidavits to achieve some perverted glory, maybe at the expense of your innocent child or grandchild.

The regular meeting looked like it would have some drama not generated by this reporter.  The PM School property was set to be sold to Dreamweaver Lure Co, Inc. for $115,250, which purportedly was greater than the other offer on the property by Jason Miney in order to relocate his Mason County Recovery venture, a budding non-profit that seeks to cure folks from the various addictive substances that are entrenched in our area.  Word on the street was that Miney wanted to offer a presentation and a counteroffer.  He showed up before the meeting with a small entourage and wound up injecting some interesting moments in an otherwise bland docket.

Miney would explain during the comment period his plans for the school property, indicated that he would be willing to offer $250,000 to the community, while waving a sealed envelope one would have to believe contained that check and some other commitments.  Shane Ruboyianes of Dreamweaver sat quietly during that time, possibly content that his initial offer was about $50,000 more than Miney's and that the agenda packet had all of the property transfer records in his or his company's name.  

Before the potential showdown, most of the normal business took place.  The consent agenda was passed without issue, the Soaring Oriole award was given to retiring teacher Heidi Urka, and changes to the school zone and speed limit around the new elementary building, effectively pushing the 25-mph zone to the Forest Hills area, were announced.

Technically, they addressed and approved a $662,000 payment on the elementary school bond, the general fund budget of the 2022/23 WSESD, updates for NEOLA policy, and purchase of technology devices.  Then came the PM School issue.

Board member Scott Foster moved (seconded by Leona Ashley) to allow the two entities that submitted bids to offer a presentation to the board to illustrate their offers.  Other members (Reed, Autrey) suggested the wide difference between offers on the table and the motion's lack of language to enable changes of offers made this a non-starter, and that it would lead to the same fiasco of what happened in the case of Lakeview School.  The question of whether they could have gotten $250,000 or more from an interested buyer and be over $100,000 wealthier was never explored.

Problem also was that the Lakeview fiasco was totally driven by the school board's lack of a consistent and fair policy-- it definitely wasn't implemented there and was totally inconsistent when you look at the giveaway of Foster School to an untested LLC for less than a tenth of its value.  The motion would be denied 6-1, with PM Elementary sold to Dreamweaver with another motion that followed.

The meeting would anticlimactically finish with a couple more votes, including the demolition of Franklin Elementary bid award.  The bids were not given to the public, but the lowest of three bids, each under $200,000 was awarded to a company that bid $162,000.  During this time, Jason Miney and his entourage would leave the meeting.

[AQUAMAN]

Speaking of stupid: I heard someone on the radio the other day say something to this effect: "Before God made stupid people, he made a school board, for practice." I think that alone fits this agenda and it's results pretty fairly X and thanks for the update on these matters that the public needs to know about, and start getting involved in.

[Willy]

Thanks X for keeping track of the school boards meetings. Maybe they will do a better job knowing you are looking over their shoulders.

I would have liked to seen Jason Miney get his bid accepted but if he was outbid then the board had no choice. By the way Jason is an accomplished photographer and has a gallery on Ludington Ave on the block just east of House of Flavors.

[XLFD]

There is confusion, some warranted from the four elementary schools which became surplus property once the new elementary went up.  Franklin's disposition was for demolition-- its close proximity to the high/middle schools has made it expendable for the construction which will have the footprint of the secondary schools expand east, and make the area currently known as Franklin Elementary become part of a parking lot.

The others were put up for general sale.  Lakeview was very popular due to its proximity to the lakeshore and received 5 bids, the highest was over 20% more than the value of the property made by a local bidder, but the board denied it.  Over a period of several meetings, they allowed another developer to match that earlier bid.  It was a disgusting display that reeked of favoritism and other corruption.  Foster was on sale but the city and school were not expecting anything less than $200,000 for it according to their records-- until they abruptly accepted $20,000 for it from an out-of-town unproven LLC.  Now PM Elementary goes for $115,000, validated at the same board meeting where a serious bidder mentioned he would go up to $250,000 for it.  

This board as a group are a bunch of corrupt fools, Scott Foster seems to be the only one with a lick of sense and propriety.