Wayland schools deserve criticism of spending, but also a ‘yes’ on bond

ACHTUNG: This is not a “fair and balanced” story. It is an editorial by the editor:

Voters in the Wayland Union School district will be deciding a bond issue in either August or November next year, and I would be guilty of having a keen grasp of the obvious if I were to say this will be a hard sell.

This will be a hard sell.

There is no question the school facility needs are very real and they cannot be handled adequately by the general fund and money received through the Gun Lake Casino.

The greatest need is for a functioning high school pool, which has fallen into a sorry state of disrepair over its more than 40 years of use. If a bond issue for a new pool is not passed, it won’t be long before it is closed entirely. The pool for too long has been a serious financial drain on the district’s finances and its current situation is not sustainable.

Architects from Tower Pinkster, who have some skin in this game, also have pointed to tennis courts, a football field that one Facebook poster said look a lot like Charlie Brown’s pitcher’s mound, an entrance to the middle school that is not properly secure and the aging buildings across the street from Pine Street Elementary on Pearl Street.

Also identified was more space for the continually expanding instrumental music program.

There is no question in my mind that the casino funding, which amounts to $1.5 million annually, cannot absorb these kinds of costs. So a bond issue is the only option.

But it faces an uphill battle because the Board of Education has demonstrated questionable financial stewardship in recent years. It has moved forward with big-time spending on a new science wing addition at the high school and two rounds of purchases of iPad computer tablets.

The science wing addition is costing the district about $300,000 a year for 10 years. While the science program needed serious equipment upgrades, there are legitimate reservations about the wisdom of funding a costly all-new building addition.

The iPad program is a necessary adjustment to today’s education system because, as I have pointed out before, Charles Darwin taught us well that those unable to adapt to changing conditions will become extinct or irrelevant. However, it could be argued that second round of iPads was excessive.

The greatest blame for the way things are falls on state government, which 20 years ago took over the majority of the power of the purse strings and has been exceptionally stingy since, perhaps even with the sinister end-game purpose of privatizing education. Michigan’s public schools, it has been pointed out, now are getting only about $200 more per pupil than they did 10 years ago, and too many have failed financially.

But blaming the state doesn’t get the job done of taking care of Wayland’s facility problems.

I hope the school district seeks the bond in November 2016, which will attract the largest number of voters at the polls and therefore a better chance of passage.

I share many of the public’s criticisms of school board spending decisions, but when Election Day arrives, I very reluctantly will vote in the affirmative. Right now, it appears to be the right thing to do.