Raising Money Tomorrow!

Hey everyone.  Come out and help support my candidacy for Lynn School Committee.  We're having a fundraiser at Old Tyme Italian Cuisine 612 Boston St  Lynn, MA 01905 tomorrow, Tuesday August 13th, from 6pm-9pm.  Invite your friends, family, kids, neighbors, anyone you know who would like to see a positive change in the Lynn Schools.

I know this conflicts with the City Council meeting on the new Marshall School (and Jesse Jaeger's birthday), but you can do both.  You know you want to.

Reading Is Fundamental or N2N Question #5

Neighbor to Neighbor wants to know how we will staff our libraries.  Here's what I said.  

5. The majority of the public schools lack a library and/or librarian. What will you do to change this?

a. First and foremost, we need to focus on teaching our kids to read. A child learns to read, then reads to learn.  Currently Lynn's 3rd grade reading proficiency rate, per the 2012 MCAS, is 41% with scores ranging from 25% at Harrington to 76% at Sisson. Let's staff our libraries next.  I would like to fund a practice based, scientifically proven, peer reviewed, structured, sequential, phonological approach to reading and spelling, such as the Wilson Reading System and have this program available district wide.  The Superintendent has hired a public relations firm to combat blogs like Stanley Wotring's. We are not in need of PR firms. We are in need of reading specialists.    

b. Reach out to the community. Ask for volunteers from the PTA, Church Groups, retired teachers, School Improvement Council Members, and local businesses to man our schools’ libraries.

c. Plan a reward trip for children whose parents volunteer in the library a specific number of days in a school year.

d. Organize frequent trips to the Lynn Public Library.

e. Look into creating a mobile library to service all the elementary schools and alternate this with trips to the Lynn Public Library.

f.  Investigate reading specific grants like Holyoke's $100,000 grant:  “Reading is Power: Holyoke Can Do It.”

Stats taken from http://uneducacion.blogspot.com/2013/03/lynns-3rd-grade-reading-proficiency.html and http://uneducacion.blogspot.com/2013/03/lynn-3rd-grade-reading-proficiency-rates_4.html 

Italicized portions added after questions were submitted to N2N.  

A question from the audience.

Stacey Devendorfasks:

"Hi Melissa. 

I was wondering if you can offer clarification on items a and c?"

Stacey is referring to Neighbor to Neighbor question #4: "What is your plan to raise revenue for the schools to be able to provide after school and summer programming?" 

And my answers:  "a.  I plan to partner with The City Council and propose that non-owner-occupied, multi-family homes be treated as businesses and be taxed as such," and "c.  I plan to partner with The City Council in proposing a rental tax."

Sure Stacey, I'd love to tell you what I'm thinking. 

First, I know that the School Committee has no purview over taxation in the city.  This is the City Council's jurisdiction.    

Second, our schools are in desperate need of funding.  

Third, Harrington and Connery were able to make improvements, in part, due to the 1.1 million dollars they received in "turn around" funding.  They received this money because they "failed" and were deemed a Level 4 school.  

Fourth, our schools shouldn't have to fail in order to receive the money they need in order to be successful.

SO, where will we get this extra cash?  Lynn already gets the highest amount of funding from the State possible and the majority of our city tax dollars go to make the city run.

This got me thinking.

The Lynn Public Schools teach to kids that come from all different walks of life.  Some kids come from homes that their parents own, some kids live in apartment buildings, we have some kids who are homeless and some kids live in "non-owner occupied multi-family homes" which is a two-family, or greater, home in which the owner or landlord does not also reside.  

These properties are income generating for the owner, just like a business would be.  I would propose that the School Committee partner with the City Council and urge them to pass ordinances that would tax these properties like businesses with the revenue earmarked for direct services and materials for our students and not administrative salaries.

I grew up in upstate NY, and we had a School Tax.  Every residence, whether it contained children or not, whether is was a rental property or a single family home, paid a tax to fund the schools.  My answer "c." falls along the same lines.  That a tax be created for all rental properties. These rental properties contain multiple families that send their children to the public schools, except the renters themselves are not paying any tax, like the homeowners are, for this service.  A tax for all rental properties would create a more fair an equitable base in which to pull funding from.  Again I would propose that the School Committee partner with the City Council and urge them to pass ordinances that would tax these rental properties with the revenue earmarked for direct services and materials for our students and not administrative salaries. 

These two solutions will create an income base that will be shouldered by the community as a whole. We all share the load.  

Keeping the math simple, imagine the rental tax is $100 per rental unit and we had 1000 rental units, this would generate an extra $100,000 for the schools.  How many rental units does Lynn have?   

     

Its All About The Benjamins or N2N Question #4

Neighbor to Neighbor (N2N) wanted to know where I would look for the money to fund after-school programs.  After looking at our current models (Ford, etc.) and investigating solutions that have not been proposed yet - this is how I answered.  

4. What is your plan to raise revenue for the schools to be able to provide after school and summer programming?

a.       I plan to partner with The City Council and propose that non-owner-occupied, multi-family homes be treated as businesses and be taxed as such.

b.      I plan to partner with The City Council to organize Lynn parents to advocate for funding for Lynn on the State and Federal levels.

c.       I plan to partner with The City Council in proposing a rental tax.

d.      Presently Lynn contains a free after-school program for children eight years old and older at the Boys and Girls Club.  Transportation is provided from every elementary school, except Ford and Drewicz.  Expanding the number of schools that can participate in this service could alleviate some of the need for after-school programming with little monetary investment.

e.       I plan to expand our grants department and pursue more private funding, as the Ford School did with private partnerships.

f.       I will review redundant administrative positions, as well as exorbitant administrative salaries.

g.      I expect to have to eliminate one teaching position per school to fund after school programming, similar to how Dr. Crane did at the Ford School.

h.      I hope to provide incentives and rewards for students who come to school every day and on time.

i.     I will look for volunteers from local businesses and the community at large (PTA, SIC, Churches) to help staff summer programming.

j.     I hope to establish Substantially Separate, Special Education, Therapeutic Day Schools and market them to communities, outside of Lynn, that currently lack them.

Italicized section added after questions were submitted to Neighbor to Neighbor.  

Didn't have time to post yesterday but....I WAS IN THE PAPER!!!

If you haven't had a chance to read the article, check it out here: Romaniello running to bring change to schools or if you've used up all your Item views for the month (Cleo) read it below.

Romaniello running to bring change to school committee

·          

LYNN — 

School Committee candidate Melissa Romaniello can sum up her reason for running in one word: change.  “I want to bring change,” she said. “I’m tired of parents always being on the losing end.”

Romaniello is a familiar face in the district. She often attends School Committee hearings and she, along with two other parents, led the charge to force the School Committee, in 2012, to hold a public hearing regarding Superintendent Catherine Latham’s job. This was despite the fact the committee had already renewed Latham’s contract.

Despite what could be seen as a contentious relationship, Romaniello said she has worked with Latham numerous times advocating for her own children as well as on behalf of others and she is confident they could work together if she were elected.

“Every time I’ve worked with her I’ve achieved my goal,” she said.

That said, Romaniello also said her hope is that once Latham’s contract is up in roughly three years, the School Committee would let her go, post the job and do a nationwide search for a new superintendent.

Married with three children, Romaniello has lived in Lynn for seven years, owns a home and readily admits two of her children attend KIPP Academy, the charter school located in The Highlands. Her youngest attends Drewicz but the older two were not getting the kind of education they needed in the public schools, she said.

“Honestly I wish KIPP didn’t have to exist,” Romaniello said. “I wish Lynn schools were good enough that I didn’t have to reach out to find what I needed somewhere else.”

When asked what is her biggest concern regarding the school system, after some pause, she said reading.

One of her sons is dyslexic and when he attended Sewell-Anderson he received every intervention plan the school had “but they still couldn’t teach him to read,” she said. Romaniello said only 40 percent of the district’s third graders are proficient in reading, which she finds unacceptable.

“We’re failing out kids in the third grade,” she said.

Her second largest concern is that parents do not feel welcome or involved enough in their children’s schools, she said. She pointed to the recent decision to bus kindergarten students from several schools to an early childhood center to be located inside the Lynn Tech annex. It was a move that outraged many parents but Romaniello said she believes that once they see how much room the schools will have as a result of the busing they will understand why it had to happen

“What they did wrong was the didn’t involve the parents in the process enough,” she said.

She said the School Department failed to give parents enough notice about the situation and when it held a public hearing the School Committee was unresponsive.

“When parents went to voice their opinion, you could see them thinking, ‘oh here come those Ford School parents,’ … they kind of shunned them, totally dismissing their opinions and concerns,” she said. “If we can teach kids to read and stop dismissing parents, we can take care of the rest.”

She also believes there will be no real change in the school district until Latham is removed or retires.

Latham has arguably the most important job in the city, is the highest paid city employee and single-handedly is in control of how the schools perform by virtue that she hires principals, yet the schools are failing, Romaniello said.

Latham likes to tout the fact that Lynn is the top among the state’s urban school districts.

“I understand why she says that,” Romaniello said. “We’re the best of the worst, but we’re not anymore. We’re like seventh now.”

Until the district has a new superintendent residents will never see an improvement in home values “Because our schools are not good enough to attract people here.”

She hopes that by adding her to a board that includes incumbent Rick Starbard, Maria Carrasco and Donna Coppola, she will be able to help create some real change.

“I’m doing a very un-Lynn thing,” she said with a laugh. “I’m going to ask people to support Maria and Donna. We need them and I want to let Lynn know that they need them.”

Voters can get a chance to meet Romaniello when she holds her first fund raiser at Old Tyme Italian Restaurant on Boston Street, Tuesday, Aug. 13, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Fundraiser Time!!!

Booked my first fundraiser!  Old Tyme Italian Restaurant, 612 Boston St., Lynn, on August 13th from 6pm-9pm.  Yeah it's about raising money but they have wicked good food too!  Invite everyone you know!

I had to admit that I don't get the Item.

I have more good news!  Just completed an interview with Chris Stevens, Lynn Item.  Now I know all the candidates do it, but this was my first candidacy related interview with a newspaper.  I had to admit to Chris that I don't get the Item (I used to read it on-line but now they charge) when I asked when the interview would be published.  She said sometime at the beginning of next week - so keep your eyes peeled.  And will someone tell me when it's out?