Lurie column Sept 28 - Fiscal Responsibility means more than voting yes

Fiscal Responsibility means more than voting yes

 

The Katrina disaster has created horrific suffering for hundreds of thousands affected locally, and tens of millions of Americans as we cope with the effects of poor preparation for serious disruption of energy supplies. The rebuilding and reconstruction will need years to accomplish. The estimates for rebuilding and relief have been estimated at $200 Billion dollars, no, $100B, No after insurance, $50B. No one really knows.

 

The high end is an amazing sum, almost 9% of the total Federal budget. How well could your family absorb a total monthly spending increase of 9%? With the energy cost spikes for gasoline and natural gas, Troy�s preferred heating source, the average home will need to absorb $250 a month for fuel and Vectran�s invisible BTU source. For the average family, $250 represents a 10% monthly increase in cash required to get to work and heat the house.

 

Families across the country are dealing with the change by driving less, and shifting spending. The first indication is from Pepsi and Lays. Sales at Convenience stores have plummeted in the past 2 months. Fill �er up used to mean 20 gallons and a big Gulp. Now, the �sensible car� that gets 20 miles per gallon looks more and more like a big gulping gas guzzler. The average car in Europe gets 42 miles per gallon, Japanese families expect an average of more than fifty.

 

Last year Congress fought back attempts to raise the CAF� (fuel economy standards) from the current average of 21. From my perspective, the war on terror is here at home where the average family is afraid to pull up to the pump, and deathly afraid to turn on the thermostat. For many families, the monthly credit card bills will have virtually the same effect as a suicide bomber. Shattering lives and wreaking havoc on everyone in sight. Hint: The first credit card bills from the $3.00 per gallon spike will hit in October, just after the new bankruptcy law takes effect; doubling the minimum monthly payments on your bill. Feel like a grenade target yet?

 

Yet in Congress this week, rather than deal with this huge and unexpected cost as the financial emergency it is, Congress is gearing up to extend tax cuts for the upper 2%, expanded medical spending programs, and of course, the October stealth bill; another $80 Billion for the coming year in Iraq. This will be a third emergency appropriation request for $80 billion, but this time, on top of Hurricane rebuilding relief and the largest deficits in history.

 

We all grieve for the victims and want to see as much help as possible given to them, in America, people helping people and neighbor helping neighbor started with the Pilgrims and has extended to this day. Yet the aid must be paid for by today's American's, not just foisted off on our children through large scale further increases in budget deficits that threaten interest rates, inflation and the future strength of the dollar. I am especially proud that our Troy based OneCall Now sent messages to over 250,000 people the week after Katrina, and another 75,000 this past weekend for Rita relief. Helping find housing, clothing and contributions on behalf of 260+ churches, synagogues and schools. These groups have raised $6 million so far because, as council President Bill Lohrer said Monday, every evacuee in New Orleans is part of our American Community.

 

Please join me in urging Senators DeWine and Voinovitch and Congressman Boehner to accept that when severe turnovers happen, it's time to re-evaluate the game plan.

 

In our personal life, when drastic hardships happen, we reduce our spending on desired things and or seek another job to pay the bills. This winter, for many, the choices will be painful.

 

Congress should roll-back $50 Billion in significant pork barrel spending plans from the recent Highway and Energy bill; and significantly reduce the plans to extend tax cuts that have driven our federal deficit to unacceptable levels. Yes, this means modest sacrifices by some for the far greater good of others; and that's what our situation demands. In fact, they have all sworn to uphold our Constitution, which opens with this premise��promote the general Welfare�; not just the rich and select few.

 

Our elected local representatives should lead this rational fight, and reject the President�s continued attempts to confuse the issues, appoint political cronies in key positions of public safety, and his calls for irrational and un affordable tax cut extensions.

 

After all, no one can plan for every contingency, but when the worst happens, our Conservative republican representatives must show they understand fiscal responsibility demands at least a temporary change in their intended course and the gumption to work for all Americans, not just the upper 2%.

 

Leib Lurie is a Troy Civic Theatre Board Member, Optimist Club member and CEO of phone message service OneCallNow.com. You can reach him at Leib@Lurie.net

Or see these columns on his blog at www.llurie.blogspot.com

Lurie column- for WED Sept 21 - questions for the committee

Questions for the Committee to ask

In June an unexpected resignation left a hollow void that needed to be filled this Fall. The burning question is whether the replacement will be right, center or left; activist or passive?

The Committee has been poring over qualifications, background, writings, musings and documents. They have started posing the tough questions as they seek to assure the replacement�s attitudes and decisions will fit the mold each committee person uses as a personal benchmark.

It�s likely the candidate will be in place and in charge for many years to come and will be in a unique position to impact the lives of many. The decision and vote will not be taken lightly. Many of us are following the process closely and I�d like to submit a few questions of my own to be asked.

Because the outcome is important for every Trojan, not just the students. Tom Dunn has been selected to replace Dr. Dolph as Superintendent of the Troy City Schools, but the challenges he faces are great. (you all knew I was talking about a real and pressing local issue, not some faraway red/blue Senate Confirmation hearing - right?). I did not participate in the process, but I would love an open letter to the community from our new Chancellor (That�s what they call the position in New York, I think it sounds much better)

Does every student have a right to excellence? Not just �continuous improvement� or an �effective� education? How would you define excellence?

Parental participation has been shown to be the most critical factor for academic success; what will you do to build and grow that parental involvement?

No Child Left Behind has been said to force teachers to use drill-and-kill and merely teach to the test, rather than teach the job skills required for the future. How would you change this and work to teach drive, common sense and dedication?

The average students watch 28 hours of television a week, just slightly less than classroom time. By turning on the TV�s built-in �closed caption� feature and turning off the sound, kids would be forced to �read� the dialogue, turning prime time into reading time. Could and should this be encouraged? How?

Teacher quality is critical, and experienced teachers have been shown to get much better results, yet Troy has hired mostly inexperienced fresh-out-of-school teachers. This saves money, but is it a worthwhile trade-off?

Troy�s teachers, unlike virtually all other professional employees, do not get annual rank ratings for how good or bad they are, but are limited by Union rules, to being classed as Effective or Needs Improvement. A far shallower grade range than we use for our students. Is this right? How should we grade and evaluate teachers?

The State continues to put pressure on education spending, in fact, the district will lose almost 20% of funding in 2007; what would you do to build community support for the essential fight to fund our local schools given the complete and utter failure of our state legislature to meet the Supreme Court mandates?

The Superintendent has amazing latitude and extraordinary constraints to what you can do. The array of �bosses� include parents, teacher union, school board, state board and Federal regulations. How do you plan to deal with the inevitable conflicting demands?

The US ranks 24^th out of 29 countries for academic achievement; even for the schools with excellent ratings, only a small percentage of students are ready for the future. How would you address this in Troy?

Only a small percentage of Troy graduates go to Ivy league schools or enroll in top MBA or Engineering programs. Our numbers in this area are less than a third of those for Centerville (as a percentage); is there hope for excellence in this area?

Living in a community makes one a better community supporter and more deeply involved with our local issues, families and students. Should Troy insist on residency for teachers? Administrators? Our next Superintendent?

Many Troy students take advantage of the Post Secondary Educational Option, allowing them to take college courses while in High School. This can save tens of thousands of dollars for college education, but often students struggling with traditional High School restrictions thrive in the college environment, but these same students are denied PSEO admission. Is this right?

Why to we devote so much space to athletic trophies, and so few to academic symbols of achievement? Granted, the district issues 350 academic trophies every year- called diplomas. That certificate is truly meaningful, but Is it enough?

Would you rather attend every home football game, every band competition, every drama and orchestra performance, or every Destination Imagination and Future Cities competition?

Finally, this is truly a masochistic career choice, why after 32 years, and months from retiring, did you want to do this?

Tom, I�m sure you will do it well for the sake of our teachers, your staff, and most of all, our students, but geez- the road ahead is pretty tricky.

Leib Lurie is a Troy Civic Theatre Board Member, Optimist Club member and CEO of phone message service OneCallNow.com. You can reach him at Leib@Lurie.net

Or see these columns on his blog at www.llurie.blogspot.com

Lurie column sept 14- Lessons sink in as others bail out

Some lessons sink in as others bail out

I love history, looking back is often the best way to see ahead. My father instilled this love in me, trying through obtuse stories of oblique facts to pique my interest in events and people who have passed on their stories and wisdom to us; if only we would learn from those that walked before us.

In 1927 tremendous rains and winter floods caused the Mississippi to threaten its levees. President Coolidge sent in political observers with no skill and no disaster experience. He had ignored the reports of the Army Engineers suggesting ways to avert tragedy.

When the levees breached, 1 million people were flooded out. Three times the number in New Orleans today, thirteen thousand managed to flee to the safety of the narrow levee wall � an eight foot wide, 20 mile long refugee center. When barges came upriver to rescue them, the white plantation owners and businessmen shot the boat pilots, fearing that if the blacks escaped, they would be left without workers for years to come. They tried to keep people from fleeing. Three hundred thousand eventually did leave, never to come back and forcing one of the fastest and largest migrations in our nation.

Newspapers screamed for justice and aid. So Coolidge assigned an experienced disaster manager to the area. An experienced and ambitious executive, who had managed American evacuation of Europe in 1914, and then the war reconstruction program after the Armistice. After the war, he was sent out west to design a set of dams to provide hydro power and prevent spring flooding.

With a million flooded victims living in the open air, this ambitious fast acting disaster dictator (his term) brought in the Red Cross and other local aid groups. He marshaled forces, aid, supplies, logistics and material in weeks. Although since the Federal Government was not providing any of it, one political appointee suggested that responsibility for the relief efforts be placed on local communities and not a national organization so that any �criticism of the administration may be localized�

The Executive moved quickly on many fronts. He insisted the railroads offer free transportation and free freight for supplies. He put in place loans for victims, and lined up capital to help rebuild. Yet without any federal loan guarantees, the banks lent only a twenty million dollars of the 500 million destroyed (five hundred million then is 200 billion today- on the high side of Katrina�s destruction).

Despite a huge federal surplus, and urging by the on-site manager, Coolidge did not call Congress into session to act or create any form of federalized relief. In fact, the Army dunned the Red Cross to pay for blankets sent to the area.

The Disaster Dictator worked hard to restore businesses, factories and shipping; often by mandating lower wages for anyone wishing to stay in government provided tent cities where Cholera and Dysentery wiped out thousands.

He ignored the pleas for home rebuilding efforts by laborers and farm hands. Although, after shootings of blacks by business owners forced him to act, he formed a toothless commission to investigate, then suppressed their findings that 95% of the aid went to white people, in an area where 75% of the people were Black. When newspapers started attacking the nominal results, he went on the road to point the blame on Coolidge, and deflect it from himself.

The Press tour and promises worked. That summer, the czar was nominated for higher office and won election (but for the first time since reconstruction, without the Black vote). He ran on disaster relief success, even though hundreds of thousands were permanently dislocated, and less than 10% of the pledged money ever spent on relief. Seen getting off a train in Washington, Pundit Will Rogers (the Andy Rooney of his time) said that �Bert was back, just resting between disasters� How right he would be.

Just seven months after taking office, the ripple effect of losing 1 million jobs and displaced workers disrupting wages throughout the Midwest, the economy tanked. Millions were out of work. Fortunes were lost. The disaster Dictator kept on doing what had not worked in the 1927 flood.

Rely on private enterprise. Raise taxes on imports to protect big business at home. Do nothing to directly help those at the bottom of the economic strata. Raise fees on things poor folks need, and tell Americans things are looking better as millions lost their jobs, homes, and families.

Yep, Herbert Hoover was an experienced disaster professional. Our government has learned from some of its mistakes � but what about the lessons that have not sunk in as New Orleans bails out?

 

Leib Lurie is a Troy Civic Theatre Board Member, Optimist Club member and CEO of phone message service OneCallNow.com. You can reach him at Leib@Lurie.net

 

Lurie column Sept 7th- Rolling Lucky 7s in the Big Easy

Rolling Lucky 7�s in the Big Easy

 

After the first plane hit the Trade center, the first emergency calls went out in 7 seconds.

In New York, 7 minutes after the first 757 crashed in the wealthy financial capital, the first trucks were on the scene and the president was notified.

 

77 minutes after CNN declared the Hurricane a near miss, and signed-off that all would be OK, NPR was reporting rising water. 7 hours after the levy broke in New Orleans, their first emergency call went out.

 

77 hours after a 20 foot wall of water poured into the black ghetto, the first scraggly National Guard trucks rounded up from those left behind, after the newer high-water trucks were sent to the Iraqi desert war, backfired into view.

 

It will take approximately 77 days to pump out New Orleans so engineers can start to assess the underlying damage, and most estimate 77 weeks before the city is back with even a modicum of normalcy and people have their lives, medical, school, and housing needs met again.

 

It will cost something more than 77 billion dollars to repair the damage and recover the economic devastation. Some estimates are $100 Billion, but wall street isn't worried, because businesses will only need to cover 15-20% of it with insurance dollars. The rest, and for the newly homeless, well, that's what the $300 in lower income tax cuts was for, if those poor city folk didn't save it for something like this, what can Congress do?

 

Many ask, why didn�t the people evacuate when given the warning? Maybe because they didn�t have the 77 dollars- the average cost for a night at a Louisiana hotel north of town; or maybe because they didn�t have $7 dollar bus fare for a family of five to leave, and the city didn�t waive the fare for evacuees, or offer to reimburse private taxi and van companies to help get people out.

 

77 miles away in the Capital Baton Rouge, FEMA officials set up their regional command center in a posh facility. But since director Brown's prior management experience was as the Stewards Commissioner of the now defunct International Arabian Horse Association, maybe being a horses ass is in his nature. Oh, did I mention that Aramco, one of Amrica's largest oil companies, with dozens of facilities and business ventures in Saudi Arabia has actively supported the Arabian Horse Association, to keep a high profile with the Arabian prices on its' board? (hint- be involved with oil millionaires if you want a top federal job)

 

77 feet above the street- in a hotel without power, water, or most of their windows, New Orleans Mayor set up HIS command post, working in a city where 200 police have deserted or quit. FEMA planners had told their boss that $7.7 million would have stockpiled food, water, formula, medicine, cots and blankets for 150,000 people for 7 days, set to arrive anywhere in the Southeast within 24 hours. But Homeland Security has better things to do, higher tech things, like funding $7 million for Anti-terrorist Armored vehicles for State Police in Wyoming and North Dakota, than planning for the obvious. Did you know that Federal Homeland Security funds will pay for the vehicles but not the emergency supplies?

 

There are approximately 770 federal military facilities and National Guard facilities in a 700 mile radius of the breeched levee, a 17 hour drive. But four years after 9/11, our guard and reserves rely on manual telephone notification systems to call up people in an emergency. That system is tested and certified to work if most soldiers and emergency responders are are reached within 72 hours. (Shameless commercial plug- Iowa Air Guard units using Troy, OH based Onecallnow service reaches 92% of their 1300 people within 77 minutes.

 

The Bush administration cut the budget request for levy work around New Orleans by almost 77 million in each of the past 3 years. I know we shouldn�t compare apples and oranges, but this summers' highway bill socked away $231 million to build a bridge longer than the Golden Gate, connecting Gravina Island (pop 50) to the bustling city of Ketchikan, Alaska (pop 8,000). But, hey, if they ever need to evacuate Gravina Island- due to a flash Glacier melt, it won't take but a minute.

 

Gee, I can certainly understand the logic of our Congress and Administration, Spend $4 million dollars per person to subsidize a bridge and eliminate a 7 minute ferry ride, or invest $4.00 per person to protect the port that handles 40% of our country�s natural gas, produces or refines 20% of our gasoline, and adds $20 billion to the economy. Why let�s pick the bridge of course!

 

When The President visited Louisiana Friday, he laughingly recalled his good times in the Big Easy. Outside the battered casino kitty-cornered across the street from the convention/refugee center is a sign saying "Lucky 7 - roll 'em here'.

 

Luck 7? Gambling with Peoples Lives was snake eyes waiting to happen.

 

Leib Lurie is a Troy Civic Theatre Board Member, Optimist Club member and CEO of phone message service OneCallNow.com. You can reach him at Leib@Lurie.net