Reply #170: Thank you Gaedel, I appreciate the response.

[Starry Messenger]

:) All I'm really looking for is increased scrutiny and community buy-in from the working class, who are also stakeholders in this issue. The reason why "outsiders" on DU have taken an interest in this situation is because variations on Detroit's school scenario have been happening in other communities in other states and these draconian solutions may or may not "produce". Bobb's solution is also going to be expensive.

http://detroit.blogs.time.com/2010/03/10/and-we-are-not-saved/

OK, so can we slow down now on the push to canonize Detroit Public Schools financial manager Robert Bobb?

Since being appointed by Gov. Jennifer Granholm as the emergency financial manager in March 2009 to control the finances of the state's largest school district, red ink is growing, according to district budget documents:

• Instead of a $17 million surplus Bobb projected for this fiscal year, spending has increased so much Bobb is projecting a $98 million deficit for the budget year that ends June 30.

• Added to the $219 million deficit accumulated from previous years, Bobb anticipates posting a $317 million deficit by this summer -- the largest year-end deficit ever recorded for the district.

...

He may very well have prevented the shortfall from swelling. But if Bobb believes that adding $100 million to the district's deficit after predicting a $17-million surplus is B-plus work, I can only hope that he's not thinking of applying that same grading scale to our schoolchildren.

It's a gamble. Is it the right one? No one is saying that the existing schools are going to magically swell with schoolchildren that do not exist. I (and I think the others here) are trying to agree with you. This "crisis" has been building for years. Why is the answer a sudden blast that must be hurried along in the matter of a few months? Every article I've read points to the extreme urgency with which Bobb is pursuing this agenda. It isn't saving money, so...what is going on?