Get Out the Vote! It is Super Tuesday This Week for DeKalb Schools!

DISTRICT 4 - if you live here, your vote is NEEDED on Tuesday, August 21st.   Return to your polling place that morning and vote again, this time you will vote only for the runoff candidate in the Board of Education races whom you wnat to represent you for the next two years.  And,  yes, YOU CAN VOTE in this election EVEN IF you missed the last one.

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Dear Get the Cell Out - Atlanta followers:


If you live in the School District #4  (see map) or even if you know someone who does, please make a note that this coming TUESDAY (Aug. 21) is a very big day.  It is the date of the RUNOFF election between two candidates for the Board of Education.

Here are the area voting precincts:  Briarlake Elem, Brockett, Brockett Elem, Dresden Elem, Embry Hills, Evansdale Elem, Hawthorne Elem, Henderson Mill Elem, Hugh Howell, Lakeside High, Livsey Elem, Midvale Elem, Midvale Road, Montreal, Northlake, Oak Grove Elem, Oakcliff, Pleasandale Elem, Rehoboth, Sagamore Hills Elem, Skyland, Smoke Rise, Tucker, Tucker Library, Valley Brook, Warren Tech.


From Briarlake to Smoke Rise and the very large voting district that includes Tucker and Brockett, here are a few reasons WHY this RUNOFF ELECTION is even MORE IMPORTANT than the last election you just voted in. 


1.  THIS election on Tuesday is all about YOU... YOUR AREA.  Your friends, neighbors, children, parents - everyone you know who lives near you or has children at your neighborhood school is counting on you to get this vote right!


2.  The value of YOUR home can rise and fall as a result of the decisions made by the Board of Education.  And, mostly, they have been falling.

Read what a Real Estate professional in Tucker, Jessica Crocker, had to say recently:

 

"According to the National Association of Realtors, 75% of buyers consider the quality of neighborhood schools either 'somewhat important' or 'very important.'

The proof is in the pudding. If you research home sales statistics in neighborhoods with 'preferred' schools, you'll see homes that sell quickly - and for great prices."

This should be of particular concern to the residents of Tucker (the DeKalb County side) including the areas from Brockett to Livsey and Evansdale, Smoke Rise in Stone Mountain (very near the border of Tucker) and those of you who live near Briarlake Elementary School in unincorporated DeKalb portion of Decatur. 

Why?  Because one of the candidates, H. Paul Womack, who is the incumbant, has already tried to harm your area as he seeks to help his political friends and big business lobbyist buddies affiliated with Lakeside High School's booster club.  By aiming to help T-mobile place cell phone towers on the campuses of Brockett Elementary School, Smoke Rise Charter School, Briarlake Elementary School and even Lakeside High School itself were among the 12 schools originally on a list to receive huge 60' x 60' cell phone towers that extend 150' in the air.

Womack does not seek to service his district, he seeks to help the business interests and public utilities whom he owes many favors.  He plans to retire after this two year term.  There is no telling what damage he can do in this time frame if he is re-elected. 


3.  Schools will be closed in favor of mega schools that cost less, and provide an impersonal approach to school.  This idea of corporate running of our schools flies in the face of what has always worked well in the past - caring, concerned teachers who are able to find what works for each child so they can help them tap into their inner strength.  We've never met a bubble sheet capable of doing that, yet. 

If you do not vote for Jim McMahan, the involved parent running against Womack in District #4 or if you simply do not vote at all, there is a very good chance that many of our historic public elementary schools, in the middle of our neighborhoods, will be closed.  Womack has already worked with the current board members in an attempt to close Livsey, Brockett, Idlewood and others. 

If you agree that a cell tower in your neighborhood would drastically reduce your property value, then think about this:  try having a cell tower that leads to your school getting closed, to.  The harm something like that would bring to a community has never been considered.  The loss in revenue to the school system from the further decline in property values would negate any benefit that could come from the very little money that Womack negotiated the deal for in the first place. 


4.  Current decisions made by the BOE have simply wasted our money.  Womack's own involvement in the cell tower issue created a diversion by the board when they should have been focused on finding a new Superintendent of schools.  It even distracted Womack from doing his own job, as he reported that $104 million was cut from the budget in the year 2010 when he was the head of the Budget Committee, yet in 2011 when he was focused on the cell tower issue, he failed to notice that the school administration was not carrying out any of the cuts that had been ordered. 

This failure to oversee the administration and failure to sanction the Interim Superintendent Ramona Tyson (and instead reward her with a huge bonus) is what directly led to the buget crsing the board was presented with this year.  The para-professionals, teachers, librarians, security and other resource personnel who lost their jobs can thank Mr. Womack for failing to keep an eye on the day to day operations of the school system.  Since Womack has already announced his plans to retire, before changing his mind and running for re-election another term, he is much less likely to be connected to the real people and real concerns in his district. 

GTCO-ATL members can tell a variety of personal stories that would back up this claim.  Mr. Womack, it has been said, does not return phone calls, emails or even address concerns directed toward him during the public comments portion of many board meetings.  He does not acknowledge or understand the damage his lack of ethics and concern has caused many children and many schools.

Womack's cell tower plan even included a school, Margaret Harris, for disabled children who are in one of the most vulneratble populations with regard to harm that can be caused by a cell tower.  Instead, he got his local school, Corralwood, a pre-school that is not even required education under federal laws, a 10.5 million dollar upgrade while Margaret Harris will get next to nothing and a cell tower on campus.

5.  The school board is a non-partisan race.  There are people of both major parties as well as the DeKalb Green party who have all come fortward to state their objection to cell towers and the process by which the lease for school grounds was approved. 

You have a choice about the type of person whom you want to represent you - the values of this part of the county that you call home.  Will your elected board member make you proud, or will you be embarassed to tell people where you are from?  Is this the type of person you would like to see your district attract?

5.  The children of DeKalb have been dropping out or failing at an alarming rate.  The schools are in disarray and teachers are being forced out.  Our school system has even been ranked as low as the worst performing district in the entire U.S. and we are frequently the largest district at the bottom of the list in graduation rates and test scores in Georgia.  We cannot afford two more years of the harmful decision making that the current District #4 representative has been involved with, supported and defended.

TUCKER - BRIARLAKE - BROCKETT - SMOKE RISE - LAKESIDE - SAGAMORE

YOU HAVE A CHOICE

and we think it should be a pretty simple one: 

Jim McMahan - a refreshing change, an involved parent, a business background combined with stay-at-home parenting skills, accessible, accountable.  This is the candidate who has the qualities most people want to see on that school board, representing them proudly!  He has spent several years working with school councils, the PTA and other activist groups in his neighborhood and has a plan that would expand that program to include all schools in District #4 and potentially al schools in DeKalb.  He talks about ways that the Board of Education can improve their transparency and has made a vow to remain loyal and easily acessable to the families he serves. 


His opponent (the incumbant) - three decades in the school system with ties to the folks who have nearly caused it to completely collapse.  This would be more of the same, which no one wants.  H. Paul Womack and some of his supporters believe his years in the DeKalb School administration is what makes him the best person for the job.  They do not understand that his lack of understanding or compassion for all the children and his insistance on funnelling resources only to one small area of the district IS a major contributor to the overall educational declnes in the entire county.