UPDATED: Is There a Truthsayer Among Us?

Which way do we go??  State takeover or local control?  Are we being
forced to choose between the lesser of two evils?  But, which one is truly
less evil?  Do we believe in our own abilities to vote for more responsible
board members in the November 2014 election?  It will be the first time they
are ALL up for re-election and the number reduced to just seven.  Can we
demand a countywide election for all seats in order to prevent special interest
groups from holding control over seats since they all receive one vote and
they all must represent the entire county, according to SACS?

Or are we ready to throw in the towel?  Do we trust in Governor Deal and the
recommendation of the state board of education to know what is best for
DeKalb County, a widely diverse county with lots of money that did not
vote for Deal.  DeKalb is a stronghold in the Democratic Party for the state
of Georgia.  Deal is a stronghold in the Republican Party old school for
the entire U.S.  Is this a premeditated takeover, aided by former Republican
lobbyist H. Paul Womack, Jr., your cell tower advocate and the Dr. Atkinson
swing vote who brought her here and potentially leaked information to the
press about the other candidates so they would back away from Georgia?

There is an old riddle about the Truthsayer and the Naysayer.  

The Truthsayer always tells the truth.  The Naysayer always lies.  If you approach them both along a wooded path and must rely on them to point you in the right direction, but can only ask one question, how will you know what to ask?  And, more importantly, how will you know which path to take?  This is the problem we are facing, Dekalb County.   But, we have many people playing both roles.  

On one side...

One one side you have the state BOE and the Governor of Georgia, Nathan Deal.  Some of the DeKalb delegation has started to line up with these fine folks.  Rep. Scott Holcomb voiced his opinion in the Patch today. Sen. Fran Millar has also been vocal about the DeKalb board and their placement of themselves before the children.  Rep. Tom Taylor has agreed and says his district of Dunwoody wants to form its own, separate school system.  Can you blame them?  The state BOE will likely vote to remove the local BOE.  Lawsuits will likely follow, but don't let that deter you from the fact that the most important lawsuit is still to come - the Crawford Lewis construction scandal charges and then, hopefully, Heery Mitchell.  Hope they collected their fees up front because we have to be close to broke by now.

On the other side...

We have to give some credit to Michael Thurmond for his choice to speak for the first time outside of the boardroom to parents at the Emory-LaVista Parent Council meeting, at Oak Grove Elementary School, right in the the middle of the well-established, tight-knit, politically-involved and uber-connected "ITP" (Inside the Perimeter) crowd.  You really need to watch the short video clip here, which was brought to you by Jonathan Cribbs of the Patch.  Thanks Jonathan!  

He gave these PTA parents, soccer Mom's and Dad's, Parent Council Members and others a lot to think about. Are the stakeholders in our county, the involved men and women who love their schools almost as much as they love their children, a part of the culture that needs to change? Has part of the problem in the county stemmed from the years of voting on "auto-drive" where you don't consider the person, just the party?

On the Thurmond side you have five board members and two of their hostages, Nancy Jester and Dr. Pam Speaks.  Funny how the board has sort-of alienated the two board members who represent accounting (Nancy is a CPA) and instruction (Pam is a former teacher).  You also have Don McChesney weighing in on this side with his belief that the law that authorizes this whole process is not constitutional.  Who keeps writing all these unconstitutional laws?  Can THEY get some kind of training please???  

One way is death, the other is paradise.  Which one should we choose?

The riddle continues as you are to consider the two path.  One is right and one is wrong, but how will you know which path to take?  

Putting this ancient riddle into our scenario, we have only recently been introduced to Michael Thurmond, who comes with glowing recommendations.  He wants us to believe he knows which path to take.  If we choose to follow him, and not Nathan Deal's path, we will be showing our support for the elected board, as they are today.  We will be giving our approval, blindly, of the board's choice for Superintendent, a choice made in a closed door meeting and without the standard employment process or notification to the public.  

That's likely what they hope we will do.  Trust in Thurmond and fall in line where we belong, according to the "powers that be."  The pecking order has been set.  The parents and others payees in the system should rank behind the Superintendent and under his/her thumb.  We're likely being shuffled to the end of the line behind the friends and family and others who are being paid for showing up to work in the Administrative Office, fondly referred to as "The Palace."  Principals, teachers and children are still not registering on anyone's scale of importance.  Sad, isn't it? 

It starts to make sense, or seem inevitable that we will go down the path Thurmond wants, but there are a lot of people who do not agree.  In listening to the irate parents at Oak Grove, one would think they are on the side with the Governor, right?  They are not happy with Thurmond and very unhappy with the BOE.  But, wait a minute...  Isn't Oak Grove the school that spoke out at the Feb. 11 board meeting?  Aren't they the ones who were professing how grand life is at Oak Grove?  

One would assume them to be on the side with Thurmond and the board that they love so much because we all know they get many favors from agreeing to "play the game."  But, we just watched a video where they were yelling and disrespecting, some might say, the new Superintendent.  So, which is it?  Do they love everything and not even see the troubles around them?  Or are they irate and irritated and want to see the board tossed out?

And for all the frequent claims this particular mid-section of the county makes about its wonderful schools and their support for education, we couldn't help but notice how frequently they interrupt whomever is speaking.  Has "hijacking" a meeting become so common of a practice for them that they will do it anywhere, any place, anytime and to anyone?  They are obviously part of the Orson cult, as this is his former "posse," the Emory-LaVista Parent Council that he ran for several years.  

Is this how we expect the upper crust of DeKalb to behave in pubic?  Do their children copy their behaviors and interrupt their teachers in this manner?  Is this condition contagious because we don't  want to catch it.  It's rude, disrespectful and the rest of the county has already been provided their "instruction manual"for tricks called "Attention Losers, This is How You Win."  If you haven't seen it, click here.   Amid all the talking these folks like to do, someone should suggest they try to take time to listen.  That's really the only true way to learn something.

We've been listening.  We heard Orson called to task the night prior to this Oak Grove meeting.  Orson is the former head of the Emory-LaVista Parent Council, yet he chose to have his meeting separately from this other group.  I'm going to guess that the folks at the Orson meeting also attending the meeting the next morning, unless they had to work.  (By the way, how are all these folks getting off work to go to all these meetings??)  Orson was reminded of the particular document that was posted online in a battle for attendance zone lines.  It describes how to control the microphone at pubic events so that all the attention and focus is on your school and no one recalls the others.  That school was Fernbank, a stone's throw from Emory University and only a couple miles away from Oak Grove, placing them in separate voting districts, but the same Parent Council bounaries.  (No idea how that happened.)  

What we found interesting is that we saw these EXACT SAME tactics used with our efforts to stop the cell towers at DeKalb County schools.  There was one group, also involved in this particular parent council and also around the corner from Oak Grove and Lakeside High School.  This other protest group, which was formed after we alerted them about the cell tower coming to their school, claimed to be representing Briarlake Elementary School and the community's best interest.  They refused to play fair.  They took all the credit for the work that was being done by all the schools in an effort to work together.  They spoke out about themselves and would have saved their school exclusively and gladly chose to throw everyone else under the bus.  As we recently spoke up about wanting an answer on the cell tower contracts and wanting the board to sign a resolution against the cell towers, this "other" group from Briarlake popped up out of nowhere to contact Marshall Orson, who had also been in touch with us.  The connections are all there.  We just need to figure out what these folks are plotting as it could potentially come at the demise of other schools and to the detriment of other children. 

We also head Orson say that he is now "sharing a mic wtih Nancy Jester."  He said it several times during his meeting on Feb. 20 and with an odd emphasis and laugh.  Is "sharing a mic" a code for "working together."  Did he mean that figuratively or literally? Is this a sign that Dunwoody, Fernbank, Lakeside and Oak Grove and even Briarlake are all working together?  

In addition, we have heard Jim McMahan from Sagamore Hills Elementary speak up in approval when we reached out to  Rep. Karla Drenner from Avondale Estates.  These are all the same communities that have driving the chaos surrounding forming new cities.  Hmmm... what else do we know about them?  Well, let's just consider what we know ....

Corruption Cooridor:
Oh yes, remember this?  Yes, it's back!  The map that defines the "Corruption Corridor. "  If you live in these areas, this map is not intended to offend you.  We just think you deserve to know who your neighbors are and what they stand for.  If you are feeling backlash against your community, there may be some good reasons you are entitled to know about in case your opinions are not being represented or your image is being tarnished.  

The areas in red are where the cell tower ballot question was either split by a 51 / 49 vote or was higher in favor of allowing towers on school grounds.  Please note, there were no overwhelming victories in terms of areas that wanted cell tower by a high margin.  But, most other areas (the ones NOT in red) were very strongly against the practice of towers at schools by as much as 70% or more.  

Womack's stronghold on his former district was his tie to Oak Grove Elementary

and Lakeside High School.  The new Superintendent Michael Thurmond went

to Oak Grove and placed some blame directly on the shoulders of those in the

room, telling them that he needs more than 8 days to fix 10 years of bad voting

decisions.  Was he referring to Womack influence on the district?  The audience

members said they are currently happy with their board member, refusing to believe the problems could 

be partially blamed on them.  And, Oak Grove was at the board meeting on Feb. 11, speaking to the board

and Superintendent and saying how happy they were with their school.

Marshall Orson told his constituents that he believes in a lot of little neighborhood schools,
but then he told them the SPLOST plan is for big elementary schools, like the one
being built at Fernbank, his home base.  He said he helped start a state authorized charter
school, but he opposed the charter amendment.  He professes to be a Democrat, but likes to talk about
"sharing the microphone" with Republican charter advocate Nancy Jester.  Fernbank and Dunwoody
sharing the microphone?  What is going on here?

Why are the schools where we normally hear parents bragging about being "the best" in the county now the ones
speaking out the loudest about wanting the state to throw out the entire board?

WHO is telling the truth?  WHO is lying to our faces?
And WHAT are they saying behind our backs?

CORRUPTION AT WORK HERE.  
PLEASE PROCEED WITH CAUTION!

   

Is Michael Thurmond a Truthsayer?  Is he dishing out exactly the kind of "tough love" that DeKalb needs?  Time will tell.  But, time is surely running out for the board of education which will faces its toughest audience, yet, at the state BOE meeting tomorrow morning.  There is no way of knowing what they will think of the many, many changes that have taken place here, mostly behind closed doors.

Thumond got an earful in return by a member of the Emory-LaVista Council who got a standing ovation for her sharp words of warning to Mr. Thurmond that he cannot fix the problem if he is not able to see that the board is the problem.  But, we know Thurmond has been reported to be a very honest, forthright person.  

 Are the members in the Emory-LaVista Council the Naysayers?   Well, we know that they lied about how great things were at their schools.  We know they lied about the need for SPLOST to pass in order to reduce the board from 9 to 7 and have them stand for election at the same time. 

So, as the riddle goes... you are given two paths and must ask the guardians one question before selecting which way to go.  The truthteller will tell the truth.  The Naysayer will lie.  

The one question to ask is:  

What path will the OTHER guy will tell me to go down?

 And then, you actually choose the OPPOSITE and you will be right everytime.  

If we asked truthful Thurmond which path  the Emory-Lavista/Oak Grove posse would tell us to go down, he would say "the state."  (because that's what he truly believes they want.)

If we asked the Fernbank group what Thurmond would say, they would say "the state" because they would be lying about it.  (he really wants us to stick with the current board.)

So, based on this exercise, we would have to be rooting for the opposite of these answers, or actually wanting the board to retain their seats.   We should hope that Thurmond can convince the state (and us) that he will fix the problems and keep the board in check.  We should not be willing to sell out our school system for the simple fact that it appears like an easy answer.  We should not want to have our rights stripped from us that would allow us to take control off our own schools.  We should hope to maintain "local control" vs. "state control."  Unless we are part of a bigger plan to create charter school districts that are state-run, as Marshall Orson admitted he had already done himself once before, then we should not give up on the election process which takes place in November of 2014 for all board members.  (some say it will take place in July 2014.)   

With enough voters at the polls and a demand to change the election from that of a voters can vote in their own small district only to one where all the voters in the county are able to vote for all 9 members who will represent the entire county.  Perhaps, we can continue to shape the future of our schools.  But, if we give up our rights and let the state take over, we will be at their mercy and they are not too fond of DeKalb, so that could be a problem. 

So, why would the Emory and Dunwoody folks want a state takeover?  And why do we think this is related to the cell towers?  Well, it's quite possible that these districts (marked in red) that have said they don't mind the cell towers as much as the rest of us, are already working to set up new "charter clusters" of schools based on state charter commission approvals.  AND, according to the ALEC initiatives, there is a push for virtual schools.  So, the "better" areas with the "better" schools may be doing the teaching while the rest of the schools not included in those clusters are watching from their laptop while kept in a cookie cutter school building located closer to their homes.

This is not a confirmed theory, but it is something for you to think about.  Orson says "there is no plan."  We think that's a lie.  There is a plan out there for our schools.  We just have to figure it out if we aren't in the circles of people who already know about it.