Guest column by Jackie Inclan on grand jury investigation of Cobb schools' Transportation Department ...
Brian P. wrote - BRAVO MS. INCLAN! You have spoken something foreign to the CCSD known as the TRUTH. When questions are made public the lies and deceit begin, supposed "leaders" such as Chairwoman Lynnda Crowder-Eagle state in e-mails to constituents "someone on the Grand Jury may have a relative or a friend that was employed by CCSD." It's all about discrediting their accusers. People have grown weary of these tactics. It's time criminal prosecutions are initiated for the conduct of leadership. Legislation should be introduced to remove and prosecute any elected official who makes campaign promises to gain votes and does the complete opposite like the majority of the school board has. If we as a people start this on a local level it could possibly snowball and we could take our country back.
SouthernGal wrote - Did Ms. Inclan have a friend or two fired? Should she have recused herself from the Grand Jury? Is this sour grapes on her part?
LCE watcher wrote - SouthernGal, are you too nice to write on this blog? Seems to me you are furthering a narrative Lynda Eagle started when she implied the grand jury had ties to bus drivers. Well, how about the fact there is now a different grand jury investigating the department? Will they also have ties to drivers? You people are all about excuses. You want the authority, but not the responsibility, and isn't that just like:
1. An ethically challenged preacher who will never be first fiddle in his chosen field
2. A PTA mom who fights primarily for her own special needs child (and really needs to from things heard around the district)
3. A petty former principal who landed a job at Glover but was in violation of a pension rule and had to go
4. An old man with too much time on his hands who can't stay awake during meetings
5. A former health bureaucrat with way too many advanced degrees who's more interested in his own speaking career than the job he signed up to do
6. A young politician in the making who misses every other meeting because he's following his wife around the country on speaking engagements
7. A lone voice speaking truth to power, getting slammed publicly by her peers
8. A superintendent who is still an enigma, lawyering up and surrounding himself with brown nosing PE teachers and incompetent staff.
What a recipe for disaster.
Tired of it wrote - Being a mechanic for Cobb County, we really do care about what we do! We have our own children riding these buses. I do. I know that every mechanic does his absolutely best for that reason! I will promise you this. We will continue to do our best with the buses for the drivers so they can do their job and get the kids to school safely and on time. Trust me, these are some really great people driving your kids to school!
RCnamoonpie wrote - Thanks Jackie, for you and the other grand jury members for looking into allegations at the CCSD transportation dept. Whether there is criminal intent or not would be up to a jury to decide, but the bottom line is that our children here in Cobb need safe and adequate transportation. Perhaps the best thing we can do as citizens of Cobb is to make sure we don't elect officials who have ties to CCSD in the first place. How can some of these board members be objective when they're overseeing the hand that feeds them.
Teacher007 wrote - I hear so many people brush off complaints as just "disgruntled employees." Isn't it important WHY there are so many disgruntled employees? Doesn't this reflect on poor management? The school district has a history of dismissing employee complaints of abuse by managers as "leadership style" instead of engaging in any introspection into whether these "styles" are really management deficiencies.
What can you say? wrote - Crowder-Eagle puts Astro-turf as a priority before teachers and student transportation? CCSD management should be the ones to suffer, not the people at the "grassroots" level that put our children before their egos.
Anonymous wrote - Jackie, You are dead on with your assessment of arrogance. It really is a disgrace that our school board and superintendent choose to behave in this manner. We parents are extremely frustrated with being dismissed by these inept politicians; Now they dismiss the grand jury as well. We as a school system are in trouble. The emperor and his new clothes need a ride out of town.
Larry Wills guest column: Marietta's redevelopment a "crown of thorns" ...
Larry One Note wrote - Hey Larry. In your next article, please explain to us how these neighborhoods and the City of Marietta would be better off today had the City followed your advice and ignored them. Focus on what the tax base, crime rates and public service costs would be today had 2002 conditions just carried forward. Your theory assumes that the vacant lots will remain forever, when history shows around the country that many stalled projects eventually get worked out and are completed in some form. At least Marietta has a chance that redevelopment will eventually get done. But if the quads, Johnny Walker and Clay Homes still existed, "the market" would surely decide that those neighborhoods are destined to be perpetual ghettos and private investment would flee permanently. You would instead be writing columns complaining about blight and rampant crime and why the City isn't doing anything about it.
MK wrote - You guys on Fraiser Circle are surrounded by the illegal alien-filled duplexes. These neighborhoods in turn effect our neighborhood school rankings. THAT's what the people should be angry about! And the Meeting Place & Magnet projects that are unfinished look just like the vacant lots in Smyrna, @ Belmont Hills, Jonquil Plaza & Concord Road. And they are DESTROYING our property values!
Turf Time: Postponing installation might be best ...
West Cobb Parent wrote - I am really looking forward to seeing these kids learn their math and science on this turf. I hope the trailer kids get to spend more of their days on it instead of in their trailers. Since this turf is going to have so many educational uses, I can't wait to see how our test scores improve with all of that fresh air and opportunity to use the turf for their actual education. I hope all of these uses don't impair the football team's ability to use the fields. That would be a shame.
Anonymous wrote - In 10 yrs, when all these board members are gone and the turf wears out who will pay for replacement?
Follow us on Twitter!
Why don't we look more closely at the Principals seeing as how they were the ones giving the evaluations this year. Why not see what their credentials are? I want to know how many hours they were taught how to provide those evaluations. I want to know what they taught and for how many years they taught in a public school. Was it all for Cobb?
Were they coaches? How long were they asst. principals?