Critical Greenway referendum fails

Greenway's referendum failed after Tuesday's votes were counted. My information comes second hand from someone in administration. I don't have vote totals, but what I heard was the measure failed by about 200 votes out of about 1800 -- roughly a ten-point defeat.

(UPDATE: From the May 21 Grand Rapids Herald-Review, referendum fails 1170-898. That's a 272 vote spread or about 56.5 percent to 43.5 percent ... not especially close)

This pivotal referendum would have combined and extended three existing excess levy referendums for the Greenway school district on the western Iron Range. The district is in massive debt and is facing a defeat in an important lawsuit with one of its bargaining units that will further deepen the district's financial woes.

The word was that the district would try again in the fall, but I seriously doubt that the outcome will change. The district has survived off operating levies for years as declining enrollment, skyrocketing legacy costs and some poor long-range planning savaged the dwindling budget. Unless given a iron-clad long term plan to A) get out of debt, and B) return the district to its past level of quality, I doubt voters are going to change their minds. It's very sad to say, but the district's only legitimate choice now is to find a way to cover the debt while entering into some kind of consolidation with Grand Rapids or Nashwauk-Keewatin. There are efforts underway to build a new school for N-K, so this might be the perfect time to talk about ways for Greenway to get involved.

I'm never happy to see hard times for schools. As a teacher myself, this is tragic to watch. But absent a solid long range plan, Greenway's leaders need to face the fact that they probably aren't going to be able to pass a referendum in the fall.

Meantime, everyone in northern Minnesota needs to be worried about the long range health of their school districts. Greenway has some special problems, but most of their problems are shared by everyone on the Range. Wise planning is the only way districts will survive declining enrollment. And all this simply underscores the fact that large, "proposed" jobs projects that might bring new families with students mean nothing when reality requires actual economic activity. Let's take this as a rallying call to modernize our thinking and fight for the Iron Range.

Local paper: 'Mayday' for Range schools

The headline might be a little overly dramatic, but here is a sign that in all of our economic "hopin'" on the Iron Range we still have big problems. Since it would take at least five years for the economic development projects everyone is talking about (Essar's Minnesota Steel plant, PolyMet, etc.) to manifest as enrollment increases, we'll face some major financial issues in our schools in coming years. I predict a strong look at consolidation ... again ... between some of our districts. Remember, it's about the education provided to students; not the preservation of buildings.

MAYDAY: STILL GOING DOWN
K-12 ENROLLMENT IN REGION SHOWS CONTINUED
By Bill Hanna, Mesabi Daily News
Saturday, November 24th, 2007

The enrollment bleeding just won’t stop in the region.

An annual Mesabi Daily News survey of 15 school districts in Northeastern Minnesota shows that K-12 enrollment this fall has dropped by 536 students from last fall to this year. However, when 81 students at the new East Range Academy of Technology & Science in Progress Park are factored in, the enrollment loss is 455. Charter school officials say most of their students have transferred from surrounding school districts, with only some previously home schooled. The 455 number, however, is at least less than the 470 fewer K-12 students from fall 2005 to fall to 2006.

The overall numbers reflect a snapshot of enrollment at different dates that last eight years in the fall provided by school district officials. School enrollment numbers often vary from month to month, week to week and even day to day.

Ness wins Duluth mayor's race

Don Ness will be the next mayor of Duluth.

The two-term Duluth city councilor and former Jim Oberstar campaign manager will take office after the new year. Ness beat businessman Charlie Bell by about 1,600 votes for a 52-47 percentage point victory on Tuesday.

Regular readers (notice I say "regular" and not "normal") know my predictions for the mayor's race had bounced around the last week, but I was close. Ness won 52-47; my last call was Ness by 51-49. My original prediction two weeks ago was the closest: Ness by 52-48. Bell threw it all away with a poor media cycle last week because he probably could have won this one. I'll point out to the blogosphere that prominent political blogs like MNPublius and Checks and Balances had Don running away with a 60 percent landslide. It looks like I was a little closer to reality. (I am, after all, the 2000 winner of the Checks and Balances John Spanish Political Prognostication award).

Why so close? Ness is, after all, a popular city councilor and veteran DFLer in a strong DFL town. Two things: Charlie Bell is well-liked and very popular on the city's west end (he carried ever West Duluth precinct, some by a whoooole lot). Even though he's not a DFLer, Bell won a lot of support for being a trusted community servant. Also Don is young (33) and had to fight a perception battle over his toughness in dealing with major issues and allegations that he's an opportunist looking for higher office. Hence, a very close election that still went the way of the proven DFL rising star.

As for what I think, Don Ness will be a good mayor. I've worked with him on political projects in the past and he's always been good to deal with. He's got a brand new city council that should be fairly proactive (Oh yeah, the Duluth council races were a slaughter. All five incumbents whose terms expired are leaving either by choice or voter will). Ness has been successful in balancing his ideology with compromise and coalition building. Also, I honestly don't think Don plans to run for higher office. I think he could potentially be a legacy mayor in the city of Duluth.

For the record, there is a 90 percent chance that Jim Oberstar's successor in Congress will be named Tony: State Rep. and House majority leader Tony Sertich, State Sen. Tony Lourey, or -- heads up -- this new guy Tony Cuneo who was just elected to the Duluth council. There is a 10 percent outside chance that the candidate will be some unknown from the woods or exurban portions of the 8th CD (or, in 2012, 7th CD after Minnesota loses a Congressional seat to reallocation and redistricting). Point is, Ness's critics were off in assuming he would run for Congress from his mayor's post.

So there it is. Congratulations to Mayor Don Ness and the new Duluth City Councilors.

Meantime, on the Range, we have a new mayor and council in Virginia that will probably fight just as much as the old one. The school bond issue passed in Hibbing but failed in Grand Rapids and the St. Louis County schools. As I said yesterday, Rapids did a poor job of selling their referendum and Hibbing did well. That's reflected in the vote totals. I did not mention the St. Louis County Schools referendum and that's actually bigger news. The failure of this bond issue will probably threatened the viability of some of the schools in this vast rural confederacy of small communities. This district needs help.

Now we political junkies have to wait for the Iowa caucuses. Stay tuned.

Election Day notes

It's election day! In the odd years this only excites nerds like me, but if you have an election in your area you should get out to vote.

In my section of Itasca County all we had to vote on today was the District 318 school referendum. In Hibbing, where I work, residents are voting on their own school referendum. There are dozens of these referendums going on all over Minnesota and it's because the state still isn't living up to its funding obligations for school districts. That's the conservative plan, Gov. Pawlenty's in particular, to shift the financial obligation from the state income tax to property taxes which are more regressive. This is essentially a reversal of the tax reforms of Wendell Anderson and Rudy Perpich of the 1970s that made Minnesota the pride of the nation for education, community strength and service delivery. So what's better? Vote "Yes" to authorize this shift or vote "No" to harm school districts in the short term? No one wins until we fix the state tax trends.



Meantime, here's a roundup of the other elections that seem worthy of following:


Regionally:
There's a humdinger of a mayor's race and several competitive council races in Duluth today. In the main event, city councilor Don Ness is battling businessman Charlie Bell for the mayor's office. Ness is a longtime DFL activist and former Congressman Jim Oberstar campaign manager. He's also the city council's youngest member and even with eight years in office is still in his early '30s. Bell is a community activist of sorts and is making his second run for this office. Both have been well financed and I really think this one could break either way. We'll see tonight.


In the Iron Range town of Virginia, longtime incumbent mayor Carolyn Gentilini is on the ropes against city councilor Steve Peterson. These two have been squabbling for years. Peterson crushed Gentilini in the primary (if this were Louisiana we wouldn't even need a general election) and she has a lot of ground to make up if she's going to prevail. There will also be some turnover in the Virginia council but even if all the incumbents are swapped out I get the feeling that not much is going to change in Virginia.


Statewide:
Lots and lots of referendums. Like I said above, if they pass Pawlenty gets to justify not funding eduction as well as he should and middle class property owners are burdened with an unfair portion of the bill. If they fail, the next two years will be hard for districts all over the state. It's hard to celebrate a victory for either Yes or No in my mind.


Nationally:
Not much to report. Governor's races in Mississippi and Kentucky. In Mississippi a portly ex-lobbyist Gov. Haley Barbour will cruise to re-election and the short list of GOP V.P. candidates. In Kentucky, a scandal-laden incumbent Republican will probably fall to a Democrat in an election that won't prove much about Kentucky's electorate. Meantime, the state of Virginia has legislative elections that might be an interesting bellweather for the state's recent Democratic swing. If you hear the Dems took the Virginia legislature, they might have a shot at that Republican stronghold in 2008.


Meantime, my friend and former news director Cindy Kohlmann is running for city council in Dubuque, Iowa. Do the right thing, Dubuque's 4th Ward. She'll treat you right.



Internationally:
You know, everything up until this part is irrelevant. If Pakistan falls to extremists in their January elections we'll all be farming potatoes with grow-lights in our bomb shelters within the decade. Our solution so far? Give Pakistanis only two choices: President Musharaff or General Musharaff. Uffda! Democracy is hard.