Super-Majority for School Bond Votes

Re George Skelton’s Nov. 8 column on school bond votes:

There are several good reasons why voters and property owners demand a super-majority to pass bond issues. Politicians and school boards rarely spend our money wisely. LAUSD has flat out put into the toilet $200 million to date on Belmont and South Gate, with millions more to be spent before either is over (not complete, just not sucking up tax dollars). They will spend money to buy out contracts of people who mismanaged the funds. In private industry, people like this would simply be fired and given two weeks’ pay.

George, do the math. LAUSD has a $7.5-billion budget. There are 710,000 students. That means that more than $10,000 per student is spent for education. Many nonpublic schools are doing a superior job for less than this amount. Taxpayers demand results for their money spent. LAUSD is not producing results. Call us when they do.

JERRE REIMERS

Chatsworth

*

Skelton practices banana republic politics: He is not the least scandalized at an electoral strategy based on “stealth” to keep the “creeps” from knowing about a school bond election. Imagine his view if the stealth were to sneak an election past blacks, or Latinos, or homosexuals, or women. Then, his article would favor the “creeps” knowing about a stealth action. Not what democracy is supposed to be about, even if you don’t like the super-majority requirement; the stealth tactic amounts to a minority-of-a-minority-of-the-majority.

S.G. FINEFROCK

Los Angeles