watchdog

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

FEBRUARY 27, 2008

THE COST OF PILOTS IN MEMPHIS AND SHELBY COUNTY! WHO BENEFITS? WHO PICKS UP THE DIFFERENCE?

As the debate goes on about how to raise more tax money, sthere is a huge elephant standing in Shelby County sucking up tax money in great bundles. It is the PILOT (Payment In Lieu of Taxes) program. I have attached a spreadsheet compiled by the State of Tennessee for the year 2006. It shows that Shelby County gave away $48 million dollars (the difference between what sould have been paid on the properties at the full property tax rate minus what was actually paid). Look at the names and amounts on the list. Were these pilots worth it? Are they being audited and reported to make sure that the original promises are being kept. Are the length of the pilots being extended without public notice? $48 milliion dollars would go a long way towards quelling the call for more taxes on the poor homeowner. Look at the difference between Davidson County (column A, #19 indicates Davidson County) and Shelby County (column A, #79 indicates Shelby County).

Click here to see that the pilot program is costing us $48 million per year. See who is getting the benefits as homeowners pick up the slack

Monday, February 25, 2008

Shelby County job positions and salaries, 6663 of them at a cost of $275 million

With all the talk about tax increases from both the City and the County, I think that it is time to put the information before the public as to how much we are paying for City and County services and the information about base salaries and benefits. Through a series of open records requests, I have asked the City of Memphis, Shelby County, the Memphis City School System, the Shelby County School System and the MLGW for salary and benefit information.

As usual I have received good cooperation from the MLGW, (since Jerry Collins has taken over there is great openness at the MLGW), and Shelby County and the Shelby County School System. Also, as usual, getting information from the City of Memphis and the City of Memphis School System is like pulling teeth.

I have decided to publish the information that I have over the next few weeks so that the public can look at what their tax money is paying for and make up their own minds as to whether they are getting value for their tax dollars and if there are ways that the cost of government can be reduced. I have the names of the employees that are attached to these salaries but I decided, for now, to only publish the job titles and the yearly salaries. The yearly total is $275 million dollars.

Please be aware that there are substantial benefits attached to these figures that run up the additional cost to about 45% of the base salaries. Those employees with longer years of service can get up to 13 weeks per year of time off due to vacations, sick days, personnel days, holidays and bonus days that means that they can be off work 25% of the year. Obviously this means that more people must be employed to get the work done. Very few in the private sector have such benefits. We need to take a hard look at our government and see if we can tighten belts beyond what politicians say is possible.



Click here to see what your public servants are earning and what their job titles are

Friday, February 22, 2008

WHY OUR DEBT IN SHELBY COUNTY IS SO HIGH

For some time I have been trying to get comparative information on school costs in Memphis, Shelby County and Metro Davidson. In looking over the finances of Memphis and Shelby County, I have come to the conclusion that our schools are our biggest cost and particularly the Memphis City Schools our biggest failure.

In a recent article I showed that our County's huge debt grew in 9 years from $374 million to $1.1 billion for just those bonds due to school construction. Much of this money went to the Memphis School System under the stupid ADA formula giving the City Schools $3 for every $1 dollar spent on county school construction.

Now I am looking at the facts and figures of each system. I have attached a very complete and well done 2 page fact sheet about the Metro Nashville School System. I asked Shelby County Schools and Memphis Schools for similar open records information. I got a courteous reply from Shelby County and after a short period I received a well done document similar to the Nashville document. I still have not heard back from the Memphis School System which is not surprising given my past experience with them.

I have not done a complete analysis but here is some information. One thing is obvious. If we combine the two school systems into one huge system, by law we will have to bring the County cost per student up to the City cost and this will add $71 million dollars to an already bloated bureaucratic cost. ($7930-$6397= $1533X46584 students+$71.4 million dollars. Do you really want to take Mayor Herenton's advice on this?

 

Number of Students 

Annual Budget 

Cost per Student 

Memphis City Schools 

114756

$910000000

$7930

Shelby County Schools 

46584 

$298006557 

$6397 

Metro Nashville 

74155 

$563230100 

$7595


 



Click here to see a report on the Metro Davidson County school system

Click here to see a report on the Shelby County School system

Click here to see how our bonded debt increase in Shelby County is mainly due to schools construction and payments to the Memphis School System per the ADA formula

Friday, February 15, 2008

February 15, 2008

COMMISSIONER CARPENTER'S RESPONSE TO COMPLAINTS ABOUT THE COUNTY'S HUGE DEBT DUE TO SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION. THAT DEBT HAS RISEN FROM $374 MILLION TO $1.1 BILLION IN 9 YEARS

In response to emails sent to County Commissioners by readers of the memphiswatchdog.org and shelbywatchdog.blogspot.com postings concerning the ADA law passed in 1997, Commissioner Carpenter responded with the following email. I will answer some of his points.

1) I admit that many of our government problems come from stupid and unnesessary requirements and stipulations passed down from Washington and the Courts without the funds to pay for their implementation. One of the worst was that the County and the City must fund schools at the same level as the previous year regardless of performance and probably regardless of funds available and attendance. This means that if you cut overhead and expenses, you still cannot cut funding. This takes away any possibility of good management reducing costs.

2) His next point concerned the Needs Assessment Committee (NAC). I have attached a copy of their report and anyone who reads and believes this report I would like to sell them a waterfront lot in Mayor Herenton’s Banneker Estates. I point you to two attached articles. One is a Memphis Flyer article that points out the following.“According to figures from the Tennessee Department of Education, SCS's population remained stable for the past decade while the population of Memphis City Schools (MCS) grew by roughly 10,000 students. In 1995, the county schools served 43,800 students. Despite that figure spiking to almost 49,000 in 1999, it was down to 45,000 in 2005. Over those 10 years, MCS' population went from 108,000 students to 118,000”.

3) If you read the NAC report, you will see the schools and the spending that they want for a system that is barely growing if any. This makes absolutely no sense. It would be like a manufacturing company building lots of new factories when sales were flat. This is lunacy. Also I have attached a portion of a report done for the Memphis School System by MGT of America at a cost of $575,000. This portion of the report shows that MCS went $80 million dollars over budget on new school construction and repairs. The MCS system is completely inept and out of control and deserves our contempt but not our tax money.

Moreover, I have attached a report on the consequences of consolidation by David Pickler, the very competent and knowledgeable head of the County School Board. This shows that consolidation of the City and County Schools systems, as Mayor Herenton wants, would be a complete disaster and would only serve to raise the already monumental education costs and probably bankrupt the City and County.

What is the answer to this crisis? The answer will not come from politicians, but only from taxpayers. Taxpayers have to take back their government from the politicians and let them know that they want reform and discipline in their government. We should start with the County by a petition to propose “NO PROPERTY TAX INCREASE WITHOUT VOTER APPROVAL” or a proposal for no total tax increase (in whatever form) greater than the increase in the inflation rate. That will get their attention.

Click here to see how the Memphis School Board ran over budget in just a few short years by $80 million dollars on school construction and repair

Click here to read the joint Needs Assessment Committee report on the huge spending they want to do on a school system that is static in student growth

Click here to read David Pickler's report on the consequences of any consolidation between the City and the County's school system as Mayor Herenton has proposed

Click here for flyer article on the school situation


Here is his Commissioner Carpenter’s email response.

Thank you for your e-mail. I am also concerned about the county's debt, which as a new Commissioner I inherited and our approach to school construction. However, the information Mr. Saino has provided to you is not completely accurate.

The 3 to 1 ADA formula was created by state statute. However, the statute was necessitated by a lawsuit and State Supreme Court ruling that required it. The lawsuit dealt with funding for rural school systems, which the state of Tennessee lost, and resulted in the supreme court requiring the overhaul of the education funding system. This legislation had to be agreed upon by the court and the legislature. In addition to the ADA formula, the lawsuit resulted in the BEP funding formula and "maintenance of effort," which means that the County must fund schools to the same level as the previous year, whether the school systems are performing well or not.

With that background, rural school bonds are an option in some cases. However, the idea that rural school bonds are the answer to all of our debt and school construction problems is misleading. The Needs Assessment Committee (NAC), a group of private citizens appointed by Mayor Wharton, to help us set construction priorities, identified nearly $500 million in deferred maintenance in Memphis City Schools. Many of these schools have been neglected and in some cases life/safety repairs need to be made. While I, nor anyone else, is happy with the management of Memphis City Schools, there are legitimate construction needs that in my view outweigh many of the County needs.

So what are the answers? First of all discipline. The county debt is actually 1.793 billion, which is a decline from last year. Our debt has been restructured and if we hold CIP spending to $75 million or less annually, the debt will continue to come down. Second, is we must use all of our leverage to get the two school systems to agree to standardized construction processes. This is one area the NAC has not been successful. Another option is to look at the possibility of a Joint Board of Control, which with the agreement of the two school systems would take responsibility for construction out of the hands of the two school boards.

As far as developer impact fees, this Commission is holding developers accountable for infrastructure. Our decisions on development to this point demonstrate that. In relation to schools however, developer impact fees wouldn't begin to pay for the cost of school construction. Particularly now when the housing market is depressed. In a boom, this could be viable, but now would not do much for us.

Thanks again for your e-mail. Please contact me any time.

Sincerely,

Mike Carpenter
County Commissioner

Monday, February 11, 2008

February 11, 2008

WHILE WE WERE ASLEEP, THE POLITICIANS PUT THEIR HANDS IN OUR POCKETS


I have often wondered how we came to the situation where if Shelby County builds a $10 million dollar school, it ends up costing $40 million, with the extra $30 million going to the City of Memphis School System. I started investigating and found that in 1997 the Tennessee Legislature passed a law which was designated HB3093 by Representative Rhinehart, SB3244 by Senator Henry.

Click here to see the summary of the bill that sent millions of dollars to the memphis city schools every time the county built a new school

One provision of the law requires that all proceeds of any capital outlay for school construction be shared with the Memphis City Schools on the basis of average daily attendance, roughly 3 to 1. The effect of this has been the huge increase in the debt of Shelby County which is now over $1.8 billion dollars. The split between debt from schools and other debt is $1.15 billion for schools and $626 million not for schools. This is made worse by the fact that the overall City and County school population has not increased very much in the last ten years, just moved around from the city to the county.

Click here to see, from Shelby County's most recent financial statement, that 65% of the County's huge debt is due to school construction and the money county taxpayers are forced to send to the Memphis School System

However, in reading the law passed in 1997, there is a further provision that reads as follows. “9-21-129(c). The proceeds of any bonds or notes issued for school capital outlay purposes shall not be required to be shared if the county or metropolitan government elects to pay for such bonds or notes pursuant to any applicable provisions of 49-3-1005(b) or (c).” This latter provision states that the bonds can be payable with a tax only upon that portion of Shelby County outside the City of Memphis. In talking to a knowledgeable member of the County Commission, this Commissioner stated that only one school was built by this provision and that was Arlington High School. There is a note in the latest Shelby County financial statement that states “Beginning in 2003 an additional $0.05 tax rate funds only Rural School Bonds and is applied only to taxpayers outside the City of Memphis.” The Commissioner also stated that a majority of the current Shelby County Commission will not allow further schools to be built like the Arlington High School because they want the extra tax money to go to the Memphis School System.

Click here to read the law and the exception that allows the County to finance new school construction without sending money to the Memphis School System if the Coouty Commission would allow it

What could be a worse outcome for the taxpayers than to feed the corrupt money hungry taxzilla called the Memphis School System. Back in 2005, a bill passed the Tennessee Senate 31-0 allowing the Shelby County school system to become a special school district and thereby freezing its boundries. However it was killed by the House K-12 Education subcommittee after the Memphis City School Board decided to aggressively oppose the bill. The bill would have also ended the requirement that Shelby County send $3 to the MCS for every $1 spent on Shelby County School construction.

This opposition by the Memphis City School Board is outrageous and there should be a solution. Every taxpayer in Shelby County including City of Memphis residents should let their legislators know how they feel about this issue and call on the Shelby County Board of Commissioners to finance further school construction in the County in the most cost efficient way and to put an end to the 1997 law that brought this about.

Friday, February 01, 2008

February 1, 2008

BUSINESS AS USUAL AT THE MLGW!!!

With all the misinformation floating around about the need for new taxes by both the City and Shelby County, it is easy to forget that the first responsibility of government is to spend the limited tax money wisely. Memphiswatchdog has been investigating corruption and mismanagement for over three years in both the City and Shelby County and we have been reporting on contracts that have been going to friends and supporters of the Mayors for some time. These special non bid or limited bid contracts have been costing the taxpayers millions in tax dollars.

There are four firms that have been favored for years with basically no bid contracts for equipment and software.These firms are Integrate Technology Inc. (Reginald French), Thomas Consultants, Inc. (Darrell Thomas), Mitchell Technology Group (Marvel Mitchell) and LeSure Computer Services. They have received millions under the ACS Information Technology contract with the City of Memphis which is currently under investigation by authorities. However the MLGW is also involved in giving business to these favored firms. A recent example is shown in an attached file as a result of an open records request. Thomas Consultants got a contract worth $1.83 million dollars for Dell computer servers bidding against two other minority firms, Mitchell and S.O.S. Computers dba Technology Express.

Watchdog received an email from a source that stated in part the following. MLGW’s IT department was forced to award to Thomas after he applied pressure to the MLGW board. I can tell you for a FACT that he was not low bid. Not even close. They broke the law and the rules by awarding it to him. Dell Computers was low. (this email was referring to a previous bid award to Thomas). They had done business with Dell direct for years. Watchdog has no first hand proof of this claim but we did check on Dell Direct and Western State Contracting Alliance (WSCA) and came up with a price for the same computers at least 25% lower in price. This needs to be investigated as to why Dell Direct and WSCA did not bid and was any pressure applied to the board of MLGW . With taxes getting ready to be raised in both the City and the County and with politicians bemoaning their lack of money, it is a crime to waste precious tax money to reward cronies.

Click here to see how the MLGW is spending your utility dollars