Saturday, May 20, 2006

School Board May Waste Your Money...You Read It Here, First.....Two Days Ago

In this mornings Knoxville News-Sentinel Ericka Mellon writes about a story that was posted here at Brian's Blog two days ago. Here is the post from Brian's Blog two days ago and Here is the Knoxville News-Sentinel story.

Here are the problems with what the school district is likely to do on this issue.

1) They are likely to hire a lawyer and spend funds for a lawsuit that does NOT name the school board. John Owings the Senior Deputy Law Director for Knox County informed the board last Monday evening, this litigation has been filed on an individual, not on the school board. The school board has no interest and is not a party to it.

2) When board members like Indya Kincannon have already complained "that it will be hard" to make the proposed School budget work with the $7.1 million in additional NEW local revenue. How can board members then justify spending our tax dollars on a lawsuit where the school district isn't named?

3) This is a use of Knox County taxpayer dollars to protect a politician's self interest. If the school board hires a lawyer, they are spending our money to keep one of their own in office This is an abuse of power.

Do you remember what the citizens of Knox County said in 1994? They spoke loud and clear. Over 74% of the people in Knox County said that Sam Anderson and all other positions in the Charter should be term-limited to no more than two terms. School Board member Diane Dozier was included in the counter suit, but her district on May 2, 2006 term-limited her to two terms.
4) Good luck to the school district getting the county to cut the check. My sources tell me there already exist a memo stating that NO public funds will be authorized or spent for the benefit of representing the personal self interest of anyone with this lawsuit. The five County Commissioner's (Diane Jordan, David Collins, Billy Tindell, Phil Guthe and John Griess) have their own personal lawyers, The remaining County Commissioners have been instructed to obtain their own legal counsel (Wanda Moody, John Schmid, Mark Cawood, Mary Lou Horner, Michael M. McMillan, John R. Mills, Larry Clark) The county-wide officeholders have been informed to get their own legal counsel (Trustee Mike Lowe, Sheriff Tim Hutchison, Clerk Mike Padgett, Register of Deeds Steve Hall, Circuit Court Clerk Cathy Quist, by the way lawyer Greg Shanks represented Ms. Quist, yesterday, Criminal Court Clerk Martha Phillips, and then Sam Anderson and Diane Dozier)

I will post more on this later. Stay Tuned.

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