CAT Tracks for April 23, 2013 FOP SAYS GOOD-BYE

It's official!

If you click on the link for March 28th, you will see that the various parties took turns bidding adieu.

The Financial Oversight Panel came to Cairo in 2003, following the 2002 teachers' strike, when the Cairo Board of Education decided that punishing uppity CATs was more important than educating the students of Cairo...

...refusing to make up 17 days of missed school, forfeiting hundreds of thousands of federal and state funding.

At a joint meeting of union and District officials called by the Illinois State Board of Education at Shawnee Community College, ISBE representatives took District officials to task, telling them that the decision not to make up the days was a mistake. The ISBE then strongly suggested that the District "request" an oversight panel, which the District subsequently did.

The Cairo Association of Teachers was on board with that suggestion from "Day One". If the District was determined to "destroy the village (District) in order to save it", well somebody needed to intervene...to stop the madness.

So...

Let me add my personal appreciation for the efforts of the various members of the CSD Financial Oversight Panel and the Financial Advisers (the "Three Wise Men" employed to monitor the day-to-day finances.) The FAs spent long hours trying to sort out the District's finances, having to resort to a "best guess" in many instances. Such was the financial status of the District when left to its own devices...as it is now once again.

Sigh...

According to the March 2013 District Treasurer's Report, Cairo School District Number One had approximately $4 million in its account at the First National Bank. (Let the frivolous spending begin? Who'll be the next relative or friend in line?)

Have District officials "learned from history"?

Having observed Cairo School District "politics" for over 40 years, I would offer this advice:

Don't hold your breath...