[Local-Maine-Schools] Intro to the Consolidation Bill Reality Check document

[Dick Atlee]

A group of us read through the new consolidation bill and met last night 
to examine how it would affect MDI schools, and to pull together a 
document that would show that in clear terms, provision by provision.

This was not a narcissistic endeavor, but an attempt to attach a reality 
to these provisions, a reality that in various ways will apply not just 
to us, but to schools all over the state.  These provisions might 
actually seem "reasonable" -- if you had no idea how education works in 
the state of Maine.  As we are discovering, this is a description which 
apparently characterizes a large proportion of a group of people 
currently meeting in Augusta.

Conversations we've had with legislators in the past two days have 
surprised us, and occasionally stunned us.  Even people VERY close to 
the bill actually have no real idea of the significance of what it 
contains -- or even merely WHAT it contains.  Yet these are the same 
people who will be asked to lead the discussion and vote on this bill 
next Monday and Tuesday.  To further guarantee this lack of awareness 
(we hear from attendees at a legislative meeting this afternoon), the 
leadership wants to end all attempts to amend the bill by Monday at 1 PM 
-- yet the newly changed version is only scheduled to arrive on desks 
four hours earlier (if that).  As we understand it, some legislators are 
demanding an end-of-amendments postponement until Tuesday evening. 
We'll see.

This rush to judgment on no (or mis-) information is exactly the same 
dynamic that gave us the USA PATRIOT Act, and it has the same potential, 
whether well-intentioned or not, to create havoc.

So today we assembled a document which we hope will be distributed 
widely -- please pass it on to every Maine person you know, or pass on 
the links to various version of it on Brian's site.  We want our 
representatives to know what the results of this bill will be, so that 
they can be held responsible when the chickens come to roost, and can't, 
like our national legislators, plead ignorance or having been misled.

I'll send the document and links under separate cover.

Dick