Fleming confirms selfish,
misplaced priorities of trustees and staff
Jun 29, 2006 Filed in:
Administration
Building
James Fleming, Dana Point
News "The CUSD Board of
Trustees has taken a certain amount of heat for
its decision, six years ago, to proceed with a
comprehensive solution for housing student support
services needed for a growing district. That
decision was foresighted then, and even more so
today." So,
Fleming admits that six years ago, while the
district was beginning a series of deficit budgets
and student overcrowding and facilities
deficiencies had become a crisis at schools
like Capistrano
Valley High School, CUSD
was developing a "comprehensive" plan for its new
administration building. During the CUSD Recall
campaign in 2005, Trustee Marlene Draper tried to
cover for CUSD's embarrassing, decrepit portable
classrooms, telling the press that the district
had a "strategic plan" to remove them - a plan
that was at least two years old. Of course,
Interim Superintendent Charles McCully later
confirmed that no such strategic plan existed and,
to add insult to injury, immediately following the
recall campaign, the Trustees showed their true
colors by voting unanimously to pay for a study to
maximize portables at every campus in the
district. Even if Draper had been telling the
truth about the "strategic" plan for the kids, it
wouldn't have held a candle to the "comprehensive"
six-year plan the trustees and staff dishonestly
and secretly carried out for the new
administration building. Fleming is the
Superintendent of the Capistrano Unified School
District.
