Your Letters for April 4, 2025
There needs to be a better plan than Prop 2
Having studied debates on both sides of the Prop 2 issue before the voters on April 8,
I feel compelled to provide a detailed defense of reasons for keeping three public high schools.
St. Joseph is a unique and special city. Unlike any other town I have ever witnessed, it has three distinct and historic communities. These three communities are Northside, Central, and Southside. In each of these proud communities, the public high school is the "heart and soul" of the community. People of power tell us that Benton High School will be closed whether Prop 2 passes or fails. It is difficult to imagine Southside without Benton as a high school.
As Superintendent of Schools for three school districts, two in Missouri and one in Illinois, I have worked with school boards to build new schools and to close schools when it seemed wise and necessary. Long before this, I was a student at Benton, a teacher and coach at Benton, and an administrator who created the Troester Media Center. It might be useful if those reading this letter know about my experience and credentials. I have been named as a Fulbright Scholar by the U.S. Office of Education and awarded with a Key to the City by Mayor Glenda Kelly. UMKC honored me with the Alumni Achievement Award in 1990 and Missouri Western honored me with their Distinguished Alumni Award in 1992. I was humbled by being named the Top Superintendent of Schools in Missouri (Pearce Award) in 1999.
As for closing schools in St. Joseph School District, Dr. Troester, our Superintendent at the time, asked me to help explain to parents and the community why we needed to close schools like Blair, Sherwood, and Everett. All were elementary schools and we convinced the majority of people that we had good reasons to do so. Closing a high school is a much bigger deal, especially in St. Joseph where the high schools are the core of each of three communities.
As for building and opening a new school, it has usually been a much happier thing to see happen. While our architects and construction managers have pleased our school board with design, appearance, and functionality, our new buildings do not match these charming old brick and stone schools such as Benton, Lafayette, and Central. At the university level, few people would dream of tearing down the buildings of Yale, Harvard, or Notre Dame.
There needs to be a better plan than Prop 2. Some other parts of the plan also seem confusing and troubling to me. An example is closing Eugene Field which is the highest achieving elementary school in the district! Why even think of closing a school with that level of excellence? Smart leaders know that any concerns about low enrollment can be fixed. I have worked with school boards to do just that. Redrawing attendance lines (or open enrollment) have solved those concerns where I have been employed, including St. Joseph.
Strong leadership should develop a plan for a bond issue that keeps the 3 high schools. All three high schools are beautiful brick and stone buildings. Benton and Central also have large, attractive campuses. $35 million to remodel and further beautify the current impressive buildings will go a long way. By contrast, the cost of a new high school these days is through the roof! $157 million is a tremendous amount of money but may be greatly underestimated in my opinion. When the second new high school is built, the costs might more than double.
As for students being at the center of this plan, I only hear talk about balancing numbers, whether it is the size of school populations or the number of students in a class.
Speakers emphasize class sizes of 20-24. What is wrong with a class of eight students at Benton or any school if they want to take Calculus, Chemistry or Physics? This plan should focus less on numbers and more on quality for students and staff.
I urge voters to vote no this time. Hopefully, the new school board will rethink all of this before closing a high school. While the debate and differing opinions seem deep and troubling today, ironically this may be just the right time for convincing leadership to come forward with a noble plan. Common sense needs to prevail.
Dr. Jerry R. Chambers
Teacher and Former Superintendent of Schools
Let's go, St. Jo
Let’s go St. Jo! How many times have I heard that in my teaching career? I have seen our city pass and defeat funding for schools over the years, and I feel compelled to speak up.
Our school district’s property consists of many old properties basically because prior generations valued it. Many of the schools were built even during the depression. There was a pride in our communities as citizens bonded together and made a difference. One of the reasons was that our schools were the key. Immigrants from Europe (especially Eastern) were moving in and education was a luxury as well as evidence of a caring community. They looked at the town and many improvements were made including…a park system that is something any community would envy, arts programs with even a Symphony, an active stockyard, and a school system that was able to turn out many outstanding individuals.
Our schools were built mainly on hills. People looked up to the schools to gather, to interact and educate. I invite you to consider our Proposition that is on the ballot! What if we all got involved and supported it!
This initiative is different! We are refocusing education in St. Joseph to fit our city. Education in St. Joseph is not only pre-school - 12 and Missouri Western University, but also includes the trades. We have many talented experts that could pass their knowledge on, we have businesses that need a trained workforce, and basically we need to right size education in St. Joseph.
What is in it for you? The more progressive we become, our education will lead to drawing and keeping young productive people in our community. Let’s give some of our young people a place to educate and raise their families. Think about how many taxes we could generate from more people staying in St. Joseph. We have some really strong drawing points: a hospital linked with Mayo, business and industry with; world wide distribution, our local University and even a training camp for the Kansas City Chiefs! Join me in voting yes! Let’s go St. Jo!
Susan Wagner
St. Joseph
D.O.G.E, or is it the Department Of Government Extravagance
“Show me a man that gets rich by being a politician, and I’ll show you a crook!” — Harry Truman
“Why not question possible fraud or mis-management and SAVE the taxpayers billions of dollars,” this should not be a “party issue —both sides need to stand up,” why is this even being challenged as it is apparent there is a control problem. Trump becomes the “fall guy” for pointing out an issue within the government systems. Why didn’t the last party do this obvious audit on our systems — no basement access to a computer?
First let us set the stage for the below information, “the government is a business.” I do not care who did what, who ok’d the spending of millions of our tax dollars or just plain stupid spending, be it Demo or Rep. or who was in office at the time of these spending discharges. Should they not be held accountable, and if we are paying people to work from home they need to “work” for us and not be “double dipping.” Then there is the money being sent all over the world. It used to be millions, now it is billions. Why don’t we take care of our own people first!
In just over 30 days, Musk has uncovered around $65 Billion! Who knows just how deep the hole is and the possible savings to the taxpayer? Below are just a few of the problems uncovered — enjoy!
The plan — “dismantle the Government Bureaucracy," slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies. Elon can't do and won't do anything without our approval. Goal is to abolish the Internal Revenue Service and use tariffs. Reciprocal tariffs will earn us $700 billion a year.
DOGE clock — website says that its tool measures in real time the number of taxpayers’ dollars that will be saved by changes being put forth.
Who is Musk — owns Telsa, 1T Market Cap- SpaceX — Twitter (X) — Neural ink — XAI — XAI Anadolu. “A Special Government Employee.” Not being paid. He's worth $433B. Hired for 130 Days.
Mystery — DOGE raises an alarm over $4.7 trillion, almost impossible to trace.
Work place — 6% of federal workers show up for work in a government office. Federal buildings have a 12% occupancy rate. Leasing/maintenance cost $15.7 Billion a year, and we have 58 different local pay areas.
First departments being reviewed — ED, GSA, EPA, DOL, OPM, DOI, USDA, TREASURY, SSA, HHS, SEC, DOE, NARA, RRB, DOD, NIH, DHS, USDA, DOC, HUD, CFPB, FDA, DOJ, SSA, DOS, VA, SBA, DOT, FTC, USGS, FWS, BIA, FCC and NLRB. First report showed $65 billion.
For the record:
USAID — $6.5B. The agency is listed first on DOGE's list of the top ten total contract savings.
The Department of Education is listed as the second-highest in total contract savings at $502 million in savings, per DOGE receipts.
Musk reveals ‘Iron Mountain’ mine nightmare and is investigating a limestone mine in Pennsylvania where federal employee retirements are processed manually. Seven hundred-plus workers, 10,000 application/per month by hand and back-up on paper, moved by a mine shaft elevator.
The EPA, federal spending, said it had located $20 billion in tax dollars within the agency. (EPA political appointee talking about how they were ‘tossing gold bars off the Titanic,’ rushing to get billions of your tax dollars out the door before Inauguration Day.)
The EPA found eight agencies were controlling the distribution of tens of billions of taxpayer dollars to different entities "at their discretion," such as the Climate United Fund, which reportedly received just under $7 billion. The scheme was the first of its kind in EPA history, and it was purposely designed to obligate all the money in a rush job with reduced oversight.
FEMA — $59 million to house illegal immigrants in luxury New York City hotels.
DOD — $125 billion over five years by renegotiating service contracts and consolidating bureaucratic processes.
$20 million to create a ‘Sesame Street’ in Iraq.
$1.5 million program slated to "advance diversity, equity and inclusion in Serbia's”
And that is just the tip of the iceberg!
Ben Pecora
St. Joseph
