Cary Town Council Leadership in This Crisis

A concerned parent sent a letter to the CTC asking for their support in driving legislation which would redefine all the BoE positions as at large. Cary's representation on the BoE is limited, and Cary has been hammered with MYR conversions. Here's the response from Jennifer Robinson:

I am really sorry that you are dealing with the frustrations of MYR and the school assignments. The decisions made by the school board have a serious impact on our quality of life that we experience in Cary. I know that
conveying these frustrations and concerns has been particularly challenging for those living in western Cary because our representatives live outside of Cary.

The Cary Town Councilmembers are aware that the school board districts are drawn in such a way as to have the western Cary area with weak representation. But, I sincerely do not believe that at-large elections will solve that problem. I believe that we will end up with less accountability than more accountability. The
WCPSS should consider moving to a more defined district level management rather than continuing to build
the monstrosity of a system that they currently operate.

It is disappointing to me that a few politicians can stand up in front of naively believe that they are being effective. These people are being politicians, not leaders and certainly not public servants. Their behavior has
degraded the process of finding a solution by further alienating the school board and causing an intense amount of friction among governing boards. I know this because I have spoken with Patti Head three times, with each conversation lasting in excess of 1.5 hours. Her disgust with their behavior has been a roadblock
to working with them to find a solution.

Re-assignment and MYR are symptoms of deeper problems in our school system. To fix these symptoms, we need to identify the root causes which include taxing authority, state funding, authorization for municipalities to tie growth to school capacity, policies promoting social engineering, to name a few. As a municipal leader, my job is todetermine how Cary's policies and ordinances enhance or degrade our school system.

My job is to work towards solving the problems that are under my purview as determined by the State.
While I have no granted authority over school board decisions, I convey to the school board members the concerns that Cary citizens and I have. I have
discussed with them:

* MYR
* reassignments
* the need to promote a sense of community among our children
* the burden on our roads of having long school commutes for children
* the need to bank land for schools
* the agreement to give land to WCPSS for an elementary school, and
* the agreement to sell land to WCPSS for a middle school

The most important thing that we have discussed is the need to actually address the root problems that our County has in providing adequate school capacity. For years, County and municipal representatives have tried to address the symptoms of our broken system and have pointed their fingers at the other governing boards for being responsible for the problem. Enough is enough. The time has come for all municipal leaders
to meet collectively with our State and County reps to discuss the causesfor our problems. I am happy to say that Patti and Mayor McAlister agree with me and have agreed to work on hosting such a forum. In advance of this forum, the Town Council is hosting our school board reps and our County Commissioners at our March
retreat, at which time we plan on going over our concerns for our citizens' quality of life as impacted by school board decisions.

I hope that you will recognize that the Cary Town Councilmembers have been working on school board matters in a way that we deem appropriate, sincere and most likely to have impact.

Sincerely,

Jennifer Robinson

District A

Cary Town Council

Here's the net: Our representatives are doing everything they can to insulate themselves from the MYR issues. We may have moved thousands of people here, but that is totally WPCSS's problem. They will not even support the BoE at large movement which would give us better representation (in the absence of any from our own town government). The comments referring to the CC's as grandstanding are beautiful. I'd like to be a fly on the wall when they sit down together at the retreat with the CC's and this letter comes up (A copy was forwarded to them). Thankfully, this retreat base been scheduled for March -- the fate of our schoolchildren will be decided by then so they came move on to more important topics like decorating bridges. This is one retreat which no one should come back from.