EM of DPS with some penny wise pound braindead nonsense.

[brizee]

So this is it huh?
This is the kind of genius the state forces on it's serfs?



http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...taff/79309700/


PS. Why hasn't EAA been expanded to statewide under-performing schools like was originally presented?

[313WX]

http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...taff/79309700/

So this is it huh?
This is the kind of genius the state forces on it's serfs?






PS. Why hasn't EAA been expanded to statewide under-performing schools like was originally presented?

We won't have to deal with him nor Snyder much longer once the criminal charges start flying for the Flint Water Crisis.

[ABetterDetroit]

A Union boiler operator "engineer" for every building in the district that has a boiler for a radiant heating system? This is a joke right? That's all he does??? They never heard of a building superintendent who is qualified to do the job of Building Superintendent?

No wonder there are 50 kids in a classroom.

[Wesley Mouch]

http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...taff/79309700/

So this is it huh?
This is the kind of genius the state forces on it's serfs?
...

Score one for the forces of full employment over evil cost control!

[Zacha341]

Interesting question. And I doubt there will be an expansion to the suburbs seeing what a success the EEA has been in the D!

PS. Why hasn't EAA been expanded to statewide under-performing schools like was originally presented?

[Jimaz]

...

http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...taff/79309700/

...

“The court takes notice of the current government induced tainted water crisis debacle in Flint,” [Wayne County Circuit Judge David Allen] wrote. “For those of us that want to listen, it has taught us that when we place financial expediency over basic and critical public health needs, we reap what we sow: Lead poisoning in thousands of children. Let us not have the next headline to go national be: ‘Detroit Schoolchildren Injured and Killed in Unattended Boiler Explosion.’ ”

It's interesting that the Flint water crisis has ripple effects.

Water distributed in Sebring [OH] village after testing finds lead

[Scottathew]

I've never heard of a school district having a dedicated boiler engineer, let alone for each building.

This is just unions advocating for waste. Suburban school districts don't have one boiler engineer per building. This is just another reason why DPS is hemorrhaging money. Detroit politics has demanded so much union waste in so many areas of government.

Sounds like a sweet gig, sitting on your ass all day taking money that should be going to educate kids.

[BankruptcyGuy]

DPS is a not-for-profit entity. Each additional engineer is one less teacher in the classroom. I'm guessing that the one-to-one ratio of engineers to boilers is not shared throughout the rest of Michigan. Which would you rather have?

[Hamtragedy]

Many of these schools have power-plants attached to them, some of which are original to the building, these would cost hundreds of thousands to replace should there be a melt down, or worse a major explosion. Ever notice those large smoke-stacks attached to the school?

As for the slams here, do you ever notice how you never hear of these things blowing up on the news? These "union, "engineers" you so ignorantly disrespect are way more highly skilled and trained than most professions [[more than likely yours), are held to the strictest regulation by OSHA, mandated regular training courses, and above all, take pride in their skill set.

These "Mechanical engineers" and "boiler-operators" may seem like bullshit jobs to you, but they are licensed by the state as engineers, who probably could double their pay to take a job in any industrial setting, and triple their salary by taking jobs working on your crappy house.

And in case you're wondering why on earth would the school have a hundred year old boiler? Because they work.

[Shai_Hulud]

I've never heard of a school district having a dedicated boiler engineer, let alone for each building.

This is just unions advocating for waste. Suburban school districts don't have one boiler engineer per building. This is just another reason why DPS is hemorrhaging money. Detroit politics has demanded so much union waste in so many areas of government.

Sounds like a sweet gig, sitting on your ass all day taking money that should be going to educate kids.

Suburban Districts probably don't have 100 year old, 5 ton steam boilers in every building either. The things are dangerous.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCej2OQSKnY
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/powe...vives-29741352

Additionally, when I worked at DPS the boiler engineer was, or was the de-facto, chief engineer anyway and had to handle all the other maintenance and environmental issues.

[michmina]

I've never heard of a school district having a dedicated boiler engineer, let alone for each building.

This is just unions advocating for waste. Suburban school districts don't have one boiler engineer per building. This is just another reason why DPS is hemorrhaging money. Detroit politics has demanded so much union waste in so many areas of government.

Sounds like a sweet gig, sitting on your ass all day taking money that should be going to educate kids.

In these buildings, they're not sitting on their asses all day, I am pretty sure of that. The buildings are ANCIENT. If they're going to continue using them, they have to be maintained by people who know what they're doing.

[noggin]

Its time to go with a New Orleans style voucher system. Get rid of the school system and allow the students to get a much better education. The union and administration behavior is disgusting and it is time to shut it all down.

[Scottathew]

In these buildings, they're not sitting on their asses all day, I am pretty sure of that. The buildings are ANCIENT. If they're going to continue using them, they have to be maintained by people who know what they're doing.

You mean they're running around like Scotty on the NCC-1701 pulling levers and switches all day long to stop the boiler from blowing up? HAHA, simply false.

If these are such a danger, replace them.

And if you think that suburban schools don't have boilers, you're simply wrong. Some of them just as old as ones in DPS.

The big difference is that DPS is built AROUND union inefficiencies. In suburban districts, more money goes to educating kids, and less is wasted on debt service, boiler engineers, and maintaining its own separate but redundant police force.

[Wesley Mouch]

In these buildings, they're not sitting on their asses all day, I am pretty sure of that. The buildings are ANCIENT. If they're going to continue using them, they have to be maintained by people who know what they're doing.

I agree 100%.

The issue is who gets to decide who 'maintains' these boilers. Who sets the safety standards.

In this debate there are two choices.

1) Building Engineers themselves [[who have their jobs at stake based on the answer)

2) The District Administration [[who are pretty much proven to be idiots and probably couldn't get a job at the Flint Water Department) under the guidelines and laws of the State of Michigan.

There are very specific laws and licenses on boiler operation. Normally, I'd trust the School District to make the best decisions based on student safety, the law, the regulations -- but I have to admin that in this case, I'm less sure.

I've worked closely with people who have done mechanical work on DPS school plants -- and I'm not sure the engineers they've hired nor the district have any idea what they're doing.

Someone posted that Detroit has old plants, and thus needs better building engineers. Well, that's somewhat true. But its also true that many DPS buildings have been upgraded. And the best decision in most cases would be to decommission the boilers and just use electric heat. Stupidly expensive of course -- but very very safe.

And perhaps next time the district spends $1.5 billion, perhaps they'll replace these aged systems.

Also worth noting that many of these schools have hot-water baseboard heat. Yes, they boilers for hot-water are technically boilers -- but they're about the safest boilers in existence. A union engineer just to run a radiant hot-water boiler is, well, just plain stupid.

[Shai_Hulud]

Having a dedicated boiler engineer for each school may very well be unnecessary.

However, cutting the staff by 80% and increasing each staff members responsibility 500% sounds like a recipe for disaster and the judge was right to invoke Flint considering who is running DPS.

I think this piece of information is relevant to this thread...

Something clearly doesn't sound right. WXYX's Kim Russell reports that while the Detroit Public Schools system is going broke, and teachers have taken pay cuts, the district's top executives are among the best paid in the country.
WXYZ shows, for example, that the Executive Director of Communications, Michelle Zdrodowsk, is paid $161,111, more than counterparts in Los Angeles and Chicago.
She reports that the district's chief procurement officer Medina Abdun-Noor makes around $157,000, about the same rate at the purchasing boss in Los Angeles.
She goes on to report that Steve Wasko, executive director for enrollment, makes more than the enrollment boss in Chicago - which has 400,000 students - and Philly, which is also far larger.
"When you look at the size of this district, it has around 46,000 students. When you look at where that ranks in the country it is about 90th. But yet you have some of the highest paid top officials in the country. How do you justify that?" WXYZ asked DPS Emergency Manager Darnell Earley.
"I haven’t seen that first of all, you say that," said Earley. "I haven’t seen your research, so I am not going to try to justify or not justify anything."
WXYZ reports that when offer to share the research, he declined to review it and comment.
Earley has been the target of criticism for the poor shape the schools are in, and because he served as an emergency manager in Flint when the city switched water systems. Detroit News editorial writer Ingrid Jacques recent wrote a column suggesting he resign.

http://www.deadlinedetroit.com/artic...n#.VqftKk1Ii0s

[Wesley Mouch]

Having a dedicated boiler engineer for each school may very well be unnecessary.

However, cutting the staff by 80% and increasing each staff members responsibility 500% sounds like a recipe for disaster and the judge was right to invoke Flint considering who is running DPS.

I think this piece of information is relevant to this thread...

http://www.deadlinedetroit.com/artic...n#.VqftKk1Ii0s

Perhaps its true, but a news reporters assessment of pay in the district isn't always completely accurate. Earley only said he hasn't reviewed the report, so he couldn't comment. And that he wouldn't jump and review the report. I don't know why, but maybe its because he has some schools to run.

I don't know if Earley is a good man or not -- but I get suspicious when blame is so loudly placed only on the shoulders of opponents.

[313WX]

Yours truly did it again...

DPS EM passes a "snitch" ordinance to penalize striking teachers and those aware of striking teachers

http://www.metrotimes.com/Blogs/arch...iking-teachers

[Honky Tonk]

I agree 100%.

The issue is who gets to decide who 'maintains' these boilers. Who sets the safety standards.

In this debate there are two choices.

1) Building Engineers themselves [[who have their jobs at stake based on the answer)

2) The District Administration [[who are pretty much proven to be idiots and probably couldn't get a job at the Flint Water Department) under the guidelines and laws of the State of Michigan.

There are very specific laws and licenses on boiler operation. Normally, I'd trust the School District to make the best decisions based on student safety, the law, the regulations -- but I have to admin that in this case, I'm less sure.

I've worked closely with people who have done mechanical work on DPS school plants -- and I'm not sure the engineers they've hired nor the district have any idea what they're doing.

Someone posted that Detroit has old plants, and thus needs better building engineers. Well, that's somewhat true. But its also true that many DPS buildings have been upgraded. And the best decision in most cases would be to decommission the boilers and just use electric heat. Stupidly expensive of course -- but very very safe.

And perhaps next time the district spends $1.5 billion, perhaps they'll replace these aged systems.

Also worth noting that many of these schools have hot-water baseboard heat. Yes, they boilers for hot-water are technically boilers -- but they're about the safest boilers in existence. A union engineer just to run a radiant hot-water boiler is, well, just plain stupid.

Guidelines are already in place for boiler inspection, maintenance, and repair, which need to be followed to prevent disaster. Last time I checked, which was a few years ago, Stationary Engineers made close to $40 an hour plus bennies, depending on their skill level. It seems to me, rather than have someone sitting around, waiting for something to happen, a more plausible solution would be to turn the maintenance/repair of these boilers to an outside contracting company. They would do the routine maintenance/repair, start-up and shut-down of the boilers. It would probably be more cost and safety effective in the long run. A lot of big companies are going that route these days.

[Wesley Mouch]

Guidelines are already in place for boiler inspection, maintenance, and repair, which need to be followed to prevent disaster. Last time I checked, which was a few years ago, Stationary Engineers made close to $40 an hour plus bennies, depending on their skill level. It seems to me, rather than have someone sitting around, waiting for something to happen, a more plausible solution would be to turn the maintenance/repair of these boilers to an outside contracting company. They would do the routine maintenance/repair, start-up and shut-down of the boilers. It would probably be more cost and safety effective in the long run. A lot of big companies are going that route these days.

It might work, but what it doesn't provide for is local control. How can the jobs be impactful on the local economy? The 'big company' might have an employee who isn't related to a current employee or who wouldn't support the school board at the ballot box.

This doesn't sound like a problem, but it could result in outside forces taking control of the school district. Another undesirable possible side effect is the money saved might be spent on students.

[Scottathew]

My wife is an administrator in a suburban school district that has seven buildings. I asked her how many staff were dedicated to boilers. The answer... ZERO.

They have one staffer that has the proper education to maintenance the boiler systems, and he also has other maintenance duties in addition to maintaining boilers.

Why? Because even with seven buildings, some of which are pretty old, and 10 boilers [[one building has three boilers), it's still not a job that requires a person solely dedicated to it.

Anyone who is fighting to have a union boiler engineer in every DPS building is advocating for waste, less education, and pandering to union scare tactics to milk the public for as much money as they can get.

[Honky Tonk]

It might work, but what it doesn't provide for is local control. How can the jobs be impactful on the local economy? The 'big company' might have an employee who isn't related to a current employee or who wouldn't support the school board at the ballot box.

This doesn't sound like a problem, but it could result in outside forces taking control of the school district. Another undesirable possible side effect is the money saved might be spent on students.

But, but, but..... we've ALWAYS done it this way!