Sound Off: Sup deserves less than troops

Published 8:00 am Saturday, July 15, 2006

OK, here we go. Some believable and some unbelievable news in Wednesday’s paper. We just passed the Stadium Bond about 20 minutes ago and we hear the price is going up $600,000 so far. Golly, wonder what the final bill will be. Sure hope we can afford it. Our newly raised Superintendent of Schools feels the increase is reasonable. Other people’s money is easy to spend. Maybe we should add a dome too.

The drinks are on the Oak Harbor School District Superintendent who just received the nod from the school board for a mighty nice 6.3 percent raise, jacking his salary to $129,000 plus or minus. Golly, the prevailing employer on the Rock paid their troops about 4.2 percent and they go to sandy places and deal with people shooting things at them. And they go 3 and 4 times. They don’t go to school board meetings cuz they don’t have time cuz they are busy packing and unpacking.

I suggest that no one in public service should get a bigger raise than our troops. How can a local pubic servant deserve more than a young kid slogging around in 120 degree heat for 6-8 months away from home while things are blowing up here and there around him. Flight decks get pretty sandy too even though they are 200 miles off-shore and those ol’ steam cats get pretty toasty especially when you are dragging chains around the deck trying not to get sucked into a Lawn Dart or Double Ugly waiting to go kill things over the beach.

I know the troops don’t agonize over budgets and stadiums but they really are pretty busy all the time. Seems like there ought to be some degree of parity in effort versus reward. Results count, of course, and that is my point.

I think the troops ought to drop their tools of war and take up consulting. The rewards are better aligned with the real world. We need heavy thinkers to spend our money and you just can’t pay the guy who controls about 10 schools too much. Seems right to me.

I want better schools as much as the next guy but CEO class salaries don’t seem to help get that kid to pass the WASL. Maybe we should bribe the kid to study harder. Would be cheaper. Kathy is a very hard worker who should be receiving a big, big salary for all that she does. But, holy smokes, balancing the budget while avoiding major cuts is not heavy lifting and I don’t agree that it warrants such a generous raise. Save the whales then save a few bucks for us.

Go Wildcats!

Bruce Wood, Captain, USN Retired, lives in Oak Harbor.