Public Trust
stinger
All,
More dialogue with Supervisor Burton below. While we are advocating for officials to consider the attached alternative, in truth, our cause is for:
1. all viable site alternatives for the next western middle and high schools (planned to open sometime after 2017) be given fair and equal consideration by officials;
2. citizens in the community be given a sincere opportunity to weigh-in on the alternatives (via one or more small, manageable input sessions like the Town of Lovettsville's August 2007 workshop) before officials finalize their decision and enter into binding contracts; and,
3. school site evaluation criteria include:
- economic benefits to communities being served (foster new commercial ventures to relieve escalating residential tax burden)
- long term bussing costs to transport students to schools on all prospective sites - to be estimated using software LCPS currently owns (i.e., a life-cycle cost analysis).
If one or all of these goals were met, we would be more than satisfied.
Please review the attached alternative. We would sincerely appreciate hearing your thoughts on the idea. For reasons unclear, a handful of powerful officials have never allowed the idea to be considered. If the majority of the community consider the option and prefer a different site (like the parcels near Fry Farm/Elvan and Picnic Woods/Brittain Rds), we pledge to stop advocating for the attached option - it is as simple as that.
One would think that more alternatives on the table would be welcomed because more options typically mean more leverage for County staff negotiating with landowners to get the best value for taxpayers.
Thanks for reading and any input you may offer.
Sarah
From: "stinger" <sti...@loudounwireless.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 03, 2010 8:35 PM
To: "Burton, Jim" <Jim.B...@loudoun.gov>
Subject: RE: check your calendars for 8/2/2007
Supervisor Burton,
What do you think is my cause and what would you suggest that I do to advance it? I'm almost out of ideas and the only ones left to me are even less desirable than my most recent plea for clarity.
We just want the truth and if honest mistakes were made, for the record to be set straight, a course reset and something done to keep these mistakes from happening again.
However, I would hope you can see from our perspective (citizens left in the dark with only the FOIA available to answer our questions and logic to connect the dots), that the documentation indicates the public trust has been violated and lots of taxdollars wasted and continuing to be wasted. Many of our members have said repeatedly to me that Wheatland is exactly like Fields Farm, and that officials in control of these things have long ago decided HS/MS-10 can never be close to Lovettsville (and Hillsboro ES will close its doors forever when ES-25 opens) and all those schools WILL be sited in Wheatland, no matter the cost, and that is that. Can you honestly not understand why we are disturbed by that scenario?
I have provided my phone number so that, if our interpretations are truly off-base, that someone who knows what happened and why, can simply call me and discuss it with me. When that happens and my transgressions are revealed, I will be silenced, beg for forgiveness and go back to honoring public servants such as you who truly give so much. I know that sounds patronizing, but I do appreciate the service you and your collegues provide each and every single day. But unfortunately this whole school thing that has dragged on for so long has severely eroded my ability to appear sincere with that appreciation.
Truly,
Sarah Stinger
SmallTownSchools
703.431.1058
From: "Burton, Jim" <Jim.B...@loudoun.gov>
Sent: Tuesday, August 03, 2010 7:04 PM
To: "Stinger" <sti...@loudounwireless.com>
Subject: RE: check your calendars for 8/2/2007
Notice: Please be advised that all correspondence to government officials becomes part of the public record and may be subject to inspection under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act.
If you would like to receive newsletters and alerts, sign up at http://www.loudoun.gov/subforms/sub6.htm
From: Stinger [sti...@loudounwireless.com]
Sent: Tuesday, August 03, 2010 12:15 AM
To: Burton, Jim; Sally...@aol.com
Cc: Pamela Baldwin; York, Scott; Bergel, Jennifer
Subject: check your calendars for 8/2/2007
From: "stinger" <sti...@loudounwireless.com>
Sent: Monday, August 02, 2010 11:26 AM
To: "Burton, Jim" <Jim.B...@loudoun.gov>
Subject: RE: The Whole Truth please
Mr. Burton,
While I sincerely appreciate our dialogue, I respectfully offer the following observation:
If you aren't part of the solution - you are part of the problem.
Why is it your "my hands are tied" response sounds exactly like your response on the County's failure to keep the McDonough Assemblage available? You are an aggressive force on issues that you believe are important so it is clear from your INACTION that you do not care about this issue.
Bottom line, until you and your collegues actually DO something to bring forward a viable community-based alternative (not these sites miles from Town on less than 2-lane dirt roads), I will always believe you are part of an insider group obsessed with the Wheatland school agenda (Wheatland = Fields Farm). Yes, guilty until actions are sufficient to override historical documentation and thus demonstrate sincerity.
It isn't too late for you do do the right thing here. Unless land banking for HS-10 is another lie, a decision will be made in the near future and I insist that all options be considered, including options that include the Shoene site or parcels in the former McDonough Assemblage.
The 74+ acre Shoene property is for sale, in range of utilities and complies with the Revised General Plan. It is not within the Town limits; therefore Mayor Walker's statements about wanting it for tax revenue for the Town are invalid. If you want to land bank something, that site makes the most sense because you have a developer who wants to unload it and the County could easily justify it to be re-zoned commercial and sell it later if LCPS ever does the real work needed to find a better site in/near Town.
Many who look at the current sites OUR TAXES ARE BEING WASTED ON FOR STUDIES firmly believe that, if LCPS can obtain the right of ways and build roads to Picnic Woods/Britain or Fry Farm/Elvan Rds, they could easily work with VDOT to get the variances needed to allow ingress/egress for schools on Shoene or find a way to incentivize the Town of Lovettsville to allow their Park to be moved to Shoene.
Sincerely,
Sarah Stinger
SmallTownSchools
From: "Burton, Jim" <Jim.B...@loudoun.gov>
Sent: Thursday, July 29, 2010 4:58 PM
To: "sti...@loudounwireless.com" <sti...@loudounwireless.com>
Subject: RE: The Whole Truth please
Dear Ms. Stinger,
While I can appreciate your frustration, and sometimes share it, my options are somewhat limited by the need for five votes and the legal separation between the two bodies. Assuming there were five Supervisors willing to request that Dr. Hatrick investigate and correct his staff's handling of these issues, I do not believe we have any legal authority to ensure that actual change occurs. I believe that authority lies with the School Board, not us. And, while there have been periodic murmurings among my colleagues on this Board about simply taking over the entire land acquisition process, I don't know that there have ever been the necessary votes on this Board to do so. My colleagues remember their predecessors' experience with buying school sites -- Fields Farm and the Saudi property - and are wary of finding themselves in a similar position.
Best regards,
Jim Burton
Notice: Please be advised that all correspondence to government officials becomes part of the public record and may be subject to inspection under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act.
If you would like to receive newsletters and alerts, sign up at http://www.loudoun.gov/subforms/sub6.htm
From: stinger [mailto:sti...@loudounwireless.com]
Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 2010 5:19 PM
To: Burton, Jim
Cc: sally...@aol.com; York, Scott; smalltow...@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: The Whole Truth please
Mr. Burton,
I always appreciate that you take the time to respond to me, particularly since I'm not even one of your constituents. I truly am surprised you were not informed about these alternative alignments. I'm sure you understand the significance of this information as it pertains to HS-10. What else do you you suppose you are not being told by LCPS and others? I suppose that now that I have brought this disturbing information to your attention, you will investigate it further. Additionally, since the RFP response submitted for the Crim/Moler property is in your district was apparently also withheld from you and your collegues on the BOS, I trust you will investigate it further as well.
I sincerely look forward to hearing from you, Sally and Chairman York on what will be done about correcting these and all the other lies/misinformation/deception, or whatever you want to call it. Western Loudoun school children and their families absolutely do not deserve to continue being political pawns and I am hopeful that you will lead your collegues into setting things straight and doing the right thing moving forward, so that people like me have no incentive to continue digging up the past.
Thank you for your service to the citizens of Loudoun County.
Sarah Stinger
From: "Burton, Jim" <Jim.B...@loudoun.gov>
Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 2010 2:45 PM
To: "Stinger" <sti...@loudounwireless.com>
Subject: RE: The Whole Truth please
Dear Ms. Stinger,
I have reviewed the materials attached to your email. I am not sure how to respond to your request as this is the first time that I have seen the email from Scott Dunn nor do I recall any mention of alternative alignments during conversations at the time.
Best regards,
Jim Burton
Notice: Please be advised that all correspondence to government officials becomes part of the public record and may be subject to inspection under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act.
If you would like to receive newsletters and alerts, sign up at http://www.loudoun.gov/subforms/sub6.htm
-----Original Message-----
From: Stinger [mailto:sti...@loudounwireless.com]
Sent: Monday, July 19, 2010 1:06 PM
To: Bergel, Jennifer
Cc: Sally...@aol.com; Burton, Jim; ma...@lovettsville.gov
Subject: The Whole Truth please
Jennifer,
Haven't heard back from you but having thought about it further, I guess you have otherwise been silenced on responding to the proposed C.L.A.S.S. Vision plan, particularly since you are on record of being very interested in schools sharing space/facilities on the Park site, per pages 5-6 of the attached "Written Questions....doc"
Is it Mayor Walker that brokered the deal years ago to keep the high school out of Town? The record shows her lobbying for it in Wheatland back in 2006, and again in 2009. If the 3rd module wasn't in part for future school capacity - what was it really for? The Mayor refuses to acknowledge the significance of "Mayor Walker's Plan" as referenced in LCPS-County-VDOT
meeting minutes. Who was the one that was spreading the rumor the Town
would have to pay for school utilities? Was that you or the Mayor?
If it isn't the Mayor behind all the anti-Lovettsville school subterfuge, was it Dr Adamo? What has happened to our friend that observed cyclist Adamo's typical use of Milltown Rd for his rides being a possible reason he didn't want schools on the Park or Miller sites? If not the Mayor or Dr.
Adamo acting singly, God forbid it has been our dear Sally or even the honorable former Asst Superintd Moler that have teamed with Dr. Adamo?
Because everyone knows they would all qualify as being very powerful potential NIMBYs with incentive to keep schools far away from their backyard.
The extent of subterfuge orchestrated by LCPS and other officials to keep schools out of Lovettsville is remarkable. All the documentation/events are not a cooincidence - they point directly at a coordinated effort to prevent high /middle schools from being sited near Lovettsville, and the elementary out of Hillsboro as well.
The fact that officials stood in front of the public in May 2008 and stated in their presentation that condemnation would be required to access schools on the Park, all the while the attached alignments prepared by LCPS' own consultants prove condemnation would NOT be necessary, is beyond deceitful.
I think now is the time that you, Sally, Mr. Burton and Mayor Walker need to own up and explain exactly why those alignments were specifically withheld from the public; and who is behind the subterfuge/obsession with keeping schools OUT of Lovettsville.
Sarah
----- Original Message -----
From: "Stinger" <sti...@loudounwireless.com>
To: "Jennifer Bergel" <Jennife...@loudoun.k12.va.us>
Sent: Friday, July 16, 2010 12:27 PM
Subject: Re: Fw: this is what I wanted to show you
> Pamela called the Mayor and tried to meet with her before the hearing. If
> the Mayor would use email perhaps she would have had more advance notice.
>
> Pamela asked me if I would show it to Bobby because I know him but I was
> waiting for Pamela to speak with the Mayor first. At the time I was
> trying
> to reach you about it, Pamela had already spoken to Sally about it and was
> trying to reach the Mayor.
>
> What specific assertions do you disagree with?
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jennifer Bergel" <Jennife...@loudoun.k12.va.us>
To: <sti...@loudounwireless.com>
Sent: Friday, July 16, 2010 11:47 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: this is what I wanted to show you
Hi Sarah,
It is my understanding that the doc was not shared with the mayor in advance
of the hearing. Did you show it to Bobby? The board voted that night to
approve the park; were you aware of that when you mailed this to me? I am
not sure what to say about any of it other than I read the entire doc. I
don't agree with some of the assertions made toward the end of it, but I
read through the entire thing. Sorry I didn't write back that I had.
I had mentioned the land behind the CC should be bought by the county for a
community center expansion - I had never mentioned a park. If the CC were
to be expanded it could allow other things to go with it...
Have a good day and weekend - stay cool!
Jennifer
Jennifer K. Bergel
LCPS School Board
Catoctin District
Jennife...@loudoun.k12.va.us
571-223-9724
Please be aware that correspondence sent by or to School Board members is
subject to Virginia's Freedom of Information Act.
>>> "Stinger" <sti...@loudounwireless.com> 07/15/10 4:57 PM >>>
Please respond.
----- Original Message -----
From: Stinger
To: Jennife...@loudoun.k12.va.us
Sent: Tuesday, July 13, 2010 12:50 AM
Subject: this is what I wanted to show you
Jennifer,
Pamela prepared the attached document and Dan Schmidt did the design, he
apparently used Dominion HS as a template. Pamela had spoken to Sally about
it and suggested to me that, since I knew you and Bobby, would I share it
with the two of you. Pamela presented it to Mayor Walker today (which is
why I couldn't talk to you or Bobby about it beforehand) who not only
wouldn't consider the concept, she apparently became hostile.
I recall you saying to me that you had always hoped for the land behind the
community center to be a Park. Others like Pamela apparently agreed. If
you had time to meet with me I would have asked you to please get Noah's
input on the concept because I know he was on the Park Committee and worked
so hard getting signatures for "support of a high school in the Lovettsville
area".
If you take the time to look at this and perhaps even with an open mind to
give it any thought/consideration, which as your constituent I ask that you
do, and can find the time to talk with me about it, I would be grateful.
I'm leaving for Richmond (VCU orientation) in the morning and return
Wednesday night.
Sarah