Had a phone call from a friend this morning letting me know I hadn’t posted for awhile. Yeah, I know. Been busy with other projects and then this week watching the impeachment proceedings. One thing I know for sure. If tRump’s defense team in this impeachment trial is the best he could get, he’s in deep doo-doo for what’s coming up in future civil and criminal trials for which he will be a defendant. It appears that he will be having some difficulty getting competent attorneys to represent him in the future. My friend also told me that he disagreed with my last post about the governor and the reopening of schools. He said that school districts weren’t prepared to reopen because they hadn’t properly planned and had not installed ventilation necessary for a safe reopening. I don’t know about the planning process for the many school districts in the State of Oregon, but I do know that as a result of the pandemic and the resulting loss of revenue for the state budget, school district funding has been hit hard. Just like other agencies, such and police and fire, 80 – 85% of budgets are for personnel costs, meaning salary and benefits. The cost of installing new ventilation systems in an existing school building with current budgets and the availability of contractors to do such installation in a timely manner is probably not feasible. That argument, however, was not my point in the post. My argument was that the governor was putting teachers ahead of seniors for vaccinations, in conflict with CDC recommendations and what other states were doing, with her expectation that schools would all of a sudden reopen because teachers were put in Group I. I don’t think it has anything to do with school districts not having plans to reopen schools as most school districts, in my opinion, do have plans. The reality is that teacher unions will make a voice in the process to reopen and I don’t think the governor and her advisors considered that could be a hiccup in her plan. News accounts have already proved my argument. I was also making the point that since she has made this decision, she better make damn sure that schools do reopen soon. If they don’t, then students and seniors are both getting short changed.
We’re at 16″ of snow tonight and will probably get another foot overnight. Keep smilin’. Ziggyman
Mountain Man Musings 