Jackson Jambalaya

NO ONE in the media is asking JPS why even $.01 has to be spent at Bates, Cardozo, Kirksey and Peeples since those were the BRAND NEW schools built with the $150m bond issue from 2006. Those schools aren't even 10 years old.

Jackson is LOST beyond recovery.

Paint, an intercom, and security cameras DO NOT cost $400,000 (Rouse Elementary K-1). People, these numbers are padded big time. Funding at this level requires extreme oversight, because it is ripe for fraud.

This is no "list". Over half of the $65 million for "other projects" - that look a whole lot like the "first projects", except of course for the football fields and the baseball/softball complex.

Most of the first $30 million is for maintenance - what in the hell is the current maintenance budget being spent on, Administrative salaries? Or those $90,000 staff members in a few of the failing schools?

If this is all the information they are operating on, there is no way the public should even begin to consider this proposal. IF they don't have any more detail than this, no respectable bond issuer would touch this offering with a twenty foot pole. But based on JPS's history with bond firms, they probably aren't planning on using a respectable firm - what was I thinking?

11:11 - looks like government consultants was hired as municipal advisor as they were quoted in an article on JFP concerning the bonds. Not sure who else has been hired. The minutes from the 6/7/18 board meeting aren’t up yet.

BUT........"IT FOR THE CHILDREN ! ! ! ! ! !"

Who is the architect? The District should state if they are getting paid a flat fee or percentage of the project size....for full transparency.

Lots of "friends" aka supporters of JPS lining up to make lots of money in fees in this project...just like jackson water meter project.

12:05 PM

I like that "IT FOR THE CHILDREN!" you sound just like Bryan Bailey

Some of you need to read State Agency budgets if you think this is bad and it is poorly done.

11:05 pm If you bought a home and 2009 and you haven't done maintenance, you will find you'll be spending some big bucks when you do.

There's also an old saying among builders " When construction is 8 years old, it's not a " new" building anymore".

The trends are obvious.

MS Press Association Pre-Conference Trends

11:10 obviously hasn't priced labor rates on a building that large in a long time, much less actual material costs. Painters charge by the square feet, and schools have a lot of square feets.

This should be right up MAC's alley since he is a remodeling contractor. But, I bet his bonding is a little limited at the moment, for "various reasons".

Facade and playground canopy

This will move the education and ratings.

NOT.

Jackson is in a deep state of lost.

Well Theca, except Bailey gets the job done.

Just asking. I know Jackson has a large land mass but does this seem like a lot of Schools overall?

I am impressed with the use of the cedilla in the word "facade." (For you Rankinites, a cedilla is the little comma thingy under the c in the word "facade.") Of course, a cedilla has no function in the English language. Perhaps some of the money should be used for English instruction rather than facade renovation.

I live in Jackson and I will vote NO unless HELL NO is an option.

Drive by Murrah, a school that has sent kids to Princeton, Yale, and MIT in recent years, and see the facade work it needs. Go to the auditorium at Bailey and see the broken seats. Go the adjacent high school sports stadium, which had to be closed because one of the stands collapsed. JPS has serious infrastructure needs. This bond issue will be a big help.

12:31, if I bought a home in 2008, I would have worried about the maintenance in 2009. I would not wait ten years and go take out a second mortgage to paint it or to replace the carpet. Ongoing maintenance should be in the regular operating budget of the JPS District - you know, part of the millions plus millions of dollars they collect EVERY YEAR from the school taxes.

Using your theory, JPS would have to take out another bond issue every ten years to do routine maintenance. As the state has learned recently (under current conservative leadership) you shouldn't be replacing roofs, or HVAC units, with 30 year bond money. The legislature has required the colleges and universities to budget those expenses into their annual expenditures and to use borrowed (bond) money only for capital improvements. Appears that this concept hasn't made it down the street into the City Hall chambers - where of course the cost doesn't matter. Cause, its for the chillen.

I vote Hell To The Naw Naw!!

https://youtu.be/JdKI1wj-JpI?list=RDJdKI1wj-JpIHell to Naw NAW

I live in Jackson and I will vote NO unless HELL NO is an option.

That's purty funny........

Churning.

jps, please hire leadership from desoto county. they have a better education, better infrastructure, and spend less money on more children. and excuse my grammer to all you fu english majors!

5:09, your example of Murrah sending kids to wherever doesn't carry much water. Yes, they have sent a few every year - those that are given the AP classes with five or six students in the class. The other 900 students are stuck in classrooms and getting mediocre instruction. As you note, though, the facade of Murrah hasn't kept those few smart kids from accomplishing a lot; maybe the money should first be focused on trying to provide a decent education to the other 95%.

The question here isn't whether some of the facilities need maintenance - the question is, at least in this voter's opinion - why hasn't the basic maintenance been being done over the past several years. If there are broken seats in Bailey, why haven't they been repaired, rather than left. Replacing them using 30 year money is not good finance; just as the painting being proposed, or the "site work" around the multiple campuses.

If this money was being used to reduce the number of facilities, which might require the expanding of some, it would be a much easier sell. But to borrow $65 million to do largely maintenance work - work that has been ignored for years - is not sensible. Just as the city doesn't care about wasting $500k on an election - an election that they could conduct in their very special August for less than $50k - or that they could conduct for zero dollars in November, they don't care about the costs involved in 'borrowed' money. Money that they see as "other people's money".

Unless and until they provide more information about these various projects, there is no way this should even be proposed and offered for a vote. To claim they don't know what these things are going to cost because "they have to be bid out" is absolute BullCrap. In any business, or even an inefficient and incompetent government, you don't go forward with a borrowing of this size without having professional estimates of the costs of these various projects. It appears that just as they don't want to provide a cost breakdown for the $500k election costs, they don't want to provide a cost breakdown for the various projects. Guess one gets to 'pocket' a few more minor expenses that way, especially when nobody is caring about the costs.

Who owns the playground canopy company?

None of this would be happening if Governor Bryant had let the state take over the district LAST OCTOBER.

I guess I’ll just continue to wait for someone to explain to me why they need the money now vs a couple of months from now. Whatever the reason, it’s bigger than five hundred k.

JPS would never hire anyone from the Desoto county school district nor would they dream of hiring anyone with credible background and experience. This has been proven a few years ago when Barksdale offered to pay $100,000 towards the new superintendent if they hired someone that measured up. They refused and it's only a stooge hire for a black leader. No whites need apply. This is one of the most racist and least diverse school districts in the entire US.

I will be voting NO!!! I live in NE Jackson and already have to pay for 3 kids tuitions for private school. No thanks JPS... not this time...

Betcha the bond pimp they plan to use has already been selected. Wagers?

5:37 pm How wrong of me to assume that others would know that funds were not likely available for all the maintenance that was needed or that maintaining older buildings . I assumed everyone knew that updating and repairing older buildings( even those 8 years old) can come with unique challenges even when one isn't part of a governmental system.

I can afford routine maintenance and budget for it, but I know that one serious, unforeseen maintenance problem can be expensive and cause other damages. Also, since fewer standards exist in construction, replacement can be difficult and far more costly than expected. Building codes also change over time. Replacement parts may no longer exist or would not be in code.

Even extremely wealthy people can fail to budget for the unexpected and cash on hand can be a problem. We just can more easily solve that problem because our funds aren't limited to a finite yearly budget that others are trying to cut.

You've obviously never remodeled a kitchen or dealt with heating, air conditioning, plumbing or electrical repairs in older buildings. Someone else must have dealt with it for you or else, you are awfully young. Try to find an appliance that fits the space for an existing appliance without have to make other changes.

Demolition and removal costs have gone up as well.

Those responsible for maintaining a home or business know they often have to prioritize, are sometimes faced with a problem without an easy solution and sometimes, in frustration. have to wait on the cooperation and availability of others . Once major repairs are made, we know you might not see those repairs. You see the cosmetics, not the guts.


By, the way, I just did the same remodeling on my house that I had done on an older home I bought. These repairs took two weeks when before it took over two years. The difference is I built this house so I knew what materials were used and what would replacements would require changes. I could do a critical path to have all the subs lined up in advance in the order that would be needed and have all the supplies needed on site when they arrived.

How many elected officials and bureaucrats making the decisions know the hell they might expect in a building or how to find out ? Besides that, I didn't build this house for profit, I built it to last and exceeded the building codes at the time, because the building codes were inadequate.

Oh the bond pump was likely at the meeting when this idea was hatched.

Reckon his name is associated with Malachia or however the hell you spell it?

919, your long worthless attempt to justify JPS borrowing 35 year money to do painting and flooring replacement totally misses the point.

Remodeling a kitchen with all new cabinets and appliances is one deal, and coukd justify a second mortgage. But repair of your HVAC unit, or replacing it, doesn't - or shouldnt- be financed with a new or additional 3p year debt. Certainly repainting the exterior of your house is routine maintenance, probably every 6 to 8 years. You shouldn't take out a 30 year loan to pay for it.

Yes, I own a home. Almost 100 year old house. And have remodeled most of it over the last ten or so years. So yes I totally understand the concept of maintenance. And I understand what happens when you ignore needed, routine maintenance. And that is what JPS has done and niw wants to long term finance short term maintenance issues.

Painting? New carpet? Yard work? Soil 'erosion'? These things should have been budgeted in their annual $40 MILLION expenditures. But no!! They had to pay all those several hundred administrative staff salaries rather than paint a classroom, or fix a HVAC unit. Also refusing to close some of the facilities and consolidate them when the student population dropped more than 20% could be another reason they have failed in their fiduciary duties. But hey - they have at least,admitted to their basic problem - they don't care about expenses. And evidently they don't care about routine maintenance of the hell holes they are sending our kids to every day. (Ever notice the nice digs of the JPS administrative offices - that building does get repainted, and new flooring, and new lights - cause, you know, they care so much about the chillen so they need to be kept in comfort and style while they discuss their caring.