The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board hearing on the Army’s application for a license to possess depleted uranium at two Hawaii sites is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. today. The proceedings will be publicly accessible via live Internet streaming, and is supposed to then be available for later viewing for at least 90 days.
Prepared testimony by Jim Albertini, one of the petitioners opposing the Army’s use of DU, was circulated in advance of the hearing.
Windward Oahu’s six Democratic legislators hosted a “town hall” meeting at Windward Community College last night and discussed the budget (grim on all fronts), taxes (no one wants them but they can’t be ruled out), cuts in essential human services (hope to avoid), school furloughs (Legislature can’t overrule the collective bargaining agreement), and even civil unions (five of the six legislators said they support HB 444, which could make a reappearance this session).
Present were Senators Clayton Hee (District 23) and Jill Tokuda (District 24), and Representatives Jessica Wooley(District 47), Ken Ito (District 48), Pono Chong (District 49) and Chris Lee (District 51).
But I thought the most interesting comment was made by Board of Education member John Penebacker, who attended as a resident but was pressed into service to respond to questions about the school furlough issue.
Penebacker criticized Gov. Lingle for launching a public relations campaign instead of real negotiations to solve the school furlough issue, but the comment that caught my attention came in response to a statement by Sen. Hee.
Hee said that, as a former teacher, he thinks giving up planning days for a limited, two-year period as part of the solution to furlough Fridays was a “reasonable” proposal.
Penebacker responded quickly, pointing out that Hee’s teaching experience came in the era before “No Child Left Behind”, which has created a whole new set of complex requirements that schools and teachers are struggling to meet. Planning days aren’t simply time set aside for teachers to leisurely think about their classes, but are used to plan for meeting those federal requirements. And, because the law now penalizes schools and school districts for failing to meet the rising standards, those planning days are more important than ever.
Penebacker’s statement was the clearest articulation I’ve heard of the direct link between the burdensome No Child Left Behind requirements imposed by the federal government and the planning days that have ended up at the center of the debate over school furloughs.
The latest issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education features a story on faculty morale at the University of Hawaii (“Contract Fight at U. of Hawaii Knocks Down Faculty Morale, Disheartened by a pay cut that they say violates their agreement, some professors look for jobs elsewhere“).
The Chronicle story is available for the next five days only via that link, so read it while you can.
Senator Les Ihara has warned that public access to and knowledge of complaints against licensed professionals is going to be under attack again during the upcoming legislative session.
I have attached materials distributed at Tuesday’s Pacific Club breakfast sponsored by the Hawaii Dental Association. One of their three 2010 bills will again seek to make DCCA regulatory complaints secret. They made a big push in 2008 for this bill.
I believe FOI supporters should consider strongly opposing this bill.
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Thanks, I had not thought about the extra burden of No Child in terms of planning days. I love the general public impression that teaching is sort of like theatrical improv. I guess that is what we will get if alternatives are removed.
As to UH morale:
Amidst a budget crisis so severe that faculty pay is being reduced and countless other cuts have been made, over winter break in the athletic facilities, the men’s intramural locker room linoleum tile floor was polished to look like glass. Not that it looked at all bad before. Who knows what that cost or why the crews were not instead fixing the leaky roof in my building, but I guess it was a priority.
And then yesterday, I discovered the new additions to the intramural gym facility of two large wall-mounted LCD TV’s. One is broadcasting CNN, the other ESPN. What, each one maybe $1,200, plus mounting hardware $200, plus overhead, administrative time on the procurement, and installation labor, so all together $4,000? How does that equate to the 6.7% cuts on a single full-time faculty member’s salary? (Don’t forget to add in the monthly charge from now to forever for the cable subscription.)
Well, if UH students classrooms are overcrowded and falling down, at least the students will get CNN, ESPN (and all the accompanying advertising) to “educate” them when working out at the gym.
Or more simply, I guess it was a priority.
Whoa- what happened to the Honolulu Zoo story?
Did it just disappear?