10/19. Occupy Fresno again marches to School Board meeting. Demands paycut for Superintendent

[annm4peace]

Occupy Fresno! is calling out for all concerned citizens to join in a march to the Fresno Unified School Board meeting where we will demand that FUSD administrators take a pay cut and return the money to the classrooms.

WHEN: Wednesday, Ocotber 19th at 4:30 pm
WHERE: The Freedom Gazebo on the Tulare Street side of Courthouse Park
(The Board Meeting takes place above the old post office at 2309 Tulare, Tulare/M St.)

More info below.

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–We demand an across the board cut for FUSD administrators (suggestion–Superintendent Hanson, 25% cut; Assistant Superintendents and Managers above the Principals, 15% cut; Principals, 10%;) with the money to go to class size reduction, services to students with disabilities, and restoration of funds for classroom materials, art, music and other programs which have been cut

–We demand that FUSD spend down reserve funds, which greatly exceed normally recommended levels, to be used for the above named purposes and to eliminate the planned increases in teacher medical benefit costs

–Teacher pay has been cut; experienced teachers have been put into early retirement; class sizes have been increased, many basic services to students have been cut, services to students with disabilities have been cut, numerous incidents of threats and physical assaults on teachers have surfaced. What sacrifice has the administration made?

–Fresno Unified spends an inordinate amount of money on its Superintendent (with his base salary of $2777,000, his guaranteed yearly salary increase and performance bonus, and benefits his compensation approaches $350,000 a year putting him in the top 1/2 of 1% of the income spectrum) and on administration

–It is true that, in the last two years, Mr. Hanson has chosen not to take his guaranteed salary increase and bonus. We applaud him for this. But few school superintendents and virtually no teachers or working people get such guarantees, especially in these economic times.

(Some objections have been raised to this action basically arguing that Fresno Unified is not a corporation or bank and that the focus should be national, concerning major banks and corporations. Occcupied Fresno! has never reached consensus on a response to those concerns. However, the “occupation” of the school board has been approved by consensus on several occasions. Based on many discussions about the action the general sentiment seems to be as follows: 1. that Occupy Fresno! is responding to teachers and parents, (including some who explicitly asked for our help) who have expressed severe frustration at Fresno Unified for its inappropriate use of public resources; 2. that the salaries of senior FUSD administrators does put them in the top 1% and that their attitudes and actions reflect the disregard that the 1% has for the people; 3. that the power structure at Fresno Unified is, in fact, identical to a corporation where all of the power exists at the top, where dictates are handed down to the teachers without any say on their part, and where the senior administration is in no way accountable to the teachers who they should be serving.)

[roody]

1. Cut all administrators pay!