Edison Board of Mythomania - Failure to Disclose 'Unbudgeted' Heads to Staff!?!

You know, it's one thing to ask my friends over there on Mythomania Lane to disclose to the residents all these 'unbudgeted' heads they've added over the years but quite another to be told they'll take it under consideration or they're working on it - and then do nothing about it.

That's just Not Nice!

Now, no one recognizes the need for fluidity in the hiring process throughout the school year more than me. No problem there. They do what they believe they have to do as reality rolls in. Problem comes in when they don't tell you what they did and hide it in their budgets you vote on every year.

By doing that, you don't get to have a say in the largest expenditure in the school budget or see the true growth of the staffing levels. If you knew they had already added 'unbudgeted' staff but were still asking for more - wouldn't you ask Why? And wouldn't you want some explanation for the 'unbudgeted' staff added?

So, take a look at their numbers on the staff growth in staff since I've been looking at it:

They've increased their staff by some 394 heads and you never ever saw it! That's a 22% increase in staff just from this hideous practice of not disclosing all these 'unbudgeted' heads in their budgets.

Now, I'm being overly generous here. I'm only talking about the net 'unbudgeted' heads against the total staffing in their budgets. If you look at the detail by position, you can see it's all over the place. For example, in the School Year 2012-13, they've added 7 heads ( 1 Reg. Nurse, 3 Guidance Counselors, 1 Secondary Supervisor, 1 Data System Analyst and 1 Lunch Aide). They've deleted 4 heads ( 1 Health Services Supervisor, 2 Occupational Therapists and 1 Principal) - for a net of 3 'unbudgeted' heads.

Here's where you can see it:

So, there's two things you want to take away from the above schedule:

1. First, always keep the prior year budget you voted on and use that to compare to the prior year column in next year's budget. That's where you'll be able to see all the 'unbudgeted' heads added.
2. Second, don't approve any new School Budgets until they begin to disclose to you what they're doing with Staffing and what they've already done.

Anyhoo, it's just Not Nice for this Board to continue to treat the residents of Downtown Edison with such disrespect - especially since it's not an unknown practice and it's our money they're playing with.