In whose league are they playing.....Major League or Minor League?

From John Curry, April 6, 2008

Subject: ...as I sit and listen to my STRS CDs and ponder....whose league are they really in?

...as I sit and listen to my STRS CDs of the March '08 board meeting I reflect upon all the guff that Dr. Dennis Leone has to take and still get his motions passed so that reform is still taking place in our retirement system. My schedule of working 12 hour shifts, so as to afford affordable healthcare insurance for my spouse (whose healthcare premium subsidies were trashed by STRS several years ago) and myself...after 30 years of teaching in Ohio's public schools, makes it rather difficult to actually attend live STRS Board meetings. Still, I can get rather up close and personal when it comes to really hearing all the petty bickering by some board members that surfaces when Dennis introduces an idea that embodies reform. The funny thing is....many of those Leone-initiated motions were, at first, attacked by some on the Board who decried the very concept of such a reform-minded motion....only then, sometimes months later, to actually vote in the affirmative on the very same motion after the concept actually penetrated the logic center in their brains!

What were they thinking -- or were they thinking? Who are these Board members who initially just couldn't comprehend what Dennis was trying to do? Well, they just happened to be the ones who were strongly endorsed by the OEA!

Tom Mooney (the former President of the Ohio Federation of Teachers), before his untimely death, did realize what Dr. Dennis Leone was trying to accomplish at STRS....and told us so...in very open and honest speech to CORE members back in June of 2006...a meeting which I was lucky enough to attend. Too bad Tom's words weren't taken heart by some of those OEA-anointed persons who now represent "labor" (i.e.. classroom teachers and administrators) on the current (and even the past) STRS Board. Tom would roll over in his grave if he knew what has transpired at STRS Board meetings since his passing.

Compounding the problems mentioned above, I feel that there is another reason that some on the Board fail to realize: that they are dealing with a guy (Dennis Leone) who is "out of their league" when it comes to the concept of openness in government and the public's right to know that we now call the "Sunshine Laws" and the "Freedom of Information Act." It might behoove them to revisit history to see that the one they sometimes belittle (Dr. Leone), for what some of them have called micromanaging is actually one step ahead of them and doing what he does for their benefit and the benefits of over 300,000 STRS stakeholders. They tend to forget two items listed below:

Awards- Society of Professional Journalists- Ohio Chapter http://www.centralohiospj.org/?page_id=5

Chapter award winners

First Amendment Award

This award recognizes significant contributions to the First Amendment rights of freedom of expression. Individuals and organizations both inside and outside of journalism are eligible.

2007 - Marc Dann, Ohio attorney general
2006 - Fred Gittes, Gittes & Schulte
2005 - State Rep. W. Scott Oelslager, R, Canton
2004 - Dennis Leone, former superintendent of Chillicothe Schools
2003 - Martin Rozenman, Suburban News Publications
2002 - Catherine Candisky and Darrel Rowland, The Columbus Dispatch
2001 - Staff of the Ohio State University Lantern
2000 - Thomas A. Schwartz, OSU journalism professor
1999 - Cliff Wiltshire, Suburban News Publications
1998 - Verne Edwards, Delaware Gazette
1997 - Frank Deaner, Ohio Newspaper Association
1996 - Martin Yant, Ohio Observer magazine
1995 - Staff of the Ohio University Post
1994 - The Columbus Dispatch and Editor Bob Smith
1993 - not presented
1992 - Alan D. Miller, The Columbus Dispatch
1991 - The Fairfield County Leader
1990 - Luke Feck, former Dispatch editor
1989 - Andrew Douglas, Ohio Supreme Court Justice
1986 - Sam Perdue, Columbus Citizen-Journal city editor and columnist
1983 - Judge John W. McCormac of the Franklin County Court of Appeals

Item #2... the 2005 "Ethics in Government Award"

This award was presented to Dr. Leone by the Government Finance Officers Association. This award was described by the Bowling Green State University Retirees Association Newsletter as an award presented "For exposing a terrible and arrogant entitlement culture at the State Teachers Retirement System beginning in 1995, the Government Finance Officers Association presented its 2005 Ethics in Government Award to Dr. Dennis Leone in Cleveland Sept. 14 (2005)."

Since this presentation was obtained by this STRS retiree in the form of an Adobe Acrobat Reader, I'll have to give you a link to go to for details of this award...it (along with other background on Dr. Leone, as well as Dr. Paul Kostyu - who wrote nearly 100 articles re. the STRS fiasco) can be found by clicking on the following link:

http://www.bgsu.edu/downloads/execvp/file15866.pdf

The bottom line is...Dennis is thinking and acting "out of their league" when it comes to the betterment of a retirement system for all STRS stakeholders (active and retired). For those Board members who continually stonewall reform at STRS Board meetings comes an award also presented by the Society of Professional Journalists - Ohio Chapter. They, in my mind, are strong contenders for the "other award" that the SPJ also presents each year, The "Brick Wall Award" is described below...along with its dubious list of award winners. Care to nominate a few current STRS Board members for this award? I have a few in mind!

John

Source: http://www.centralohiospj.org/?page_id=5

Brick Wall Award

Started in 2001, this dubious distinction is presented to the individual or organization that, according to chapter members, did the most to block citizen access to public records and proceedings or otherwise violated the spirit of the First Amendment during the past year. Anyone is eligible, but special consideration will be given to public officials and tax-funded agencies that fail to follow the law.

2007 - Ohio Supreme Court justices Paul Pfeifer, Judith Ann Lanzinger, Terrence O’Donnell, Evelyn Lundberg Stratton and Alice Robie Resnick

2006 - The Ohio Supreme Court for a series of decisions which weakened Ohio’s Open Records law. Particularly onerous was the court’s decision to recognize “executive privilege” for the Ohio governor’s office in Dann v. Taft. This exception is not in the state’s Open Records statutes or the Ohio Constitution. In other record-shielding decisions, the court has blocked newspaper access to photographs of police officers and to the home addresses of state employees – both longstanding public documents.

2005 - Sen. Larry Mumper, R, Marion: Sponsored “Academic Bill of Rights” to limit what professors can say in the classroom; Jacqueline Piar, superintendent of Northridge Local Schools: Dismissed the high school principal and sent public records out of the county to shield them from view and asked the Licking County sheriff to drop a criminal investigation.

2004 - Ohio Consumers’ Counsel Robert S. Tongren: Destroyed a $579,000 consultants’ report to hide it from public scrutiny

2003 - Village of New Rome: Refused to provide documents showing how money was spent or how some officials came to occupy their offices

2002 - The Ohio Historical Society: Refused to follow Ohio laws regarding open meetings or public records, even though it received 75 percent of its annual funding from taxpayers; kept executive salaries secret

2001 - Judge Thomas E. Louden of Delaware County Juvenile Court: Sued by The Columbus Dispatch when he improperly closed a detention hearing and posted deputy sheriffs at the doors of the Delaware County Courthouse to keep the media out of the building)