OBAMA VS DOUGCO: Rep. McNulty Blasts AFL-CIO & DougCo Teachers Union For Spending Priorities

Published on June 10, 2013 by

The fight down in Douglas County is ramping up in the lead up to the 2013 school board elections in November. Rep. Frank McNulty (R-Highlands Ranch) recently weighed in on the issue, blasting the local teachers union for sending most of their union dues to elect Barack Obama and almost none on teacher development.

Check out McNulty’s robodial:


If you listen carefully you’ll note McNulty takes a veiled swipe at 9News union rep education reporter, Nelson Garcia, who has been reporting the union smear that Douglas County teachers are leaving in droves. Turns out it’s not only not true, but Douglas County has the same retention rate as union-friendly districts like Cherry Creek.

Strangely, Garcia has yet to report on Cherry Creek’s “colander” for teachers. Guess the AFL-CIO isn’t interested in feeding him that story.

We also received this walk piece (after the jump) from a reader down in Castle Rock that lays out the line of attack highlighted in McNulty’s robodial, namely that the DougCo union sent 70% of its union dues to Washington, DC to elect Barack Obama and only 1% on actual teacher development.

To put it lightly, that kind of thing ain’t gonna be popular in the Republican Promised Land of Douglas County.

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SURVEY SAYS: Despite AFL-CIO Misinformation Campaign, Douglas County Teachers Love Douglas County Schools

Published on May 6, 2013 by

The AFL-CIO-led coalition of teachers union front groups in Douglas County has been slamming the school board there for creating a hostile workplace. Based on a new statewide survey, it appears the only hostility in the workplace is that created by the unions, as Douglas County teachers report a satisfaction significantly higher than the statewide average.

Reports The Colorado Observer‘s Sunana Batra:

DENVER — Teachers in Douglas County generally have a higher degree of faith in their school leadership and enjoy greater engagement from parents and communities than do their counterparts in other parts of the state, according to the results of a recent survey.

The findings were part of the Colorado TELL (Teaching, Empowering, Leading & Learning) survey, which is described as an “anonymous statewide survey of licensed, school-based educators to assess teaching conditions at the school, district and state level.”

Some 33,000 Colorado teachers responded to a series of questions in ten separate categories. That number included more than 70 percent of Douglas County teachers, who participated at a rate 16 points higher than the state average of 55 percent.

On all nine measures in the Community Support and Involvement category, Douglas County teachers gave their district higher marks than the statewide average.

More educators in Douglas County felt that the community they serve is supportive of their school (90 percent), that parents are influential decision-makers in their school (92 percent), that their school maintains clear lines of communication with the community (94 percent) and does a good job encouraging parent involvement (94 percent), than did teachers in other districts.

It’s not as if this was a survey paid for or conducted by school board supporters. This is a massive sample (70% of DougCo teachers) and it was conducted by an organization that lists the DougCo teachers union, American Federation of Teachers Colorado, as one of the groups that administers the survey.

The survey results, with DougCo teachers reporting high levels of satisfaction with district leadership, severely undercuts the campaign that the AFL-CIO affiliates have been engaged in.

Facing a parent population enthralled with the district’s schools, and now proof that Douglas County teachers love Douglas County teachers, what is there left for the AFL-CIO to say?

Don’t worry, we’re sure they’ll find something to complain about. That, or they will just start making sh*t up.

UPDATE: In that category, take this bit of fiction from a disgruntled Doug Co teacher who got caught playing politics during school hours. The disgruntled union flack, named Brian White, argues that teachers are fleeing Douglas County. Only problem is, more teachers are leaving Cherry Creek Schools. 9News tried its best to tell the full story, but they did miss a big part – their source is a disgruntled staffer on an angry tirade.

 

PeakFeed: AFL-CIO/Douglas County Classrooms Finds The Spell Check Button

Published on April 29, 2013 by

The AFL-CIO operatives responsible for an anti-Douglas County School Board group either purchased spell check software, or they hired one of those teachers they dubiously claim to represent to do a little proof reading.

We can now report their “vision” is free of the embarrassing, ironic spelling errors that riddled the original version.

New version:                                                                                              Original Version:

 

UNION DUES GET PAID: Teachers Union’s $2 Million Gets Returned In The Form Of Legislative Attack Ad Bill

Published on April 23, 2013 by

UPDATE: A reader points out that State Senator Mary Hodge is getting good at this pay-to-play thing. Hodge, as readers remember, was the lead sponsor of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s mag ban bill earlier this session. All the buzz in the State Capitol is that she carried the bill after Bloomberg called Governor Hick and Hick called Hodge.

Gee, why would Hicka and Hodge have ever given into Bloomberg? $$$$$$$!!!!!!! But there is more work to do, sayeth Senator Hodge. Pay back time for the AFL-CIO/AFT. Hodge is becoming a go-to legislator for liberal special interest causes. Now that is the kind of legacy to be proud of!

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Teachers unions are, at least in principle, meant to help improve life for teachers. Unfortunately, in the last couple of decades they’ve transformed from a teacher support system to an outright wing of the Democratic Party.

There’s no clearer evidence of that than how they spend their money.

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PeakFeed: 6 Ways To Not Eff Up Your Political Paraphernalia

Published on April 22, 2013 by

UPDATE: A reader wrote in with another helpful suggestion to help future candidates avoid Perlmutter’s mistakes. See 1A.

A number of political outfits in Colorado have made some pretty rookie mistakes recently, from poor photoshop decisions to union attack websites that forgot to spellcheck. In an effort to improve the professionalism of politics in Colorado, here are 6 ways to avoid effing up your political paraphernalia.

1) Don’t Mess With Minorities: Don’t photoshop them in or out of photos. People notice and it never helps.

1a) Know Your “Foreigners”: If you are going to attack an opponent for outsourcing, don’t use an American citizen and veteran as the face of it. You’ll be accused of both racism and stupidity.

2) Spell Check: Always check that your grammar and spelling are correct, most especially if your site, mailer or yard sign is related to education issues. Yes, we’re talking about you, AFL-CIO/Douglas County Classrooms.

3) Make Sure They’re Colorado Mountains: If you’re going to use photos of mountains in your campaign schwag, just ensure they’re in Colorado.

4) Made In The USA: Don’t buy campaign t-shirts or hats made in China. For Democrats, check that they have the union bug on them signifying they were made in a union shop. For Republicans, the reverse is true — make sure they don’t have a union bug.

5) Campaign Staff Are Not Constituents: Ed Perlmutter learned this the hard way when his campaign staff accidentally uploaded raw cuts of a web ad to YouTube, exposing an alleged constituent as nothing more than a campaign staffer play acting.

6) Don’t Let Your Mailer Step On Your Message: If you’re sending out mail about the importance of hiring in-state workers, don’t do it with an out-of-state mail firm. Right, Evie Hudak?

 

AFL-CIO NEEDS HELP WITH ABCs: Union Group Website Attacking DougCo School Board Marred With Spelling Errors

Published on April 17, 2013 by

It’s a good thing the AFL-CIO’s name isn’t difficult to spell, because by the looks of the website of an AFL-CIO-aligned organization, Douglas County Classrooms, created to attack the Douglas County School Board, the union operatives don’t spell so good.

Those watching the political wrestling match in Douglas County know that last month a union operative boasted that the AFL-CIO and its local education affiliate were standing-up a non-profit to carry the water of national union bosses during the Douglas County school fight.

Our friends at Media Trackers and The Colorado Observer have done some excellent reporting on it, for those not keeping up. Here’s a good summary from The Observer:

DENVER – The nation’s largest federation of union organizations is gearing-up for a fight to oust school board members in Douglas County, members whose tenure has been defined by ambitious reforms that have helped notch high marks for student achievement – and rankled state and national union bosses.

But when the powerful AFL-CIO, and their constituent arm the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), flex their financial and political muscle in the form of campaign commercials, attack mailers, and paid union canvassers in Douglas County neighborhoods, the familiar AFL-CIO and AFT monikers won’t be anywhere in sight.

Instead, the AFL-CIO and AFT will be funneling their activities through a group with a name that is more local, and far more Mom and Apple Pie – Douglas County Classrooms. 

Mandy Sheets, a representative for the teachers union, told Clayton Woullard of The Denver Post in December that the Douglas County Classrooms group was created to oppose the school board’s reform efforts.

So the AFL-CIO is for all practical purposes one and the same as Douglas County Classrooms. Following along? Ok, good. 

Now for the fun part.

The website of the AFL-CIO-aligned Douglas County Classrooms…a website that proudly boasts a vision of “putting kids and classrooms first…” is marred with multiple spelling and grammatical errors, including a hilarious sentence where the DougCo Classrooms boasts of its focus on making sure that “all students understand basic subjects like reaidng (sic) and writing…”

To the right is a full screenshot of the error-riddled page. Like a good teacher, we have circled in red pen the misspellings we have identified. 

The irony here is rich. Douglas County schools have been at the forefront of the movement for choice and performance pay. The school district has been called one of the best in the state and nation.

The unions hate choice and performance pay, however, and they have fought these reforms at every step. The leaders in the school district do not suffer fools lightly. The school district got tired of the AFL-CIO-affiliates’ obstruction, so they cut off the spigot of taxpayer cash that for years had been filling union coffers.

In the aftermath, the unions have been all over town saying all kinds of bad things about the district. As a recent TV ad pointed out, the AFL-CIO wants the money back.

In retribution, the union operatives stood-up this group called Douglas County Classrooms to attack the Douglas County School Board, setting the stage for everyone in power to be thrown out at the next available opportunity. 

Good idea, but bad execution.

We don’t doubt that Douglas County Classrooms cares about “reaidng”. We would never judge their “focs” on the best interest of kids.

But maybe the AFL-CIO-led group should spend more time educating themselves on the success of Douglas County schools and the reforms behind that success. There is plenty of good “reaidng” on the subject.

 

WOULD THE REAL MIKE ARNOLD PLEASE STAND UP? DougCo Schools Surge Despite National Recession

Published on April 16, 2013 by

We are a blog, not a newspaper, so we will leave it to someone else to confirm whether there are two Michael Arnolds in Douglas County in a heated dispute about the impact of the economy on government services in Douglas County, or whether there is one Michael Arnold who is indulging in a very public argument with himself.

Either way the conflicting statements from the person or persons named Michael Arnold in Douglas County shows just how silly the union-bred attacks on Douglas County schools really are. 

The backstory here comes courtesy of friends of school reform in Douglas County. The AFL-CIO created “Douglas County Classrooms” sent out a newsletter recently with their usual crap about why Douglas County School District, widely regarded as the best in Colorado, is dog meat. The unions need Douglas County voters to believe their school system is terrible (even though all measures show the opposite is true) so they can throw out the school board later this year, and install one of their cronies who will put the AFL-CIO back on the taxpayer dime.

In the union newsletter, there is a lengthy column from one Michael Arnold, who, in full embrace of the AFL-CIO’s attack DougCo strategy, tries to diminish the success of the District by chalking up the success of students to the strength of the economy and the prosperity of the community:

“The high academic achievement the board takes credit for is due more to family background than board policy. It is well established that higher socio-economic status (SES) students generally do better academically than their counterparts from low-SES homes.”

Nevermind this from The Colorado Observer, which shows that Douglas County is more succesful than districts than Districts that are equally or more affluent than Douglas County Schools:

[An] analysis [by Schooldigger.com] ranked Douglas County Schools top among the state’s largest school districts for 2011-2012, three slots ahead of Littleton Schools, eight slots ahead of Boulder Valley RE2, 13 slots ahead of Cherry Creek Schools, and 29 higher than Jefferson County Schools. 

No, don’t pay any attention to that for the time being. Rather consider Michael Arnold’s statements in the union newsletter, where he writes off all that is good in DougCo schools as the sole result of prosperity and a strong local economy, to the directly contradictory statements from a man also named Michael Arnold, head of suicide prevention in Douglas County, who attributed a recent surge in the suicide rate in Douglas County to…hold the line…financial pressures and a bad economy.

This, from The Denver Post, under the headline “Suicides rise in wealthier Douglas, Arapahoe Counties“:

So why the increase in (suicides in) Douglas and Arapahoe counties? 

It could be that the two — which are more affluent counties in the region — have experienced greater population growth compared with other counties and may be now experiencing the effects of the slumping economy, experts say. 

“In Douglas County, there’s a lot of financial pressures on families,” said Mike Arnold, chairman of the Douglas County Suicide Prevention Alliance. “Someone loses a job, loses a home, and the family falls apart. It just gets too be unbearable for some people.”

Are you following along here?

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LAUGHING AT LIBERALS: AFL-CIO Colorado Might Need A Tip Or Two On YouTube

Published on April 11, 2013 by

Big Labor might have millions of dollars at their disposal, and an army of paid canvassers harassing people at their worksites, but what they don’t apparently have in Colorado is a lick of skill at getting videos to go viral.

A couple days ago, AFL-CIO Colorado released a lame-ass YouTube video of their staff doing the already-dead-meme Harlem Shake in support of a union payback bill in the Legislature. They tweeted it out no less than 7 times and even got The Denver Post‘s Lynn Bartels to embed it in a Spot blog post.

Despite their massive political infrastructure and the helping hand of Colorado’s top political scribe, in the three days the video has been out they’ve received a whopping….99 views.

Congratulations, AFL-CIO Colorado. That might be the lowest amount of views on any Harlem Shake video anywhere on the internet.

Mike Cerbo, was it really worth wearing a feather boa for 99 views?

 

#KIDSFIRST: Douglas County Education Alliance Launches To Combat Union Attacks

Published on April 9, 2013 by

First they lost the 2009 school board elections, then they watched as a school voucher system was set up and held up by the Colorado Court of Appeals, and recently their union boss salaries, funded by taxpayers, got pulled out from under them.

It’s been a tough time for the local AFL-CIO teachers union bosses. And they’re pissed.

Dealt one defeat after another, the local chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, a member of the AFL-CIO, and their allies, have resorted to trashing the Douglas County school district’s reputation in a bid to take back control of the school board in the 2013 elections, complete with lawsuits and dubiously researched direct mail.

Fed up with the union mud throwing, a group has sprung up to combat their attacks, headed by former Castle Rock Mayor Randy Reed.

The Douglas County Education Alliance just launched their online efforts with a YouTube spot and Facebook page, where they outlined their goals and agenda.

From a Facebook post today:

Douglas County has always had one of the best school districts. Now, thanks to our great teachers and cutting-edge reforms Douglas County Schools are the envy of the country.

So why would the AFL-CIO and their union affiliates attack our school district? It’s pretty simple. Just follow the money…

Read the rest at the Douglas County Education Alliance Facebook page.

If you would like to tweet about the Douglas County school battle royale, the group suggests the hashtag #KidsFirst

 

THEY SAID WHAT? Senate Dems Name Fundraising Levels After Fireworks

Published on July 5, 2012 by

A week or so ago, we rolled our eyes when a partisan web site needled the Colorado Republican Party for hosting a mini-golf tournament at which teams who donated $10,000 would have an elected official play on their team.  The guest blogger wrote, dripping with sarcasm, “the Colorado Republican Party will demonstrate their (btw, their should be “its”) accessibility to and compassion for the American middle class”. 

But, we did a double take when we received an invitation on July 2nd to attend the 2012 Senate Post-Session Event “Star Spangled Banner Happy Hour” on July 31st at the Glenarm Rooftop.  The State Senate Democrats, clearly the paragon of sensitivity and compassion, have named their sponsorship levels after fireworks – Uncle Sam, Statue of Liberty, Bottle Rocket, and Firecracker. 

As everyone knows, fireworks are banned throughout the state right now because of the high fire danger, and um, the many wildfires that have damaged or destroyed homes, threatened lives, and decimated our beautiful landscapes. 

Perhaps, State Senate Dems, you’ve heard of the Waldo Canyon Fire that destroyed over 350 homes in Colorado Springs or the High Park Fire that burned over 87,000 acres and more than 250 homes?  Or, perhaps ANY of the other fires that have been ravaging our state? 

All sarcasm aside, there are thousands of people who lost a tremendous amount with the fires that have swept through Colorado – we’ll keep them in our thoughts and prayers.  And, we’re sure that the Coalition for Colorado’s Future, a 527, would certainly be willing to donate part of what it raises through this event to the victims of fires in Colorado, right?  RIGHT?

Also, be sure to thank the top sponsors of this event – the unions, including AFL-CIO, AFSCME (Association of Federal, State, County, and Municipal Employees), AFT (the teachers arm of the AFL-CIO), the Colorado Education Association, the Colorado Trial Lawyers Association, and SEIU, for putting on such a thoughtful and, dare we say, “compassionate” fundraiser.


 
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