Baffle Me With Bureaucrat

Well the curtailment plan has been unveiled. But first I want to talk about the open enrollment report that was distributed. It seems the administration wants to convince us that open enrollment is a good thing.

An airplane analogy was used. Here’s how it goes: An airplane has 100 seats filled at $600 a pop, and is readying for take off. At the last minute, they sell 20 more seats at $300 each. The rationale is that the flight attendants, pilots, air traffic control, etc are all there and being paid anyway (fixed costs) therefore is there really any harm in selling the last minute seats at a lower cost? It’s going to fly regardless. The answer is no, if you only have one plane.

But generally companies have a fleet. Let’s say they have 6 jumbo jets, 2 Cessna’s and 1 stealth bomber. Each of these planes has been flying for 30 years with 20% of their last minute tickets selling for ½ price. A stewardess does some math and realizes that by filling each plane with full price customers, one whole plane could be grounded. Eliminating 1/9 of the fixed costs (fuel, pilot stewards and stewardesses, baggage handlers, etc.). The stewardess does a cost benefit analysis on sending the grounded plane full of ½ price seats and realizes it would be foolish to do so. She also notes that there is ½ of one plane still unsold. Profit wise it is now best to sell those seats at ½ price. But what about the customers that paid full price? Maybe the airline could reconfigure the seating and give all the full price payers a little more room each and eliminate ½ price tickets. She then recommended that the airline sell the grounded plane to the airport it is located at for use as a community center. Not everyone can afford the dues at the Frequent Flyer Club, so the airport may be interested in the community center plane. The stakeholders marveled at the genius of this stewardess. Stock in the airline reached an all time high and the economy was saved.

For those of you that are confused, Planes are buildings, full price payers are CFCSD children, ½ price tickets are open enrollees, Fixed costs are teachers, support staff, utilities…
And yes the grounded plane is a closed building. No, this wont really help the US economy. But it might help us avoid state takeover.

Here is what nobody wants me to say out loud. IF we would stop accepting open enrollment, Silver Lake Elementary could not sustain itself. It would be reduced to 1 classroom per grade. What’s more is each of these class rooms would easily fit into Lincoln elementary. No matter how you try to baffle with your complicated forms and misleading math, it comes down to the fact that open enrollment costs the tax payers of Cuyahoga Falls. Or to word it another way, not accepting open enrollment would save the tax payers a substantial amount of money.

Let me show you another way it costs us. According to the complicated State form provided to me, an open enrolled child brings $5,614 with them. Last year we spent anywhere from $6,716 to $9,085 per pupil to educate that same child. That difference is our local dollars being spent on kids from other cities. Another thing eliminating open enrollment would do is reduce class size in many buildings. This is the beginning of a very public campaign for equity for CF children and fiscal responsibility for our taxpayers.

My thoughts on the curtailment plan are in the works…Stay Tuned! Meanwhile, check out the Falls News for thier coverage.