Article about Goffstown:
Superintendent Apologizes to Parents for Email
Watchdogs on both sides of the political aisle can see potential abuses of the new Bow Emergency Alert System. Last year Bow School board Chair was caught red handed using taxpayer resources to push a political agenda.
Here is a PDF of a News Flier that was sent out with taxpayer money and The Bow School District’s News and Views.
Will the taxpayers of Bow see their taxpayer money being used by political purposes in the guise of information? Lets hope not.
Using taxpayer monies for political purposes must be stopped and it should be at the top of the agenda.
Emergency systems are critical for the well being of the citizens of Bow those who attempt to abuse such critical systems for their own political purposes should be removed from office or fired if they are town or school employees. If they aren’t already these should be town and school policies.
I am not in favor of the emergency alert system being used for political purposes. That is clearly inappropriate. I’d like to suggest however that this be something we can address through policy rather than throwing out the baby with the bath water.
I much prefer to get messages electronically. It saves both time and money. Bulk rate postage for a single page letter to every child is almost three hundred dollars. That doesn’t count paper, envelopes (if used), toner and time. $300 per page per incident + incidentals is well worth it to me to find a way to address the potential misuse of the system. Is that something that has happened in Bow previously? It seems prudent to me in tough economic times to maximize the resources we are already paying for, encourage efficiency, rather than limiting utility.
I’d love to get general messages at my desk where they serve as an easy reminder and are not subject to the abuse of my child’s backpack. It’s also easy to forget to check the website for updates, though I know they are there, and easy with my busy schedule to forget a game or event. If I decide at some point, I assume I can opt-out of the messages?
Since there are records of the messages, which I assume are public records, it would be easy to find abuses. Maybe a Board or Budget committee member (or both?) could be included on every correspondence as a check and balance? Email is the present and future for communications. Let’s figure out how to deal with it.
Thanks to everyone for the SBII petition! I will be signing!