For months, we have been trying to work with the ALSD administration (Vince Colaluca) and Board of Education to resolve obvious and serious safety problems with the way they transport our children. From many meetings, discussions and e-mails with these officials, two central themes have become very clear. First that Vince Colaluca’s ego rules the Austintown Local School District. He is so intent on being right, even in the face of overwhelming reason and logic showing that he’s wrong, that he’s willing to risk the lives of the children of Austintown and the employees of ALSD to not have to admit that he and his transportation supervisor (Colleen Murphy) made some mistakes and fix them. Second, that the Board of Education of ALSD (with the exception of Harold Porter) provides virtually no oversight or supervision to the administration. They didn’t even have a transportation safety policy in place until we brought that fact to their attention, after which they hastily threw something together which supported their already unsafe policies.
Aside from the obvious driver inattention issue that caused this accident, the root cause is that the dismissal and exit plan for the Watson/Frank Ohl area is unsafe. I hear stories constantly about the utter chaos happening there daily. It's unsafe, because the administration won’t devote the effort or funds necessary to do it properly because they have higher priorities to spend our money on. Vince actually told me on several occasions that if I found extra money in the budget, he’d spend it on many other things before fixing any of the safety issues that abound in this district. He did this in front of witnesses including 2 BOE members.
If you want to join in the fight fix this broken thing, visit our Web site www.safebusing.com or visit our Facebook group http://www.facebook.com/groups/atownb.... We’ve exhausted our attempts to reason with these people and are now preparing to force them to fix these issues.
‘This didn’t have to happen’
For months, we have been trying to work with the ALSD administration (Vince Colaluca) and Board of Education to resolve obvious and serious safety problems with the way they transport our children. From many meetings, discussions and e-mails with these officials, two central themes have become very clear. First that Vince Colaluca’s ego rules the Austintown Local School District. He is so intent on being right, even in the face of overwhelming reason and logic showing that he’s wrong, that he’s willing to risk the lives of the children of Austintown and the employees of ALSD to not have to admit that he and his transportation supervisor (Colleen Murphy) made some mistakes and fix them. Second, that the Board of Education of ALSD (with the exception of Harold Porter) provides virtually no oversight or supervision to the administration. They didn’t even have a transportation safety policy in place until we brought that fact to their attention, after which they hastily threw something together which supported their already unsafe policies.
Aside from the obvious driver inattention issue that caused this accident, the root cause is that the dismissal and exit plan for the Watson/Frank Ohl area is unsafe. I hear stories constantly about the utter chaos happening there daily. It's unsafe, because the administration won’t devote the effort or funds necessary to do it properly because they have higher priorities to spend our money on. Vince actually told me on several occasions that if I found extra money in the budget, he’d spend it on many other things before fixing any of the safety issues that abound in this district. He did this in front of witnesses including 2 BOE members.
If you want to join in the fight fix this broken thing, visit our Web site www.safebusing.com or visit our Facebook group http://www.facebook.com/groups/atownb.... We’ve exhausted our attempts to reason with these people and are now preparing to force them to fix these issues.
November 14, 2012 at 6:04 a.m. permalink suggest removal