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Public Records Suggest Southwestern College Used Public Funds Frivolously
Further information for student consumption: If Southwestern College can't get all deficiencies corrected in those 10 recommendations by October 2011, then United States Department of Education requires WASC to terminate accreditation. Credits earned before termination may transfer, but with the taint of substandard college administration that led to terminated accreditation. As for future students, you take your chances when you pay your money. Let the buyer beware. The clock is running, and the apparent failure to address 4 of 5 listed WASC accreditation deficiencies on schedule by October 2010 is not at all a good sign of things getting better. Somebody at Southwestern needs to crack the whip. I think it's time to audit the books and regulations, fully and completely, and to have the campus associated students organization address the student body pursuant to Education Code Section 76060 on current efforts to prevent the termination of Southwestern College accreditation by October 2011. Anything less is a cover-up. If board members were up front about all of this starting in 1996, then it wouldn't be coming out here now.— October 23, 2010 11:24 p.m.
Public Records Suggest Southwestern College Used Public Funds Frivolously
RE "You make great points. However, there IS a letter that I have seen that put the college on warning": Interesting rumor, if it's about San Diego City College. On the other hand, Southwestern College most likely received such a letter BEFORE probationary status was imposed by the WASC community college commission and published by WASC in the August 2009 list of accredited institutions. WASC informed Southwestern College months ago that it needed to make corrections regarding a total of 10 then-unaddressed recommendations. The accepted report by SWC due to WASC by October 2010 was supposed to address not only distance education (Rec. #5 mentioned as approved) but also the lack of SWC's Technology Plan integration with strategic planning, and other deficiencies (Recs. #6, #8, #9 and #10 conveniently not mentioned by SWC in the mailers). See http://www.swccd.edu/Pdfs/WASC_Action_Letter.pdf for details of the remaining 9 recommendations that led to probation for a roster of deficiencies that "deviates significantly from the Commission's Eligibility Requirements, Standards of Accreditation, or policies, or fails to respond to actions and conditions imposed by the Commission." In some cases, the failure to respond goes back to 2003; in others, back to 1996. So far, Southwestern College has not made any accepted report to WASC on Recommendation 8, requiring "that Southwestern College develop and implement written definitions of an effective decision-making process" before adopting "processes and structures providing faculty, staff, administrators, and students a substantial voice in decision-making processes." Given the blog post content above on shut-out faculty and students, whatever has been done so far doesn't cut it.— October 23, 2010 11:23 p.m.
San Diego City Council Stalls Vote on New Energy-Saving Streetlights
The City Council is wise to postpone the issuance of AA- or lower grade debt until after the election. If Proposition D fails, Fitch Ratings has already indicated that such a loss may be a negative factor in determining the ratings of any specific City-issued general obligations. See the supporting documents from the Fitch Ratings training session on debt servicing for city council members earlier this year.— October 23, 2010 9:24 p.m.
Public Records Suggest Southwestern College Used Public Funds Frivolously
RE "This board had truly dealt with the issues and the most recent report was just submitted and ACCEPTED by WASC! They [WASC and/or Southwestern College administration] conveniently forget to mention this": Apparently the acceptance of the report by WASC has nothing to do with WASC actually removing the loss of accreditation by probation... or perhaps WASC won't formally announce a reinstatement off probation until some time next year, like August 2011. Obviously, they didn't publish a list in August of this year, so in any case, SWC administrators cannot claim such published probation-free WASC accreditation for the current academic year: http://www.accjc.org/directory_of_accredited_inst… Let us check the list for 2011-2012 a year from now and see if "they" caught "their" omission by then. Amending my previous statement, I am aware of no time since I was a City College student body president decades ago that San Diego City College has ever lost full WASC accreditation for placement on any form of probation, and I don't recall any time when it was formally listed as "warned" of pending probation either.— October 23, 2010 8:35 p.m.
Public Records Suggest Southwestern College Used Public Funds Frivolously
The Southeastern Economic Development Corporation in southeast San Diego was given to sending out glossy heavy-stock PR postcards for no good reason on a fairly regular basis while then-SEDC president Carolyn Smith was doing her nearly-solo wheeling and dealing with area developers, one of which may have included a former SEDC president who was there when Smith was first hired decades ago. That lasted until Smith was ousted for paying out nice staff bonuses from funds not used to hire a financial director who could internally audit the relatively non-existent books and report findings to the board. If sending out glossy, relatively detail-free mailers is a new practice at SWC, then I'd be both worried and curious... as we seem to be now.— October 23, 2010 10:35 a.m.
Public Records Suggest Southwestern College Used Public Funds Frivolously
RE "I just received a mailer today that assured me as a resident that everything is progressing well regarding accreditation. Odd, I never received these glossy mailers before....": It would not be all that unusual for there to be some community outreach regarding accreditation efforts. If I recall, there usually are common accreditation standards to be addressed regarding how a community college serves it surrounding community, and certainly there must be some sort of policy at Southwestern College accounting for the presence of interested members of the public at that public institution. Communication to the public regarding restored accreditation would not be out of line but should be sensitive to pubic sensibilities of current economic conditions. I wouldn't put tons of expectations on "everything is progressing well regarding accreditation" as that probably means that the College has finished its self-study report addressing the concerns that led to the loss of accreditation, and has submitted the study to WASC. Now it's up to WASC to review the self-study report and inspect by visitation -- at least I'd expect a WASC visitation would be required before there was a commission decision to risk removing/rescinding the prior loss of accreditation. Now, if the mailer received was in any way misleading or untruthful... wow... a new low?— October 23, 2010 1 a.m.
September SD Unemployment Stays at 10.6%
RE "We need to be competitive in the job market and we can't be when Democrats want to begrudge the 'rich' every nickel, and they don't educate themselves on economics to boot": I'd settle for a mandatory high school requirement of basic accounting. How is an electorate without the fundamental accounting literacy to read a balance sheet going make a decent decision regarding any public expenditure? Did anywhere near a majority of the voters actually go the the City of San Diego web site and download Fitch Ratings' supporting documents for the debt servicing training that our city council members received this month? Bets are that they're getting all of their election information from media one-liners and corporate-purchased advertising: Why bother with one's own analytical due diligence when our personal idiot boxes can keep us all "on message"?— October 23, 2010 12:30 a.m.
September SD Unemployment Stays at 10.6%
On sending MBAs with no other skills to Venus: BRILLIANT! On the way, they can organize as manual laborers. On capitalism self-destructing: It doesn't have to, but it needs to evolve beyond greed for the sake of greed with no sense of public responsibility. Perhaps the Greeks were right to insist on moderation in all things, as no single artificial entity such as a corporation for its own sake can outweigh the rights of everyone else, not even if it is allowed by the Supreme Court to have unlimited speech in the marketplace of ideas. Once incorporated under the law, there is no state-mandated death penalty for artificial persons regardless of what they do, and for that reason alone, it suffices to require corporations be held to the same standard as natural persons, to speak truthfully, to not assert corporate rights to the detriment of others, to do all of those things natural persons are required to do under the Civil Code of California and the Constitutions of California and the United States with respect to the rights of all natural persons under the law regarding our lives, liberty and property. Corporations are not above the law but must obey the law as the voice of the people of California and of the people of the United States. Under the law, the people of California speak with but one voice. In America, that law is democratically utilitarian in its creation, where each natural person has one vote and the best outcome -- the ethical outcome -- is the greatest good for the greatest number of us. No corporation is above the law, and the utilitarian nature of democracy insists that law upholding the natural personal rights of life, liberty and property in the public interest be the common moderator of corporate existence and action. Otherwise, we lose the rule of law to the rule of a person as dictator, an artificial person at that. That would be an abomination to be avoided in one nation under God. The American ideal is that under the rule of law, there be justice FOR ALL. If we have lost sight of that as an ideal, then yes, capitalism is doomed in the same way any parasite is doomed on killing its only host.— October 23, 2010 12:10 a.m.
Coronado Lawyer Shaber Pleads Guilty to Tax Evasion
Did any of the alleged shell companies actually conduct business with members of the public, or did they exist only as fictitious accounting transactions? If they did business in public, did any of it involve alleged work performed or other contractual obligations with any local government unit?— October 22, 2010 10:10 p.m.
Public Unions Funding Almost Two-Thirds of Yes on D Campaign, Says Aguirre
RE "The Wall Street Journal reported today (Oct. 22) that the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees is the biggest outside spender in the 2010 election. The union has given $87.5 million. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has given $75 million and groups such as those headed by Karl Rove have given $65 million. The Service Employees International Union, representing public employees, has given $44 million and the National Education Association $40 million": By comparison, Jerry Sanders, Fred Maas and Nathan Fletcher secretly put up $6 billion in City of San Diego future tax revenues on the table in Sacramento. The people of San Diego are thankful that they are so generous with OPM. At least the homeless got Golden Hall temporarily. At what point did the Romans start throwing out bread at the free circuses in their stadium? Was it before or after the human sacrifices to distract the mob?— October 22, 2010 9:43 p.m.