The Havre Chamber of Commerce board of directors recently voted unanimously to send a letter to the Havre School Board voicing their displeasure with the School Boards recent decision to send local tax dollars down the highway to an out of area contractor instead of dealing with one of our own local taxpaying contractors. We have been informed that when the School Board Chairman Shad Huston received the letter from the Chamber Directors, he blew a fuse and marched right down to the Chamber office to give them a good old fashion tongue lashing and cancel his business Chamber membership.
Apparently the Havre School Board is close to snapping under the strain of the community backlash regarding this inept decision. School board members are now acknowledging that they know that Clausen and Sons were indeed awarded the Glasgow Jail contract for over 5 million dollars as a “qualified” contractor using the same “Construction Manager at Risk” type of contracting process that our local school board just a few weeks ago deemed Clausen to “unqualified” to complete for 1.5 million.
It appears that the school board has been caught with their knickers down on this one. In an attempt to put a positive spin on this embarrassing situation, various board members are now proclaiming that they were instrumental in pointing out Clausen’s flaws in regards to the Manager at Risk process so he could make the necessary corrections and get the Glasgow job. Are they serious? They give the local a kick to the head and toss him under the bus and now they are trying to spin it that they “helped” him? When this outlandish “spin” was scoffed at by our interviewer the next defense offered was chiding back with “well he is THE out of town contractor in Glasgow now isn’t he?” First, what does that have to do with Highland Park School and Havre Montana? Secondly, he wouldn’t have to haul his crew to Glasgow to spend their wages if he was building a school addition in Havre. Maybe Anderson would be going to Glasgow? And lastly, I believe Mr. Clausen is from Malta which I would assume would be deemed “local” to Glasgow people.
Now the board is trying to divert attention from Havre’s Boondoogle story of the year and is getting off the subject here with chiding, accusations, and angry finger pointing. The School Board members maybe even are feeling some embarrassment about their whole lack-luster board performance (I should at least hope, even I would have at least a blushing when I got an Failing grade, which is what they have just received from Havre taxpayers.
Next they will be trying to tell us the “dog ate their research papers and they didn’t mean not to do their job”. GO STRAIGHT TO THE PRINCIPALS OFFICE AND AT LEAST HAVE THE DECENCY TO FESS UP
When the school board is made to be held accountable for there actions there will be no change. Same way with the schools and there administrations, Its there way or no way. They are right and the parents and students are always wrong. Seems they believe they are the rulers and not the tax consuming people that they relly are and should also be accountable to the people.
ReplyDeleteI am glad the Chamber sent a letter vicing their displeasure about business going out of town. Isn't that why the business people join together into a Chamber? To create and protect LOCAL business?
ReplyDeleteIf the Chamber would have neglected to send such a letter I would have had to consider going down mad and canceling my membership.
Thankyou to the Chamber. You did the right thing
Who is the Chamber Board to get involved with this issue. I can not imagine that Debbie Vandenberg would want the school board to scrutinize her life choices as relevant to her overseeing a HHS youth leadership program. Debbie if the board looked into what you have done in your life choices you would not be allowed around ANYONE's child. Furthermore who keeps all their dollars in Havre? I see more people from Havre while in Great Falls (including Debbie - shopping) then I see at any local store in Havre. Chamber board get some guts and focus on what it takes to promote Havre - Debbie works for the board, the board does not work for Debbie - Dave Henry - Terry Schend or Dave Clausen!
ReplyDeleteSchool board meeting Tuesday November 10th 6:30pm at the Havre Middle School.
ReplyDeleteThe Chamber did the right thing!
Plenty of money leaves our community via internet & catalog shopping, Great Falls, Billings, ect. - but our tax dollars - they should be circulated HERE!
We weren’t told that Debbie from the Chamber had anything to do with this letter from the board of directors although she most likely was in support of the action also. The Havre Daily Corrector folk here whole heartedly support the action the chamber took in this matter. Their function is to promote and protect the local business climate, which includes speaking out against the shameful sending of our local tax dollars down the road. One of our staff, who is a Chamber member, even went so far as to say that he would cancel his membership at the Chamber if they DIDN’T come to the aid of a local business that was thrown under the bus by that malfeasance of the local school board.
ReplyDeleteWe are also assuming that this “anonymous” is one and the same with the “anonymous” that posted as the suspected school board member. Again, deflecting criticism by throwing stones and personal attacks. Are the members of the board above reproach if we looked into your individual “life choices” and actions?
Just found the site and I love this blog ... Not to savvy on these computers, just refer to me as HAVRE.
ReplyDeleteI have to say I think Anonymous Above has a point. In reading through things I see it as "what's done is done", for some reason the school board has made a choice that - as always with any board - not everyone agrees with. Havre Chamber Members DO NOT start burning bridges here - your function is to promote Havre so get on the ball and turn lemons into lemonade. Show Dick Anderson what resources are available to them right here in Havre throughtout this project. If you keep the fighting up more than one chamber member will suffer.
Don't you just love "anonymous" comments? I was intrigued by "Anonymous" on November 10th at 8:47. Well due to the wonders of the internet and the local phone company, I found out that the blog was posted by an unemployeed pedophile in our community. Pretty sad.
ReplyDeleteI for one am glad the chamber sent the letter to the school board and the way the school board is handling the situation reminds me of how our elected officials are handling all the tea parties around the country. "You can talk all you want, but we won't listen. We are doing it our way and we don't care if you don't like it!"
ReplyDeleteI believe that Anonymous was way out of line with the comment on Debbie Vandenberg's "life choices". What the heck has that got to do with anything? My God people, we are talking about a new addition onto a school building of which Debbie's personal life has nothing to do with. If you are going to bring out the dirt on her then let's play fair. I am sure that even though I don't know you, I bet we could bring up some dirt about you too.
I agree with ShopGirl. Keep our tax dollars here in Havre. Seems like we should be able to control that a lot better than the shopping dollars that go out of town.
It is interesting that the “anonymous” that is intrigued by the “anonymous” post below is smart enough to “discover” that a blog poster is a unemployed pedophile but isn’t smart enough to even post a made up name on his / her post. Probably the same jerk that trys posting links to porn sites here also. We started this blog to get information out to the community about what is happening behind the scenes here in Havre, not provide entertainment for the local village idiots so give us a break and participate intelligently or just keep surfing porn and leave us alone
ReplyDeleteAnonymous said...
Don't you just love "anonymous" comments? I was intrigued by "Anonymous" on November 10th at 8:47. Well due to the wonders of the internet and the local phone company, I found out that the blog was posted by an unemployeed pedophile in our community. Pretty sad.