I have been following the issues with the Olympia School District and am disappointed in the outcome of the budget decisions. Community members, parents, and students took the time to show up for the forums and voice their priorities. Keeping teaching positions was the overwhelming top priority. This priority was ignored and new administrators (hired out of the reserve funds to begin with) were kept at the expense of teaching positions. The end result is larger classes and less flexibilty for class offerings at the school level, due to larger class sizes. This means raising class sizes in OSD for the second time in less than 5 years.

I appreciated the letter to the editor today from Stephen Bray. I hope that educators and parents can come together to correct the trajectory that OSD is racing along.

What are others hearing on this issue? What are the solutions?

The levy increase on the ballot is completely unreasonable. If your home is worth $200,000 (which is below the average home price in Olympia) you could be paying an addition of $454 annually! They received a requested levy increase only 2 years ago!!! This current levy is just for maintenance and operations.

They are also seeking another levy for Technology which could cost the owner of a $200,000 home as much as $92. This would mean a total increase of your taxes of $546!!! I can’t afford to pay an additional $546 per year in property taxes. That money could be spent to stimulate the economy during this recession.

There are many reasons for not passing these levies:

First, the amount of the cost to the home owners is astronomical. An increase of over $500 (about average) per home is simply beyond reason.

Secondly, I do not believe the money will actually go to programs which will assist learning. The North Thurston Schools web site has not indicated any specific information on the projected use of this money.

The Thurston County 4-H Dog Club The Muttz-K-Teers and many other local 4-H clubs will be collecting this Saturday, water Bottles for Adna Elementary School. All of the schools in Adna use Boistfort Valley Water and due to the flood it is now not drinkable. Adna said it would be nice to have a stash of bottled water to last for the end of the year, But that would take around 60,000 Bottles! So This Saturday at the WSU Thurston County 4-H Extension Office (back parking lot of Fred Meyers) we will be collecting as many bottled waters as we can. But we will need your help!!! Help out our neighbors—tell everyone you know to bring donated bottled water this Saturday, January 19!

Address: 720 Sleater-Kinney Road SE, Suite Y Lacey, WA (The Back Parking Lot of Fred Myers)

Feel Free to Contact Chris Swearingen for more info at,

360-456-6309

If you are out and about, and can add a case of water to your shopping list, it's is much needed.

Big Lots has cases of water for only $4.