Your Lee County School Board is in the process of hanging a large albatross around YOUR necks. They are presently building an UNNECESSARILY EXPENSIVE school at a site in Alva that the school board had deemed not usable and that the land should be sold. While I am not here to argue whether or not the school is needed, what I am here for is to convey the total lack of common sense and FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY being applied to the process.
If you have heard any of the campaign messages from the candidates for school board, they all chirp in unison about what a great job they have done. How “conservative” they are. Given the financial status of Lee County Schools, are they all smoking something or do they just want YOU to overlook their incompetence.
Continuing with fiscal incompetence, the initial building cost was placed at $140M. It is now over $170M and projected to be even higher.
Lehigh Acres has a population of 136,752 people while Alva has a population of 3,437 people. Lehigh has 31,315 children of school age while Alva has less than 100.
Now, it would seem to me that building the school in Alva, the number of students being bused and the miles being traveled by the buses would be far greater than if the school was built in Lehigh Acres at Joel Blvd. and David Road. Is it their aim to purchase more school buses, provide more driving positions and assuredly incur higher expenses? This certainly seems counterintuitive as they have had a shortage of drivers for a while, not to mention how far in debt they are.
The site in Lehigh Acres, in addition to being more convenient, has all of the necessary infrastructure in place. The site in Alva requires that YOU, the taxpayer, pony up an additional $50M in unnecessary expenses for electric, sewer, water, sidewalks, etc. Why would they insist on spending so much extra money when they are all whining that the school system is so far in debt. I know they do not have a printing press, but why do they need one when they have YOU?
Could it have anything to do with a well-known developer who has large holdings in Alva, on which he wants to build thousands of homes in the vicinity of the new school, who would greatly benefit by YOU paying for the infrastructure for him. There is also an agent in Lee County who is the campaign manager for most of the commissioners, members of the school board and the school superintendent. This same agent also represents a number of developers, including the one who wants to build in Alva, in front of the people whose campaigns he runs. I might also add that the contractor for this school is also represented by this same agent.
Did I mention that the school board awarded, right after the election, a $180,000.00 contract to a lobbying firm, Ballard, which also made a hefty campaign donation, that this agent belongs to.
Am I the only person in Lee County that smells like conflict of interest and/or collusion is still alive and doing well.
Norman Cannon
Fort Myers
