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About Herald and news. (Klamath Falls, Or.) 1942-current | View Entire Issue (June 7, 1963)
HERALD AND NEWS, Klamalh Falls, Ore. Friday, June 7, 1J Letters To The Editor PAGE A V County Education Would Benefit : .While advocates of both sides of the pres ent county school consolidation proposal have been decrying the attitude that money is the 'most important element in the consideration, it is nevertheless apparent that major empha sis is being put by both sides on the economic factor. It is unfortunate that this is so, but it is a fact. As a result, there is a great deal more of confusion than would exist if leaders and speakers devoted more effort to the other ;issues involved. Inasmuch as both sides are using different sources of figures to present jtheir argument, we are hopeful that voters .will completely disregard the claims made bv bolh sides, get their own figures, or forget about the economics of the situation altogeth er. It is acknowledged here that the last-mentioned course of action is pretty hard to swallow. The important thing to remember is that if consolidation has merit, otherwise, to justify a favorable vote Monday, there is not enough difference in cost regardless of which set of figures one uses. : One real important factor for voters to keep in mind is that voters, the various school board associations, the various citizens com mittees, and knowledgeable individuals have studied and advanced several proposals for solution to the school problem in this county. All plans have been rejected by: the voters, or the school boards,-or the citizen groups. It would not be reasonable to stamp the Monday ballot proposal as a "last chance" but we are coming dangerously close to exhausting the alternatives in our situation. , Opponents of the single county unit have made much of the cost factor (probably with good reason) and statements to the effect that consolidation would arouse bitterness, enmity and open warfare between the city- people and their rural neighbors. One cannot make light of cither charge, but wc are inclined to discount both. None of us like td see our taxes go up, but they do, anyway, despite our individual efforts to keep them down. We arc certain that no self-respecting citizen of Klamath County is going o allow education to suffer for Jack of a few tax dollars. For the most part, that is what we are talking about here only a few dollars a year more for consolidation, if it is effected. The cost would bo so small, it ap pears, that it pretty well dilutes the argument against consolidation on the basis of econom ics. As to the charge that a consolidated situa WASHINGTON ARA By F11.TON LEWIS JR. A Nebraska Republican charg es that the Area Redevelopment Agency has so much money tt doesn't know what to do. ' As a consequence, the AltA lias proposed grants that are eco nomically indefensible, according to Kep. Halph Beermami. The t4j5,50O.On irom Congress tins ear, is considering a loan of $18 million to build a soy bciin processing plant in Dorchester County. Maryland. This is de spite the act that present facili ties are operating at only 80 per cent of eatacity. Experts Irom private industry ainl the Depart ment of Agriculture call Ibe proj ect absurd. ' In New York. Ihe AHA has tentatively agreed to underwrite ; 63 per cent of a $20 million sugar ;beet project. Agriculture. Secre tary Orvillc Freeman has prom , Ised Cayuga County a 50.000-ton sugar beet quota if the loan goes tlirough. '. " Nebraska farmers have idle acres on which beets can be grown without federal aid. So do farmers in other states. "Actu ally," Bocrmann says, "farmers can grow all the beets tliey want It is processing plants we need " And private capital won't fur nish those until It is assured that the annual U.S. sugar quota set by the administration-won t bo drastically cut. 1 Republicans, alter a thorough research Job on AHA, discovered (hat 24 per cent of the loans ap proved between July I, lata ami March 25. IKtU went to finance motels and hotels. They claim Uiat was not Uto intent of Congress. One "distressed area" listed Is Mineral County. Nevada, where the median family Income Is $5. (MS a year. The county's potu lation rose 13.8 per cent between !M0 and litiO. while population In the county seat rose M per cent. Republicans cite a Feb. I loan In tlx Ponehartrain Hotel hi De tion will lead to bickering and cleavages with in the county: We have seen enough of these situations to realize that for some individuals, this will be true. But, we have enough faith and confidence in the people of Klamath County that we deeply appreciate the extent of their maturity and common sense that would not let such a terrible situation develop on a widespread basis. There appear to be sufficient safeguards in the selection of school board members and administrative people to assure orderly, broad - based representation on the consoli dated school boards. That will preclude any group or faction of the county's population exercising too much control over the destinies of a particular school unit within the couuly complex. We have a great deal of respect for the argument that consolidation tends to dilute the opportunity for close "local" control. But, it is our belief that the benefits of consolida tion, particularly as related to educational op portunity, transcend the "local control" con sideration. It is not entirely clear, at this time, just what is the effect of a recent act by the Ore gon Legislature that revokes Klamath County's exclusion from reorganization laws of the state. Even the schoolmen cannot get together on interpretation of what the new law means or requires. It is not conceivable that the aver age citizen will be able to ascertain the signifi cance of the legislature's action. However, it seems reasonably clear that the new law can not change the situation in Klamath County physically. The same arguments prevail against the various plans that have been advo cated in the past, and it is not feasible to think that the law will change any of those objec tions. Wc have tried to be objective in this issue. We have recognized the validity of viewpoints of those who share a difference of opinion on the consolidation proposal. Letters to the editor and news stories we have carried have tried to present as clearly as possible the ex planations and statements of those who should be knowledgeable in the subject. It is not nec essary that we repeat these various pro and con arguments in a long editorial here. We have made an honest attempt to study the sit uation from the wide range of material avail able. Based on the information available to us, wc arc of the opinion that voters Monday should react favorably to the consolidation proposal, and vote "yes." REPORT Development Absurd troit for $l.a'.H.525 to help finance a 432-unit motor hotel and provide t.ifl new jobs. Detroit's hotel or eupancy rate last year was only 54 per cent, however. A sizable grant was made to Duluth. Minn., "to supplement convention, entertainment, rec reation and cultural facilities." The cost for tlic 22 permanent jobs created figures nut to $277, 272 er job. Sen. Ted Kennedy, who prom ised voters be could do more for Massachusetts, bus seen Ins juici est plum snatrhtd away. Soon alter Kennedy canio to Washington as a freshman legislator live months ago. Ihe Commissioner of Internal Reve Letters To Burden I am a resident of (lie city of Chiloquin and a taxpayer in Ihe count) school system. I can't see where a single school district is going to be of any advantage to the people of the county. I went to Kl! 2J years ago and granted tney need a new school. But it seems to me that w hen our county school board pro posed several Ideas to the Kl' School Hoard and to Elementary Board No. I and Uiey were ail turned down that we should not have to help txnld a school lor Klamalh Falls. I am tin1 mother of (our chil dren, three of which have already graduated ftom Clulitquin High and I might nild received line educations. We will not receive a better curriculum under a one unit dis trict so don't see why we siioukl nue, Mortimer Caphn, announced that he was shutting down his Northeast Regional Office, locat ed in New York. All its functions, he said, would lie transferred to Hoston. Congressional reaction was vi olent. Hcniblicaus and Democrats alike cliarged the sw itch was po litically motivated. Tliey present ed government statistics to prove that the move could not be jus tilled for any reason but poli tics. Congress called Caplin's boss. Treasury Secretary C. Douglas Dillon to explain the move. Ap parently. Dillon couldn't come up with enough reasons, for the an nouncement w as quietly made that UiS would slav in New York The Editor have to dig any deeper in our pockets. As 1 have lieard setcial limes all we want is your money. I say let the people of Klamath Kails vote a tax or two to build their schools as the people in the coun ty do. We tkm't have a swimming poo lor our school, our athletic pro gram is self-supiHirting 'or we don't have sports' ami our chil dren don't gel any help for our bunds. Also we don't squander money for Greyhound buses, 'our bus drivers work nl other jobs also1, but Ihey still haul our boys to the games. In closing I al.-o want to ask people to think before tliey mark tltcir ballot Nit I hope they see whore (boy will be putting an extra burden on tlie rural people II they vote yes on Monday. June 10 Mrs. Roger tt Wright. Chiloquin. Letters To The History The need for reorganization of Klamath County school districts is not new. The problems that demonstrate this need have not solved themselves even though they have been considered in the past. It would be interesting to look at some of the past ef forts at reorganization. Without question the outstanding reorganization work in this county was the county unit plan creat ing the present Klamath County school district. This included all the area of Klamath County ex cept that of District No I. Soon the Klamath Union High School district was superimposed over District No. 1 and the por tion of the county district adja cent thereto (or high school pur poses. This is the present or ganization and well demonstrates, as most educators agree, the inef fectiveness of union high districts. Early in 1053 tlio boards of the above three districts jointly requested a study and survey he made by representatives of the stale department of education. The survey was to study building needs, population trends, and the degree of efficiency that could be attained under the present system. This survey pointed out the unique organization of the districts found in nu oilier county in Oregon. To quote from the report. "Every one familiar with the district or ganization in Klamath County is aware of the fact that under the present system there are very definite handicaps because of the three di((erent typos of school districts and their overlapping responsibilities. To meet fully the needs of Uie schools of the coun ty within the next ten years or less, at a reasonable cost and to provide fur the maximum ef ficiency, a certain amount of dis trict reorganization seems inevi table. Any system in which Ihe elementary schools arc under the jurisdiction of one board and the high schools under the jurisdiction al a separate board is not only in ellicient as far as cost is con cerned but makes it very difficult to provide tlio necessary coordi nation and sequence in curriculum development and instructional ef ficiency throughout the system. Experience has shown that the most ellicient school system is possible when all of the schools both elementary and secondary within a geographic unit come under the administration of one Utard ami a superintendent chosen by that board. This condition docs not exist in Klamath County. This could be attained by district No 1 joining Uie county schitol district If this were done the union Inch school district would ho dissolved automatically and all ol the schools o( the county both ir the city and rural areas would come under a single board which would provide for unified admin istration " In 'Xu the School District I(o orc,aiu,ition act was passed hy the state legislature with its nu or objective the "I nitiod Di. tint." A county looriMiiiM'ion committee was cstabhslicd toi th. put pose of proposing a plan ot icoi ganization to the otc;s tor their approval. The plans studied hy the committee were: 1. A single district tor tlic coun ty - Two districts consisting o( tin present school District No 1 and liie present county unit ele mentary district :l. Two districts consisting of Ihe approximate Kl IIS district and t!y county unit high school 4 Three districts consisting o( S D, No I. a suburban district, ami the county unit high school district. 5. Two districts w ith boundaries to be determined, that would di vide the south suburban area be tween the two districts on the present pupil tax rcsponsibilityr Plan No. 4 above was soon elim inated - since it would create a very poor district as far as the assessed valuation per pupil was concerned. No. 5 can be recog nized as the presently proposed "gerrymander" plan. This plan was found undesirable since it arbitrarily divided a social unit, was only a stopgap measure with no long range benefits, and offered little permanent tax equalization. Plan No. 1 was criticized for its difficulty of administration. H seemed to offer the best possibility for improvement of education and the most efficient use of building and facilities. In total disregard of the acute need for reorganization this committee had not agreed on any plan by llllil when it was dissolved hy legislative exemption of Klamath County from the act. In Ihe fall of 12 a citizens committor again found that re organization should be accom plished prior to a major building plan. The schoul board associa tion, consisting of the three tioards, tried hard to find an ac ceptable plan. The single district again apicars as the most de sirable educationally, and t h e most efficient cost wise. As a result the boards of Dis trict No. I and the county dis trict were petitioned and will hold an election dune 10 to organize all the schools in Klamath Coun ty into a single county unit dis trict. Tlie voters will have an op portunity to express their desires on this date. Be sure to study all issues concerned and then express your wish on the ballot. Ray Garrison. 2'J38 Hope St. Equitable One sometimes hears it said tliat it is not fair to expect people who live at Henley, or Merrill, or Bonanza to help pay for the edu cation of children who live in the city. It is very hard to say where fairness starts or stops in the area of taxation. It seems to me In lie most unfair that the school district of Gilchrist, a very rich area, would have to be taxed to help educate the elementary chil li: in of the sprawling suburban urea: a much poorer district in proportion to the number of chil dren per tax dollar. However, this has been going on (or years with out protest. Certainly it has been commonly rtrognized hy all that where a suhstantial portion of the educa tional lax burden falls on the people within a certain area, tlien that district must be large enough to provide for enough of an equal ization factor to furnish the op portunity lor an equality of educa tion for children within the area There are those who are very q uck to say it is the duty of tlio city to educate the siiliinhnn i lildrrn ami otiiers equally quick to say that these children belong to tlie county I think this is a p ireiy academic debate and that it is tlie duty and prnilcce of all ot the wealth within Klamath Coun ty to educate all of the chil rlren within Klamath County. A single county unit school dis tuct would provide an eqiut.ih'e taxing unit and a line and dil uent school district lor adminis trative purposes T A Patterson. 2i01 Lawrence. Flexibility Tlie county-wide set-! disir.t consolidation election on June '.' will culminate many- weeks ot Editor study by the school boards of Dis trict 1, District 2 and the county. During this time every conceiva ble form of reorganization was presented for study, thoroughly analyzed, and, except for the sin gle unit district plan, eventually discarded. It slwuld be significant to the voters in School Districts 1 and 2 that the boards of directors of both districts have unanimously gone on record as favoring this form of reorganization. In doing so they have viewed the benefits of reorganization from the long range standpoint rather than the near term. Tlie heart of our present prob lem is centered in tlic Henley KL'HS area, which is, of course, the populous sector of Uie county and the one where these problems are likely to be continually pres ent, in the foreseeable f u t u r'e. These problems are created by Ihe population growth in the Henley-suburban Klamalh Falls dis trict. Only by removing the dis trict boundary between these two areas and placing them under one school board with full author ity for the education of all of Uie students through all the elemen tary and secondary grades can the necessary flexibility be ob tained to solve these problems. Although tlie immediate effect of a school district consolidation would be a slight increase in mil lage rates in tlic county versus no appreciable change in the suburbs and a small decrease in Ihe city, if tlie Henley district grows fast er than the metropolitan Klam ath Kalis area, as has been the exiericnce in similar cases else where, this situation could easily be reversed in a few years with the present urban area bearing the brunt of the tax load. As a result, those in the county who have been predicting "hard feel ings" and "bitterness" if consoli dation is approved and charging the city with asking the country to underwrite the cost of its edu cation, can hardly be considered either far-sighted or realistic about Ihe future growth of Klam ath County. Opponents of consolidation in some instances have, perhaps un knowingly, used half-truths and withheld some of the facts while proposing an alternative plan which tliey have represented as a painless panacea. Tlie implica tion has been that reorganization can be had very quickly and sim ply by action of Die Klamath County Board of Supervisors act ing as a District Boundary Board. However, we may all rest as suied that no major school dis trict lumndaiy change will ever be maile by this body without a vote of the people. 'l iie odds are that tlie school dis trict consolidation to he voted on .lime 10 is tlie only plan of reor ganization we will have a chance to vote on for a long time to com. If it is defeated our chance for a unified school sys tem in tlie city and suburbs goes witii it. and we must continue to make do as Itest wc cat wit.i o.r oatmided. inflexible Vr.ion. II. .h School system St it is extremely imortanl titat every citizen express lum seif at the polls next Monday. The opponents of live measure cm be expected to turn out in tercc. Consequently those wlxt bc l:ee in improving our edmat.on al standards and orcaniat.on here in Klamath CiHinty must be equally anxious to cast their bal lots in faor of tlie proposition if it is to cam C. S Huston. Member. Bw.d o Director.. KUIS District No 2 No Charity This is an open letter to the people in Klamath County who care more for the education of all of our children than for area preju dices. We are for the Single Coun ty Unit System as the answer to the present and future school prob lems in Klamath County. For one district to have crowd ed facilities while the adjoining district might have an underfilled school is a ridiculous waste of taxpayer money. If two districts adjoining each other are over crowded, it also seems a waste of taxpayer money for them both to embark on two separate build ing programs, when a joint build ing between them, in the area that needs it, would be more eco nomical. If, according to one of the many plans backed by oppon ents of unification, a greatly en larged Henley High is to be built, why can't city and county build it together? Many of us in City Elementary District No. 1 are not too happy about being held up as the "city slicker out to skin the farmer." Many of us do not live wiUiin or even very near the city limits. District Nu. 1 extends north as far as the Algoma area and west to include Lakeshore. We are proud of our schools and they aren't crowded or underfinanced. We aren't asking for "charity to bail us out," as has been said so often. But K.U.H.S. is crowded. We in Elementary District No. 1 supply only one half of the students that jam K.U. The County Elementary District provides the other half. We feel that if our joint popula tions need another school, we should build jointly to solve the problem. Some people ask. "Is the fight for unification worth all the emo tional upset and bitterness?" Will there be less bitterness among the people of Bly. Bonanza, Chiloquin, Gilchrist, Malin, and Merriil if the county alone has to build a new Henley High of twice the size, than if it is built in part nership w ith City Elementary Dis trict No. 1? Will there be less bittcrnoss be tween the county and the suburbs if the people in this area are paying one tax on one side of the dividing street and another tax on the other side? Will the bitterness over a tax raise now, to back all the chil dren of the county, be more or less than the bitterness of a coun ty that will have to build for and maintain 500 to 6C0 additional stu dents and also build for and main tain all additional students result ing from the steadily expanding suburban area in their district? The single county unit district is the only solution to our school problem that gives permanent equalization of taxation and that allows the best utilization of ail the facilities present and future. It is said that Klamath County h too big to administer as one district. From a population stand point? With less than l.ooo stu dents this is not so. School dis tricts are often bigger, i Salem 15.000; Eugene l.l.ono; Portland 7.1.000.1 Geographically speaking? At tile present, tlie Countv School I 31 By SYDNKV J. ilARRIS Tliere arc two contradictory, but equally strong, desires in the modern human being who lives in a mobile society such as ours. One is tlie desire to "belong"; the other is the desire to "stand nut " How successfully we can re solve the tension between tliese two contradictions is the measure of a society's growth and sta bility. And such tension can most easily be seen, lor instance, in the world of fashion and style. Edward Sapir, writing some years ago in tlie "Encyclopedia of Social Science." describes tlie "contradictory functions of fashion." Style on Ihe part of women is alwavs an cftort to arbitrate, to strike a balance, be tween the desire to stand out in the crowd and the need to belong and be accepted by the group. A woman would not customar ily go out for an evening in a hat or gown that was 10 years outmoded; she wants to be in the current fashion. On the other hand, if her hat or gown is too much like some others at the same party, she feels humiliated or cheated out of her individu ality. What she is looking lor. in Sapir's phrase, is "adventurous sjtety." The contradiction was put in more basically p.ychoiocical terms by I.m Yuung.'in his witty epigram: "All women's dresses are merely variations on the eternal struggle between the ad mitted de-ire to dress and the unadmitted desire to undress." Sit icty. like ail institutions, tends Urn ai d cotitoi mity, toward unitormrty. toward group solidar ity Yet the individual, w.i.ie needing the comlort of "helonc ing." also possesses tlie opposite ure lo be dilferr:H. to stand out. to ase-rt his uniqueness in one v av or anotlter Chan; u-n or., i.tr. !e un derstood only as a p-vi-hoio a District stretches from one end of Uie county to the other with ad ministration offices in Klamath Falls. This would not change. The utilities, rail lines, timber lands, and present and future man ufacturing plants are here be cause of us all. Our farming and business and social lives are all interdependent on each other. Should not all of our children ben efit from all of our combined re sources? People in the rural area have, more than once, asked what could they possibly gain from unifica tion other than a bigger tax bill. Here are some advantages of a single county unit system: From the point of better education, a large district could afford travel ing teachers and possibly science labs on wheels that could stay 2 or 3 days at each school in order that the smallest high schools could offer subjects that arc not at present a possibility. In many areas the telephone sys tem can provide a direct phone line intertic between schools so that such subjects as languages can be offered with a traveling teacher calling al the schools 1 or 2 days a week to examine stu dents and help out on problems. This is being done in California. Another item of interest would be an expanded county instruction al materials center containing more projectors, record libraries, book libraries, educational films, science equipment, and other teaching materials that the indi vidual school districts can now only afford on a limited basis. This center would work like a bookmo bile program with the various teachers ordering their materials one week for delivery the next. Wc feel that the Single Counly L'nit is an offer of partnership for the present and the future. If this is really too unpleasant to the out lying districts we do not wish to force this partnership upon Uiem. The vote on counly unification will answer this question. One thing that many of us in City Elementary District No. 1 feel, however, is that we cannot property work our education sys tem unless wc have jurisdiction over our grades 1-12. We would like to be able, like the county, to get rid of the outdated union high school system and have a unified grade school-high school district so that wc, too, could util ize our buildings and financing without having lines of legal juris diction interfering. Wc must in Ihe near future get our education al house in order and satisfy state reorganization plans by hav ing 1-12 jurisdiction over our stu dents. Wc urge bolh rural and subur ban, and City r.lementary District No. 1 residents to consider the long range picture and then vote your ow n conscience, but do vole. A "yes" vote means all the dol lars for all the children and a grades I through 12 educational system. A "no" vote means that any school reorganization that will result will be without regard to equalization of any future popu lation or financial growth. Vote June 10. Bruce and Maxine Wirth. STRICTLY PERSONAL means of giving expression tn both these tendencies at once the w omen all w ear sack dresses or cloche hats at the same time, and yet each one endeavors to look as distinctively different as possible. A good society seeks to pre serve as much diversity as possible within tlie unity of tlie group. And although the United Slates prides itself on being the land of "individualism." we too often limit this to our economic liie alone, and discourage indi vidual expression in ideas, in ways of living, in the eccentrici ties and idiosyncracies that give a people color and vitality and charm. A country without a "beat movement" of some sort, without its rebels, its innovators, its iconoclasts, would be spiritually and intellectually petrified. And economic individualism could not long thrive in such a climate ot social conformity. Al manac By I niled Press International Today is Friday, June 7. the l.vhh day of 19W with 2n; to follow. Tlie moon is foil. The morning stais aie Venus. Jupiter and Saturn. Tlie evening star is Mais. On this day in history : In 1IM. delegates meeting in Baltimore lor tlie Hepub'.ican'mn xenlion nominated Abraham I,in ivin and Andrew Johnson tu head tiicir ticket in the Noiember elec tions , In Mary Pu-klnrd made her motion picture debut with the ideas of "The Violin Maker o: Gremor.a " In fM. Cen Dm.!. i D E.-er-hower took up hi- dut:cs as presi dent of Coli.mh.a l.r.ner-itv in New York
