Paladino To School Board: 'You Should Be Ashamed'

BRAVO to Carl Paladino. He is doing what ALL of us should be doing but instead complain while we sit in front of our computers or televisions. Is there any wonder why things have gotten so far out of control in this state?

It is time to get up off your apathy and speak out and most importantly VOTE! Listen to all the sound bytes at the link.

WBEN 930 : Paladino To School Board: ‘You Should Be Ashamed’

“I think it’s a responsibility of our business community leadership to get out there and criticize where we have to criticize and applaud where we have to applaud,”
– Carl Paladino, Buffalo businessman

Buffalo, NY (WBEN) – Buffalo real estate developer Carl Paladino is calling for the state to remove the Buffalo School Board, in the latest of a series of paid advertising messages where he presses for city reform and better leadership.

Paladino’s radio advertising, airing on WBEN, minces no words, and is a open letter to the board and Superintendent James Williams, directly calling for them to pay better attention to community needs.

“Hello, Board of Ed and Dr. Williams, can you hear us now?” Paladino says in the messages…”We are still waiting for the state to remove you.”

His criticism focusses on spending issues and the recent scandal involving the suspension of a student at McKinley High School.

“You get $26,500 per student. We could send all of them to private schools and have $10,000 left for a college fund,” he says in the open message to the board.

Earlier this year, an independent investigator was hired to conduct an investigation of McKinley High School,after volunteer coach Michelle Stiles questioned whether boys basketball coach James Daye was involved with a student. Principal Crystal Barton fired Stiles and student Jayvonna Kincannon was suspended for 5 weeks when she used a cell phone during school hours to try and speak on Stiles’s behalf.

Paladino’s statement refers to the coach as “the philandering Daye” and questions whether he is worth a $79,000 annual salary.

The board citing costs, state education law, and the time considerations involved, has declined to persue disciplinary action against Barton, despite the investigator’s report (below) which says the Kincannon suspension was overly long.

“You couldn’t find the courage to reprimand a rogue principal who slandered, discharged and humliated a talented volunteer coach, and vilified and abused a 15-year -old honor student,” Paladino says in his open message to the board. ” You (The board) blatantly showed favoritism toward a … coach… with the feeble excuse that it would be too costly…. You should be ashamed of your collective disfunction and overall incompetence.”

The Paladino approach, while not always embraced because of it’s bluntness, is generating a range of reactions, including some support for those who want others to speak out more often in favor of reform. A few examples: