Comments on: Upscale liberal Kentfield discovers that scary phrase “We’re from the government, and we’re here to help”

By: Bookworm Room » California Department of Education fights school district for daring to spend money on children’s education.

Wed, 12 Dec 2012 19:44:05 +0000

[...] wrote a few days ago about the fact that the State of California Department of Education has gone after the [...]

By: Danny Lemieux

Danny Lemieux — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 22:12:04 +0000

Lee, here is another way that works. During the real estate boom, we had Russian families in our neighborhood that would sell/flip houses between family members to artificially inflate the prices. They would then out huge home equity homes against the houses and live off the loans. They probably never declared incomes and qualified for entitlements.

By: Les

Les — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 21:02:45 +0000

Danny, I think in many instances it’s done the old fashioned way. I know of many Asian families where both parents worked, some saving enough to buy their own business and building on that. Some just continue working. They don’t spend a lot on big ticket items and the cost of living is lower in their neighborhood. Eventually they save up more than enough for the down payment on a house and buy one. However, their take home pay is still low so their kids still get a subsidized lunch. This process has always amazed me.

By: DL Sly

DL Sly — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 18:52:59 +0000

The phrase “Be careful what you wish for. You just may get it.” comes to mind.
0>:~}

By: School Lunches in Marin County « White Rock Kitchens

School Lunches in Marin County « White Rock Kitchens — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 16:35:04 +0000

[...] School Lunches in Marin County var addthis_product = 'wpp-264'; var addthis_config = {"data_track_clickback":true,"data_track_addressbar":false};if (typeof(addthis_share) == "undefined"){ addthis_share = [];}“We’re from the government, and we’re here to help”. [...]

By: Maggie's Farm

Maggie's Farm — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 12:11:52 +0000

Tuesday morning links…

Like the Hannukah reindeer? A new war game: Europe 1939-1945. How Ben Affleck’s Argo Screws History Inside the glacier-cave: Amazing underground chamber with giant ice slides that never melt You Could Tell Santa’s Helper In The UU Church Pagea…

By: Bookworm

Bookworm — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 01:37:34 +0000

Thank you, Ceruleanbill. I think that flatters every one of us here!

By: Danny Lemieux

Danny Lemieux — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 19:51:52 +0000

Charles Hammer, you would be surprised about that “handful”. Our school district is upper middle-class that is seeing a major influx of immigrants (mostly Russian and Asian). They buy very nice homes but many of their children qualify for free food in the local schools. How can that be?

Well, my guess is that many of these immigrants brought their homeland values of tax evasion and money-under-the-table economics to our country. They are swimming in money but have no qualms about living off the government when the government forces these benefits upon them (i.e. me and thee).

By: lee

lee — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 18:26:46 +0000

My experience with volunteer organizations is that there are a handful of really energetic take-charge people who run things for a few years. They either tire out, or their kids graduate, and the volunteers move one, leaving a group who have followed the leader for so long, they really don’t know how to run things, and are not sure what they need to do. It take a year, or two, or three, or four, possibly five, and eventually, the leaders rise to the surface to take charge again.

My guess is the PTA in Kentfield is like this. Some one, or handful, of parents did a GREAT job at running this program. They moved, or their kids all graduated, and no one was left who could really do it as well, or manage the resources quite the same. Whereas once, the kids in Kentfield has FANTASTIC lunchs, possibly, they now have merely mediocre, (But still no doubt better than what most school lunches are like…)

My mom was a school teacher in Indiana when her school district changed from individual cafeterias, to a central kitchen. Since it the district did this based on state requirements, what also happened was that the cafeteria went from little government interference, to LOTS of government intereference. (But still MUCH, MUXH less than what there is today.)

The food had been actually pretty good BEFORE, but the after was AWFUL–tastless, overcooked, starchy… Ick. It was so bad. There were a lot of poor kids in that school, and before hand, they got one really good meal a day. Afterwards, they were miserable–they refused to eat the swill in the cafeteria. And what they got from home, if they brought their lunch, was pretty bad–usally chips, a twinkie, and peanut butter crackers. But at least they got some calories from that. By refusing to eat the awful lunch, they were incredibly hungry by about 1.

(One of the things that pained the cafeteria workers with the change was that all uneaten food was required to be thrown away. What had frequently been done before was that desserts were given away at the end of the day to whomever wanted to take home a little extre peanut butter bar or brownie… Now it ALL had to be chucked in the garbage.)

By: Charles Martel

Charles Martel — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 17:31:30 +0000

Heather, Kentfield is a very affluent area, so there would be, at best, only a handful of students poor enough to qualify for “free” government lunches. Most likely the school’s informal, internal principal-parents network would take care of it very discreetly, making sure that poor kids receive lunches with no fanfare and no questions asked.

This is one of the advantages an affluent school district has, as Book mentions above with her description of a well educated, activist group of moms. Even though most of them subscribe on paper to strong government, they’ve had enough unsettling experiences with government inefficiency and interference in their previous business lives to realize that the last thing they want is a government agency squatting on their turf and destroying the well-functioning system that’s already there.

Contrast that with the dysfunctional schools in big-city districts where stressed parents not only have no real knowledge of how to run a bureaucratic maze, but have been softened up by two generations of a mentality that says it is the government’s job, not theirs, to feed their children.