… Jesus Armas. Here’s the brief for tomorrow’s paper, will have more on this later.

Former City Manager Jesus Armas was appointed to serve as an interim Hayward school board member Wednesday, and said he intends to seek a permanent seat in the November election.

That will pit him against outgoing City Manager Greg Jones and Councilwoman Anna May, who each are leaving their positions to run as a slate for two of the three slots available on the board.

School board members chose Armas from a field of 10 candidates in a 3-1 vote, with Luis Reynoso dissenting.

Reynoso was wary of the appointment because he felt district staff members were “less than transparent” in divulging the fact that Armas’ wife works as a human resources manager in the district, which he said creates potential for a conflict of interest.

In other news, today was the filing deadline for June’s election. All six of the City Council contenders mentioned in this story filed.

UPDATE: Two Hayward high schools were removed from the final list.

The California Department of Education released its list of “Persistently Lowest-Achieving Schools” today, meaning those in the bottom 5 percentile, and Hayward was well represented.

Here are the lists, in two sections: Tier 1 and Tier 2.

Hayward Unified was the only district in Alameda County to have high schools on the list, and all three were on it — Hayward High, Mt. Eden High and Tennyson High.

Interim Superintendent Janis Duran said it was “very disheartening” to see them there, considering Mt. Eden and Tennyson have made significant gains in API scores over the past five years.

In order to receive federal funds to help turn listed schools around, districts must adopt one of four intervention models. They range from the very drastic — closing the school, or reopening it under a charter operator — to the not-so-drastic-but-still-significant, which involve changing the principal and either replacing at least 50 percent of the staff or increasing instructional time.

Duran said the latter has already been accomplished at high schools because of the switch from the block schedule system.

That move, approved by trustees last year, was done as a budget cutting measure to save the district $1 million. But it may prove handy, if feds agree that it could count as part of an intervention model.

Duran said they “are still getting clarity for interventions” and have not made any decisions regarding available options.

Longwood and Burbank elementary schools were also on the state’s list. Longwood has already been slated for restructuring because of unacceptable test scores, but Burbank has seen a turnaround. However, the method used in selecting schools for the list averaged scores over the past three years, putting Burbank on the list despite this year’s 25-point growth in API scores. Harder, which is the other school facing restructuring, had better scores than Burbank three years ago but they’ve since switched places.

“I would think that attention would be given to the fact that we have recently improved scores,” Duran said.

Here’s the state Web site with more information about the list and how the schools were identified.

UPDATE 3/9: There is a precedent for this, from 1997.

The gist of it is that the question was asked, “May the city manager or assistant city manager of the City of South San Francisco serve simultaneously on the board of trustees of the South San Francisco Unified School District?” The answer given by then-Attorney General Daniel Lungren was no for the city manager, yes for the assistant city manager.

Greg Jones said he is looking this case over, and may ask the Attorney General’s office to confirm that it still applies.  ”It is an old opinion, so there may be a different slant on this in this age,” he said. Jones expects to make an announcement regarding his plans late this week or early next.

UPDATE 3/4: David Mora, West Coast regional manager of the International City Manager Association, said that members cannot hold any kind of political office, according to Tenet 7 of their 12 tenets. Jones is a member of ICMA, but you don’t have to be a member to be a city manager.

City Manager Greg Jones announced Wednesday that he plans to make a bid for a seat on the Hayward Unified School District board. He’s got an inquiry in with the state Attorney General’s Office to see if they would consider it  a conflict of interest, but he doesn’t think it is.

“There could be occasions, regarding specific items, where the city is providing a service to the schools, but it seems to me that I could recuse myself from a vote,” he said.

Jones also said that if state officials say he can’t hold both posts, he will have to make a “tough decision” what to drop — his current gig or the bid for the board.

“From my perspective, schools are the most important issue we have in the community,” he said. “We can do all the great work for the city, but if we don’t improve schools we keep losing families, and losing future leaders of the community. People vote with their feet.”

UPDATE 2/25: Survey has been updated so that it’s no longer confusing.

The Hayward Unified School District set up a special Web page that has a load of information regarding upcoming budget cuts. It has feedback from the community meetings held in recent months, and links to information about budget timeline, who is on the Budget Advisory Committee, statements from top HUSD officials and a feedback form, where you can rank priorities for cuts.

In addition for a chance to weigh in, it gives a good idea about how much can be saved by doing what. The format is a little confusing, however. From the survey:

Respond to the following questions by ranking each one on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being most important and 5 being least important.

Q4: Reduce or eliminate staff development for teachers (currently 3 days). Saves $400,000.

So what this means is, you’d rank it 1 if you consider it “most important.” That doesn’t mean you think staff development for teachers is a most important priority, but rather that you think it’s most important for the district to cut said development.

To see other savings, read on: Read the rest of this entry »

UPDATE: Councilwoman Anna May announced that she is not running for re-election come June, instead setting her sights on the school board.  She said  she has some running mates but would not divulge names at this time. More in tomorrow’s story.

Sarah Gonzales handed in her letter of resignation today. The school board will begin the process to fill the vacancy by approving the procedure tomorrow at a special 1 p.m. meeting that also includes discussion of board goals and meeting protocol.

Gonzales said the resignation is due to health and family reasons. She and her partner are moving to Southern California to take care of an aging family member, and Gonzales is recovering from shoulder-replacement surgery.

She said the decision has little to do with the state of affairs on the school board, other than that she has a lot of work to do that makes it “impossible to do the hard work” required of a board member.

We’ll have a story in tomorrow’s paper.

UPDATE: The video of the meeting is now available online. Recommended viewing times:

33:40 —  Trustee Luis Reynoso’s first objection of the meeting to seating placement of superintendent.

41:20 — Cameo public comment appearance of frequent HayWord poster John Kyle.

1:41:45 — Restructuring item begins.

2:13:12 — Reynoso input begins. Conflict begins about 9 minutes later, ends with item moved over Reynoso objections.

2:42:20 — Reynoso input on next item begins. Conflict begins almost immediately, with request for round robin, rejection of request, accusation of superintendent giving direction. About 15 minutes later it again gets heated and ends in a brief recess before being moved.

There was a fair degree of dysfunction, which is touched on in today’s story about Harder and Longwood elementary schools facing restructuring. The video isn’t available yet on the district’s Web site, but it is recommended viewing for anyone who wants to see how trustees are getting along.

Just curious to hear comment from anyone who might have been at the meeting or seen it on television.

Some recent stories: Hayward was one of two school districts in the East Bay to be appointed a county fiscal adviser. The SRO problem was solved, in no small part due to deal brokering by the interim supe. There’s a special HUSD meeting Tuesday night at which they will talk about the search for a permanent superintendent. HUSD is also a topic at the city’s Economic Development Meeting today, where trustee Paul Frumkin and interim superintendent Janis Duran will talk about API scores. And later this week, the superintendent’s action plan, presented as item H2 at the Jan. 27 board meeting, will be the subject for the Hayward Local Agencies Committee meetins, 5:30 p.m. Thursday  at the H.A.R.D. conference room, 1099 E St. 

Capt. Thor Poulsen, the Public Education Officer for the Hayward Fire Department, checks in with some advice on inclement weather:

Severe Winter Weather

The Hayward area is being pounded by a series of powerful storms driven from the Pacific this week. The most severe is scheduled to hit on Wednesday. The intense winds and rain have already caused power outages and flooding across low-lying areas. Please take the time now to prepare in advance and assure your family a safe winter as the storm passes through.

During Severe Winter Weather, if it has been raining hard for several hours, or steadily raining for several days, be alert to the possibility of a flood. Listen to local radio or TV stations for flood information and know what the terminology means: Read the rest of this entry »

So maybe it’s already too late – word is out that they did a soft opening Tuesday night. During off peak hours this afternoon, a couple dozen cars were lined up for the drive-thru, about the same for the drive-in, and a walk-up line was rolling about 12 deep.

Still, fast food fans said they were getting served in short order by the inline-skating bellhops.

We will have a story out over the weekend. Frank Leamy, the pictured co-owner, said they didn’t do any advertising and are already swamped.

“It’s all Facebook and Twitter and online word of mouth,” Leamy said. So consider this is the official online heads up for HayWordians.

There’s even OMG it’s a Sonic YouTube video of a car driving by the new Hayward location.

More details on the Sonic are in our earlier HayWord post.

UPDATE: Here’s the latest on SROs. It appears the idea to go with something other than an HPD presence on campus is no longer on the table.

Some information that didn’t make it to the story:

This was a murky situation. There was no information available from the district about the incident that prompted the discussions of revisions to the SRO contract, which in turn was the basis for looking at alternatives to using HPD officers. At the December school board meeting, the item was pulled from the consent calendar for discussion and the agenda had no indication that there were revisions in the works. Legally, there’s no problem there. The board wasn’t set to vote on any changes to the contract or make any kind of decision. It was pulled for discussion and direction.

At that meeting, available for viewing below, staff was directed to look at alternatives to using HPD officers.  From Reynoso’s comments, it appeared to be a budget issue. Gonzales talked about student rights in regard to search and seizure and interrogation,  and the need for the district to have a say in selecting SROs — something that HPD has since said has always been the case.

Heredia and Frumkin — the board members on the committee that has been meeting with police — both spoke about the contract negotiations, but neither specified what the alterations are or why they are being sought.

Heredia declined to comment about the matter on Wednesday and deferred it to administration.

“The only comment I have is that the district wants a resolution that is favorable to both parties,” she said. “We as a district care about the safety of children.”

The new interim superintendent — on the job since Monday — did not want to comment Wednesday on the April 2009 matter because it happened long before she took the reins.

The April 2009 matter was brought before the public by Police Chief Ron Ace, who responded to the district to explain why the revisions are unacceptable in the letter available below. He reiterated his comments at this week’s City Council meeting.

For decades, Hayward police officers have served as School Resource Officers on high school and jr. high campuses, something that “has been highly successful in improving safety of students,” according to City Manager Greg Jones.

However, at a HUSD meeting last month, trustees asked administrators to review the current arrangement and come back with a “Option B,” possibly utilizing more security hired by, and who would answer to, the school district.

That idea didn’t sit well with some parents, who don’t want HUSD to be in charge of overseeing the safety of their kids. They have said that the cost of the SROs is well worth it, to have an HPD presence on campuses.

Trustees raised other issues, including the selection of SROs. Board member Sarah Gonzales said they should have some say in selecting school officers, looking for ones “with more of a propensity for working with youth” and also wanted clearer language to ensure the Educational Code is followed regarding search and seizure and rules pertaining to the interrogation of youth.

You can watch the recorded meeting here. The issue begins at the 44 minute mark.

The City Manager recently backed statements by Police Chief Ron Ace, who sent HUSD a letter in November. At tonight’s Council meeting, Ace will be giving an update on what’s going on with the agreement. HUSD is supposed to go over alternatives at its Jan. 13 board meeting.

Read on for the full text of Ace’s letter to the district. We’ll have an update on the update after tonight’s meeting.

Read the rest of this entry »