By Nancy Thorner -
Recent articles by Lisa Black in the Tribune and Paula Skaggs in the Lake Forest Patch about “big benefits” for ex-superintendent Harry Griffith are painful reminders of just how improvidently our tax dollars were spent under his reign.
Some will say that Griffith's boondoggle existence is old news and that it's best to allow sleeping dogs to lie. However, lest history repeat itself, it is imperative that the issue of squandering tax dollars remain in the forefront, even more so if a request is made by the Lake Forest School System for increased funding through its 2013 tax levy which should be made public at December board meetings.
It appears that the root of the “Griffith Gone Wild” problem is that our school boards enabled his every action. The boards allowed at least three major gaffs to occur in Griffith’s era: his grossly excessive compensation; his botched handling of the Steinert sexting scandal, including his proven lies to the community; and the huge increases in teachers’ salaries from 2009 to 2012, in which the majority of Lake Forest High School teachers (and administrations) received percentage increases from 19% to 33.114%, helping to propel LFHS to the #2 rank in top Chicago-area High School Districts in cost to educate per student.
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