State Releases Graduation/Dropout Rates For 2015

The state today released graduation and dropout rates for 2015. 

Below is provided a copy of these results for Southbridge Middle/High School. Comparable data is also given for the preceding five years (2010 to 2012 are for Southbridge High School. Afterwards the results are for Southbridge Middle/High School). Of particular note is the sudden increase in non-graduating completers in 2013 and 2014 and its dramatic rise in 2015. 

Track Santa

Health Care Cost Rising At Slowest Rate Since 1961

The revised third quarter economic data contained some good news for President Obama and the Democrats. Thanks to Obamacare healthcare costs have risen at their slowest rate since 1961.

From The White House:

Prices of health care services have risen just 0.7 percent over the past four quarters, extending the recent period of exceptionally slow health care price inflation, while expanding coverage has driven faster growth in aggregate utilization of health care services. Prior to 2015, an increase in health care services prices as low as the 0.7 percent increase over the most recent four quarters had not been seen since 1961.

2015 Lie of the Year: the campaign misstatements of Donald Trump

By Angie Drobnic Holan, Linda Qiu

Politifact 

It’s the trope on Trump: He’s authentic, a straight-talker, less scripted than traditional politicians. That’s because Donald Trump doesn’t let facts slow him down. Bending the truth or being unhampered by accuracy is a strategy he has followed for years.

"People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those who do. That's why a little hyperbole never hurts," Trump wrote in his 1987 best-seller The Art of the Deal. "People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular. I call it truthful hyperbole. It's an innocent form of exaggeration — and a very effective form of promotion."

DESE Slide Presentation On Southbridge District Review

Here's What Has Happened To Income Distribution

How the distribution of income in America has changed over four decades pic.twitter.com/QAUFCmzTrs

— Conrad Hackett (@conradhackett) December 14, 2015

Happy PC Halloween

Southbridge MCAS Results 2015

The results from Spring 2014 are provided below for comparison.

Southbridge Town Council Meeting - August 24, 2015

Southbridge Election Results

ELECTION RESULTS

Town Council

Shaun Moriarty

Denise Clemence

Kristen Auclair

School Committee

William Bishop

Scott Lazo

Moriarty, Clemence, Auclair get council posts (Worcester Telegram)

School Committee Fails To Approve Superintendent’s Contract

Ken O’Brien

Last night the existing School Committee met, presumably for the last time, prior to next Tuesday’s town election.

Following a predictably tearful farewell from the current Chair following a period of turmoil and failure unseen in recent memory, the Committee went into Executive Session.

According to the agenda for the meeting the Committee was to reconvene to vote on four items.

One More Time...

Southbridge School Committee Candidates' Debate

Southbridge Unemployment Rate Ranks 15th Out Of 351

Ken O’Brien

Of the 351 cities and towns reporting, Southbridge, with an unemployment rate of 6.5%, was tied with Hinsdale for the 15^th highest unemployment rate in Massachusetts for the month of April. Of course Southbridge has a labor force almost eight times the size of Hinsdale's.

Eight other communities with higher rates were either resort communities on Cape Cod or of inconsequential size. Five are dramatically larger than Southbridge. Only North Adams, with a rate of  6.6%, is comparable to our town.

If there was any good news to be found in this fact it was that from March of 2015 the rate of unemployment in Southbridge declined by 1.3 percentage points. However, this was accompained by a 1.4% decline in the available labor force. On balance, Southbridge remained firmly ensconced in the top 5 percent of pockets of unemployment in the state.

James Sottile Candidate For Town Council

When I moved my family from New York to Southbridge approximately 34 years ago I found a viable small town that had been recently awarded the title of an "all American-city". It had a vibrant economy which was starting to be plagued by a double digit inflationary national banking interest rate. On the other hand it still had a high community participation ratio by all groups religious, political, including the business community.it was a confident community that apparently worked as a team.

State Tax Collections Ahead Of Benchmark

State House News Service

The latest tax-collection data appears to underscore the belief that this year's state budget problems were not due to revenue problems.

With one month left in fiscal 2015, tax collections are running $389 million above the benchmark used for budgeting purposes, thanks to $1.84 billion in May receipts that followed the state's first-ever $3 billion month in April. 

Candidates For Southbridge Town Election

Ken O’Brien

The slate for the Southbridge Town Election is pretty well set. A couple of candidates had not returned their papers as of 2:30 this afternoon.

 However, the big news is confirmation that Lauren McLoughlin and Kara Donovan never even took out papers to run for re-election to the School Committee.

The candidates for office are as follows:

Southbridge Town Council of the Whole Meeting - April 7, 2015

About Those Property Tax Bills II…

Ken O’Brien

Regarding my most recent post on property tax bills, someone noted that there had been a shift in the allocation of taxes based on changes in property valuations. They even provided me with a time reference from the video of the December 8^th Town Council meeting where this was explained.

However, they should have listened to, and evaluated, the immediately following portion of the chief assessor’s presentation. In this he compared Southbridge’s standing relative to the rest of Massachusetts in terms of their average tax bills.

For those of you who don’t recall this, let’s take a look at the video.

Happy New Year 2015