Recent efforts by the citizens of Mount Pleasant to get a hold of runaway tax increases and a rampantly inefficient government bureaucracy are bearing fruit, as exemplified by the imminent implementation of the Unit Road System.
The new County Road Engineer takes office in April, and while we don’t expect he can work miracles, it would be hard to not to see some improvements and savings.
Mount Pleasant is like many small towns – there are in the “ins” and the “outs”. There are people who live off government jobs and contracts, and those who are told to pay up and shut up by the "establishment".
What is bad about Mount Pleasant is that the “ins” are especially hard-headed and hard-hearted about letting new people step into the “inner circle.” In most small towns, over time new blood slowly seeps in and helps prop up and stabilize the establishment.
In Mount Pleasant, there’s been the same cast of characters for over 20 years. The old saying applies to these usual suspects – “Few die and none resign.”
This is probably because of the demographic change in the community. The city now has a Hispanic majority, and the school district is overwhelmingly Hispanic. But there’s not a single Hispanic school board or city council member.
The Old Boy white establishment doesn’t know any new people, and really doesn’t care. They have the jobs and the power.
Unfortunately, when change does come – as it inevitably does – there will probably be a big disruption and a massive turnover. But to be blunt, the Old Boys (and Gals) are too ignorant and hateful to see what will happen to them. They’ll just take their ill-gotten gains, move out to the country, and leave the city in ruins.
Although there are small ongoing efforts to enact reform in the city and county – which whether the BIMPS realize it or not is for their own good – the school district, the largest pot of bucks and patronage in Titus County - remains impervious to reform.
When you have a school district that is two-thirds Hispanic, and there are no Hispanic school board members, it’s obvious something is up.
The Mount Pleasant ISD is in reality not an educational institution, it’s a full-employment racket for people who want a government job with no real demands or accountability.
In light of the patronage and nepotism that drives the school district, the wonder is not that student educational achievement is so poor, it’s that the students learn anything at all.
Taking young people, full of ambition and curiosity, and sticking them in a school system staffed by people who got their jobs through connections and kickbacks and who have no real incentive to care or work, verges on child abuse.
You won’t see any criticism of the school district from the shabby remains of The Mount Pleasant Tribune – the publisher’s wife works for the district. The district ploughs thousands of dollars into building a public relations Potemkin Village*. It’s like the propaganda ministry of the old Soviet Union – the Tribune plays the part of Pravda.
Nobody in Mount Pleasant can challenge the MPISD’s bureaucracy. You’ll end up like a Soviet dissident in the hands of the KGB.
Still, we can call them out and let them know to their faces what every one says behind their backs: You are destroying Mount Pleasant’s economy, tax base, and future, because of your bigotry, greed and snobbery.
* A pretentiously showy or imposing façade intended to mask or divert attention from an embarrassing or shabby fact or condition. (www.dictionary.com)
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