Michael Phelps with President George Bush?

While at the beach this past week, I had alot of time in the evenings to watch the Olympics and I had lots of observations.

Primarily the main observation was that Michael Phelps just dominates his line of work. I won’t bother to try to put it all into words but the understatement of the century would be “The guy is good.” Toss in the fact that we had a 40+ year old woman come within .01 seconds from a Gold Medal. Add in our current “Redeem Team” rolling through the “competition” and you have pretty much USA domination at this year’s Olympics.

It may be a stretch because my vision isn’t 20/20, but every evening watching swimming, I told my wife that I thought Michael Phelps looked alot like Wes Donehue (who by the way is the guy pictured above with his wife, Elizabeth, and POTUS….not Michael Phelps.)

For full disclosure, Wes handles my website; nonetheless, “the guy is good”.

Many of you probably never visited the old “NathanBallentine.com” site that was up since December 2003 until after I crossed paths with Wes and he convinced this tightwad to pay for a “21st century site” and start blogging.

Then I ran into his wife, Elizabeth, who took me into the 21st century of fundraising and helped me raising twice as much money as I did before working with her.

I wasn’t Wes’ first website but I was on board before several other higher-profiles joined and I appreciate what he, Lauren (outstanding videos), and Tim do to help me stay in touch and keep my constituents informed.

If you’re running the sites for US Senator Jim Demint , US Congressman Greshman Barrett , US Congressman Joe Wilson , the SC Senate Caucus, Senator Hugh McConnell, and several others…well, I’d say that’s pretty dominating.

Now before other consultants and folks start anonymously ripping me for tonight’s blog, I admit there are a couple other consultants out there that I not only use, but also have their own area of domination. When I find an athlete that I think looks like you, I’ll write about you as well, fair enough?

Alright, what sport’s on tonight? Trampolining? No, that was last night….

Ok…..it’s been almost a week (since I blogged) and I couldn’t hold out anymore!

I’m on vacation but I went to the computer desk at the Business Center and was catching up on some reading and discovered we have a very full slate of candidates for the November School Board Elections.

This information was taken from The State’s website so if you see any errors or ommissions, please let me know.

I’m considering giving each candidate an opportunity to speak to NathansNews and have their information, photo, news, etc. posted here on the site for the community to see.

Richland County portion of district: One Seat

Robert Gantt (Incumbent) – Irmo
Earl Lee Brown II – Irmo
Bruce Reeves – Irmo
Win Hughey – Little Mountain
L.E. Outlaw – Chapin

Lexington County portion of district: Two seats

Beth Burn – Columbia
Mel Amundson – Columbia
Ed Smith – Chapin
Jan Hammond – Columbia
George Burbach – Chapin
Jeff Knowles – Chapin
Kevin Kibler – Chapin

I don’t know how I’ll survive not blogging for a week but I apologize in advance.

My next post won’t be until Sunday night when I return from a week with Karen, the kids, and my folks at a family member’s house at Grand Pavillion.

If you need any assistance from my State House office this week, please ask for Eileen Fogle at 803-734-9966 or contact Howard Still and Marcia Legare at 803-734-3000.

Hope you’re enjoying your summer too! The first day of school is right around the corner.

The South Carolina DOT plans to repair the bridge on Firetower Road (over Nicholes Creek).

The bridge will be closed on August 25, 2008 for approximately three weeks. Pending any delays due to weather, etc., the new bridge should be reopened to traffic by September 12, 2008.

The current plan is for the detour to use Western Lane, North Wingar Road, and Kennerly Road.

This is the second recent bridge repair/improvement in our area in recent weeks.

I look forward to each Saturday when I get to be “Daddy” with no other obligations (well, most Saturdays anyway. I do still speak/attend when asked by organizations/groups in our community).

Today “The Breakfast Bus” (the nickname we give Karen’s Car on Saturday), found an extra treat!

On top of the usual stop at either Dunkin Donuts (for “mumphskins”) or McDonalds (“pancakes and bacon”), today we found gas for $3.37/gallon.

Where? Off I-26 and Bush River (Raceway, 1204 Bush River Road)

Across the street $3.39 was posted but, by the time I was finished at Raceway, they had lowered to $3.37 also.

As always, the Kroger in Irmo is still a good spot ($3.42 this morning) and compared to others in the area, these are good buys.

Still lookin’ for the cheapest? Try here .

(While watching WIS 11pm news tonight, I learned we have a new Interim Superintendent)

From The State….

Former Kershaw County School District superintendent Herbert Berg will come out of retirement to temporarily lead Lexington-Richland 5 schools.

The District 5 school board chose Berg as its interim schools chief at a special called meeting Tuesday night.

Berg, who retired in 2007, has 34 years of experience as a superintendent. He replaces Scott Andersen, who resigned Thursday.

Board chairwoman Paula Hite said she doesn’t expect that Berg will be in the job any longer than a year.

— From Staff Reports

I’m torn tonight whether to write about this. We obviously have many folks in our community in need of prayer. Some I get a chance to write about. Obviously several others, I do not.

But I couldn’t let it go without bringing this to everyone’s attention in our community and asking for everyone’s prayers for Rod Shealy, Sr.

The news first broke this morning after Rod wrote on his weekly blog, Doing the First .

I literally had to pull over in my car.

Rod Shealy - political consultant, businessman, and always a “Hawaiian-Shirt-Wearing-Guy” – has shared that he has a cancerous brain tumor.

Simply put – keep him and his family in your prayers.

Arguably one of the most brilliant minds in SC politics , Rod learned under the tutelage of “Republican Bad Boy” Lee Atwater . Everyone in political cirlces either loves him or hates him (opponents of his candidates, obviously the latter) but tonight, everyone joins me in sending their love and prayers.

Rod’s a laid-back, fun-loving guy but I know he’ll treat this battle like he does all his campaigns – aggressively, with everything he’s got, and pulling off another upset that many thought he couldn’t.

Never – never – bet against him!

UPDATE (8/6): Tonight, one of SC’s most popular blogs has put the first of a series of video interviews with Rod) Go visit at www.schotline.com.

9:15 p.m. Just got in from National Night Out events in our community.

Special thanks to Corporal Amanda Lee with the Richland County Sheriff’s Department Community Action Team for allowing me to ride along tonight with her and her team.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t get to all the events but worse than that was that not many neighborhoods in our area participated. Next year, I want to work to have more local participation.

Before joining Amanda and others at the Riverwalk Subdivision, I was at Waterford. They had a great set-up complete with Law Enforcement, Fire Department, hot dogs, dessert, prizes for the kids, tshirts, and even Andrew Talkish (our local celebrity) who spoke to the kids about recylcing. I spoke with many folks, including Mr. and Mrs. Rembert who lead the Crime Watch efforts. I also got to speak with Chris and Susan Locker , Karen Way , and Christina Cato (Treasurer of the HOA).

Next, I met up with Amanda Lee at Riverwalk along with Joni Crosby (Riverwalk HOA) and rode the main thoroughfare with several members of RCSD as well as two law enforcment officials visiting from Germany. It was good to see many residents come outside with their children and their dogs to see what was going on. Before the parade, I got to meet with a few neighbors who were grilling out on Siklwoth Place: Mr. and Mrs. Gobel, Mr. and Mrs. Ray, Ms. Patricia Van Houten and Laura, and a few others. They braved the 100+ degree heat to participate and fellowship with neighbors – right there on the road!

From there we went back to Waterford (National Award winners for their 2007 event) and then on to The Village at Hilton. We were joined there by Sheriff Leon Lott and we had a chance to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Whitlock, Amy Taylor, Mr. Hatfield and Susan Thabian (CrimeWatch Leader).

It was good to hear that our area (“Region 4″) is one of the safest areas in the county.

Let’s keep it that way! Stay involved. Know your neighbor. Report any suspicous activity.

Tomorrow we continue our Education Funding Act Study Committee meetings (Room 521 Blatt Building, 1:30 p.m.). The committee has heard alot of testimony from several knowledgable individuals but now we need to start formulating a plan that can hopefully accomplish two simple objectives:

1. Improve how our state funds public education
2. Draft legislation that can actually pass through the House and Senate and Governor (171 people).

The State has been writing about this alot. Tonight I wanted to provide some “sunshine” on information most people may not know about. Tonight it’s Weighted Pupil Units.

The (current) weight system provides for the cost differences between educational programs for different students. The elementary (4-8) student is determined to be the most economically educated student and bears a weight of 1.00. Visually and hearing handicapped students bear a weight of 2.57. There are 15 classification of weights.

Classification Weightings

Kindergarten……………………………….1.30
Primary……………………………………..1.24
Elementary…………………………………1.00
High School………………………………..1.25
Trainable Mentally Handicapped*……….2.04
Speech Handicapped……………………..1.90
Homebound………………………………..2.10
Emotionally Handicapped………………..2.04
Educable Mentally Handicapped………..1.74
Learning Disabilities……………………..1.74
Hearing Handicapped…………………….2.57
Visually Handicapped…………………….2.57
Orthopedically Handicapped…………….2.04
Vocational………………………………….1.29
Autism………………………………………2.57

*Includes Profoundly Mentally Handicapped.Average Daily Membership (ADM) The aggregate number of days for which students are in membership divided by the number of days in the reporting period. Reporting periods are 45 days (October) and 135 days (March/April)

Ok….can’t we simplify this? Do we really need FIFTEEN different classifications? In doing research, some states have only three…..1, 1.5, and 2.0? And aren’t these numbers arbitrary really?

Apparently we acknowledge a different “cost” (weight) for each “type” of student. However, one notable exception to me is the “Poor Kid”. (Is that politically correct to say?) My question is this: Wouldn’t most of us consider it more expensive to educate someone in a “poorer district”? Most would admit that in a “perfect world” it should cost the same to educate every child but if we already have a system of weights, shouldn’t we explore this concept?

I’m not saying we need to throw more money at the problem but (here goes the politically damaging part), shouldn’t we agree there should be some weight given to “rich” and “poor” kids? This would most likely mean that folks like me (representing “rich” districts) will have to give up some of “our money” to the “poor” districts. Because if we actually address this disparity, districts with a “poor kid” classication will receive more money than those with less students in that category.

I could muster that (and hope my constituents could to) if….and that’s a BIG IF:

1. We assure the money gets to the classroom (maybe 65%?)
2. We let the districts determine how to spend that money…free them up, so to speaks so that they have local control on what works/what doesn’t, instead of all these mandates from state government.

Of course, now we are getting outside the scope of the committee (are we?) and addressing more than just the FUNDING side of things. And if we’re going to go there, do we address the “third rail of SC politics” – school choice? And by “school choice” I mean public AND private.

Back to funding: can’t we propose something like Elementary 1.00, Kindergarten, Primary and High School 1.25, “Poor Kids” 1.50, Handicapped/Disabled 2.25 for Weighted Pupil Students?

I could, if we can also address the SPENDING part of the equation too.

That’s alot of Ifs, isn’t it?