News Day – February 4: Q Comp, Walk on the wild side, Coleman-Franken recount, MN Job Watch and more

Q Comp: A little comp, not so much Q The Governor’s educational flagship, Quality Compensation, came under scrutiny by the non-partisan legislative auditor’s office, which reported that, after three years, there’s really no measurement of whether the program has improved student achievement. Some 72 public and charter school districts participate in the program, which rewards teachers based on “performance” rather than on education and experience, and encourages teacher mentoring programs. The Guv wants to increase funding for the program by $41 million this year, but legislators are not so enthusiastic, Tom Weber reports on MPR The MN DOE spent $181,000 on its own independent study of Q Comp, released a day ahead of the legislative auditor’s study.

Emily Johns and Bob Von Sternberg wrote in the Strib that the Guv’s plans to mandate Q Comp statewide would not be fully funded by the $41 million increase he proposes. Participants give the program mixed reviews, according to MN 2020 education writer John Fitzgerald: “Over 80 percent of administrators in Q Comp settings agreed or strongly agreed that Q Comp had improved classroom teaching and will lead to increases in students’ performance on standardized tests at their school. Less than half of teachers in Q Comp settings who responded to our [legislative auditor] questionnaire felt similarly.”

Hey, be careful out there! According to the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, seven motorists were killed on MN roads in January, and six of them were not wearing seatbelts. That’s even higher than the norm, according to the AP report in the PiPress, which is about 55% of all annual traffic deaths in MN.

And this differs from blogging … how? The PiPress reports on-line:

A fire overnight has destroyed a house in St. Paul, a local television station is reporting.

Just below 11 p.m., firefighters were called to a home on the 800 block of Marion Street, WCCO-TV said. No one was home at the time and the house may have been vacant, the station said.

Walk on the wild side Coyotes are invading the Twin Cities, writes John Brewer in the PiPress. The “small, skulking cousin of the wolf” has been spotted near the Roseville library, fighting with a dog in Reservoir Woods, and standing on the frozen ice of Lake Calhoun a few years ago. (And, I might add, in alleys near the Town and Country golf course in St. Paul.) The PiPress says that the February-March coyote mating season will probably lead to more encounters. That doesn’t mean the Twin Cities are rural — Chicago boasts lots of coyotes and the Urban Coyote website with info on the wily critters and how to tell a coyote from a German Shepherd.

And one more wild animal story: the criminal charges against the man in Willmar who sprayed teens with fox urine to keep his yard from being toilet-papered.

The never-ending Coleman-Franken recount Punxsutawney Phil predicted six more weeks of winter, but no one is predicting when the end to the endless recount will arrive. Yesterday, the judges said they would look at no more than 4,800 of the 11,000 rejected absentee ballots that Coleman wants reviewed. According to Rachel Stassen-Berger in the PiPress , the court also said the law on absentee ballots is “clear, objective and unambiguous.” That probably means Coleman voters like Janet Czeck of Brooklyn Park, who testified that she just forgot to sign the ballot envelope, will not get their ballots counted. Coleman and Franken legal teams also agreed to withdraw any challenges to the 933 previously-rejected absentee ballots that were accepted and included in the recount. MinnPost sums it up nicely:

If you, Mr. or Ms. Voter, are among the 4,797, and you cast your vote by absentee ballot but you royally screwed up — like, say, didn’t sign it, or you voted in person, too, or you weren’t registered — your vote still won’t count.

No ifs, ands or buts, the court order seems to say.

But if an election judge happened to discard your vote by mistake or the lady at the counter who took your absentee ballot forgot to tell you to sign in … your vote just might count, the same court order seems to say.

Indeed, no more “The dog ate my ballot” stories from Coleman or Franken voters.

The votes in this new universe will only be counted if they were previously rejected through no fault of the voter.

Housing’s mixed bag Tim Nelson at MPR warns that as bad as the housing crisis looks now, it may be about to get worse again, as “high-risk loans … with obscure names like Cash-Flow ARMs, Pay Option ARMs, and Pick a Payment Loans” come due. Many of these loans, in what is called the “Alt-A” category, were made to more credit-worthy customers who were entrepreneurs or self-employed.

In Minnesota, for instance, there are only about half as many adjustable rate Alt-A loans as there are similar subprime loans.

But Minnesota’s Alt-A loans are about a third larger on average, and nearly twice as many are the most volatile interest-only loans. Many more are also secondary loans. That’s according to end-of-year data for 2008 from the New York Federal Reserve Bank.

And while Alt-A loans are generally better quality, and the borrowers better off financially than with subprime mortgages, no one knows how they’ll fare as unemployment grows and real estate values continue to plummet.

On the other hand, Jim Buchta writes in the Strib that “pending sales in the 13-county metro area during January rose a robust 17.7 percent, marking the seventh consecutive year-over-year monthly increase, according to an analysis of data from the Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors.” That’s about the only bright spot, as home sales prices continue to fall and getting a mortgage remains difficult for many buyers. And the pending sales included many distress sales, which were 32 percent of all active listings in the metro area in January.

Aiding and abetting in North Minneapolis The latest chapter in the Jordan Area Community Council contest, reports Sheila Regan in the TC Daily Planet, came in court yesterday as the “old” board officers sued to stop just about everybody they could think of from recognizing, aiding or abetting the newly-elected officers. Attorney Jim Moore represents some of the defendants, including the city of Minneapolis, Don Samuels, Barbara Johnson, and Mike Martin. As far as the city council members, he asked: “What is it that my clients are supposed to be restrained from, not taking sides, or voicing opinions about neighborhood issues?” The judge deferred a ruling, guaranteeing another day in court.

Borrowing new money to pay interest on old debts: A T-Paw idea Patricia Lopez reported in the Strib that the legislature is cool to the Guv’s proposal to borrow $973 million this year and repay it at a cost of as much as $1.6 billion over the next 20 years, all in order to pay the interest on current state debts, a plan the Strib likens to refinancing credit card debt by taking out a mortgage on your house. Rep. Tom Rukavina (DFL-Virginia) has another name for it: “really a stupid idea.”

MN Job Watch Looked at the City of St. Paul website yesterday, and saw a big “no jobs available” message. But, on a more positive note, the PiPress reports that Vascular Solutions, a TC med-tech firm, plans to hire about 25 people across the state as it increases production. Bad news: AP reports that Phoenix Industries in Crookston, which employed about 100 people a few months ago, then cut to 20 employees, will not close its doors.

On the national/international scene, the jobs hemorrhage continues, with mass layoff notices from PNC Financial, Liz Claiborne, Beechcraft (airplanes), King Pharmaceuticals, amd Rockwell Collins (military). GM is offering buyouts to all hourly workers. UPS is freezing pay and stopping matching contributions to employee 401(k) plans.

New federal unemployment figures for January will be released this week.