Slashdot Mirror
Pressure Is On IBM To Forgive Millions In IT Debt
coondoggie writes to tell us that several California state legislators are pressuring IBM to release the Costa school district from some $5 million of long-standing debt as a charitable donation. "The back story on this tale is that the school district owes IBM for computers ordered in the late 1980s and early 1990s. For one reason or another the computers were never used and no one now seems to be able to locate either the paperwork or the hardware. The school district experienced hard financial times and ultimately never paid Big Blue for the computers. In 1993 the district and IBM negotiated a long-term settlement that said the school district would pay the first of four $1.25 million installments beginning in 2008. Payments were deferred until then because 2008 was the year the district was scheduled to finish making state loan repayments under its previous loan plan, according to the Contra Costa story."
They give the school 15 years and now the school wants it just forgiven? I wish I could wait 15 years on my loans.
coondoggie writes: to tell us that several California state legislators are pressuring IBM to release the Costa school district from some $5 million of long-standing debt as a charitable donation.
Do you mean Contra Costa?
How do you lose that much computer equipment? It must have walked off.
signed,
Epstein's Mom
Best Windows Freeware
No multi-billion dollar corporation left behind.
And obsoleted computers does not mean they should be let off their debt. I reckon I may leave everything I owe for 27 years or so then claim that.
Seriously instead of saying "let us off" they should be saying "here's your money, _please_ don't charge us interest or take us to court".
They agree to defer payments for 15 YEARS, and now that they're finally at the time they might have to actually start paying something they want to just pressure them to make it go away entirely? Yow.
Oh, so that makes it OK to rip IBM off.
Well, "honorable" lawmakers, how many of your teacher's pensions are in IBM stock?
Or what about your investments?
Or some of your other constituents - many who are retired and are relying on IBM making an actual profit in order to make money on their retirement investments.
Not all stock investors are rich, fat, white, dudes who nobody has pity for.
Mental note: Do not give credit to the CA schools - cash only.
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
So, yeah, about the 5 million... well, we were kinda expecting you to forget about it ya know? Thats what friends are for, right?
On a serious note, I am surprised at no mention of paying a smaller amount or anything.. No they expect IBM to just forget about the whole thing.
...this invalidates the forgiveness part of their plea: Unaccountability encourages corruption.
"What you subsidize, you get more of".
Have the school district *try* a little harder to find out where it all went.... a good first step.
If the taxpayers het mad enough at the failure to do this, *then* you'll get some accountability, although late.
BWilde
Wow, this is amazing. They ordered computers, which were never used... shouldn't that be an outcry? That school-district must have had a terrible administration at that point. I really don't see how the argument that they never used the equipment has anything to do with why or why not they should pay the bill. Afterall, IBM delivered, so why should they not get paid?
If it wasn't for the fact that the administrators that created this mess are probably all not working there anymore, I'd say they should pay the full amount, with interest, as punishment for wasting the taxpayers dollars!
Neither the paperwork or hardware could be located? Does this mean there is no proof of delivery?
Don't waste time... procrastinate now!
So the school district is corrupt, and the computers got jacked, and now we want corporate America to take it as a tax write-off. I'd like to see it referred to a criminal court so the guilty actually pay the price.
technical writing / development
Besides...lets say they were using the computers. How does the fact that they're missing affect whether they can pay for them? Surely the district didn't place a $5 million order with no means to pay for it?
to a collection agency. Let the agency buy the loan at a discount and then harrangue state officials until they ante up. It would be good for the officials to experience the same kind of pressure and hectoring that they allow consumers to endure...
The contest for ages has been to rescue liberty from the grasp of executive power. -- Daniel Webster
Just like the first world should cut off aid to Africa to ultimately strengthen it, corporations should cut off aid to school districts and other governmental dead beats who think technology will solve education problems.
And the school still wants a free pass.
What sort of example are they trying to set?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
The school ordered and received the equipment. If they used them or not is irrelevant, and that they can't find the stuff or any records only speaks to their incompetence. They need to pay their bill.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
I love that part. I wish I could just order $5M worth of computer equipment using the taxpayer's wallet and then blame IBM for being hardhearted and cruel for not forgiving the debt. Why is the media not reporting on the waste and/or fraud involved in the original contract? Obviously, computers that were never used were not "needed", since the school district is still there and is apparently serving students. Who signed the original deal and what did he/she get out of it?
Intron: the portion of DNA which expresses nothing useful.
"Unlike corporations such as IBM - with revenues of $22 billion in the first quarter of 2007 alone - our schools do not have the ability to generate new dollars to fund projects or pay for employees," the lawmakers wrote. "Our schools rely solely on limited state and federal assistance to educate our students and every dollar is precious."
If every dollar is precious, they should've thought twice before spending $5 million in hardware that was never even used!
This district's atrocious conduct is precisely the reason why IBM should not forgive the debt.
Their concept of money has never really reflected the real world. Mix that up with "THINK OF THE CHILDREN" and the school district's own inability to deal with money, and you can see where this came from, at least.
IBM has been more than fair. They are owed their money. Mistakes are made, but unless the consquences are paid they will happen again.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Meanwhile, the State of California has insisted on, and gotten, much stricter terms (including interest.)
Now, the State is suggesting that IBM should forgive their loan altogether?
Maybe, if forgiving those loans is so good an idea, the State of California should go first?
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
there is no reason that a resident of another state, or even another city (taxpayers, all), should bear the burden for a bad local decision.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Big Blue can afford it. Nobody seems to dispute this.
The school will have difficulty paying the money back. The owed money may end up being written off anyway.
Nobody is forcing anyone to do anything. There's a lot of pressure being applied but it's up to IBM, and IBM can benefit from this. They'll get some of the money back as a tax break, more as good PR, and this will mean more money for the school to spend education, which will benefit IBM in the long run. That, and the person who makes the decision will have a feeling of being a nice person.
Ultimately it will be better for everyone if IBM forgives the debt.
as mentioned in the comment section of the network world article:
"of course, it's worth pointing out that Contra Costa County is the predominant county and tax base for the East Bay -- a sprawling set of towns/cities full of people that work in downtown San Francisco, Oakland, and Silicon Valley. It's the same county where median home prices for most of the towns are well north of $500,000.
To quote the Contra Costa website: "Due to the presence of relatively high-wage skilled jobs and relatively wealthy residents, the County achieves high rankings among all California counties on a variety of income measurements."
This isn't the story of an impoverish[ed] county begging for debt relief from an evil corporation. Move along."
Research suggests the county population is quite well off as compared to other counties. http://www.city-data.com/county/Contra_Costa_Count y-CA.html
i a.html
At what point does this cross over from "poor school district" to clever constituents trying to get out of a deal?
I doubt this would happen in, say, compton CA.http://www.city-data.com/city/Compton-Californ
Got Trader Joe's? friendwich.com RSS feeds work now!
if IBM were smart, they would try to cut a deal with the CA state to buy more goods from them in exchange for forgiveness.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
The basic problem is, in 1992, they got a superintendant who was going to revolutionize everything. New schools, new ways of doing things, the works.
He turned out to be a corrupt bastard, but he disappeared without ever having to pay or atone for anything, and the people who use the schools have been paying for it ever since.
The school district is broke as hell, and quite honestly, will probably go bankrupt before they pay IBM (if by 'pay' you mean 'pay in the next 50 years').
All the other comments here seem to be going 'lol pay up already', but it's not that simple. IBM should forgive the debt, and everyone should learn a lesson from this:
Don't let public institutions pay with credit. The people who make decisions are not held responsible, and thus do not make responsible decisions. They will rip you off, and rip off the people they are supposed to be representing.
Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM, losing the documents and misplacing the hardware. Until now. This summer, one man wages a solo war against confused and incompetent administration in schools. You'll laugh, you'll cry. You'll mostly cry.
'Thats they exact same thing a banana wrench monkey.'
Lessee, the school district has such lousy financial controls that they can't account for the systems, and they can't pay for them. Typically, the socialist argument is to not hold them accountable. I say bankrupt the district and put some people in who won't let $5M get STOLEN.
Not entirely true. This *is* the story of an impoverished school district begging for debt relief from a corporation. (I won't comment if their request is justified or not).
Contra Costa County is broken up into Multiple School Districts. This story is about the West Contra Costa School District, which serves communities such as Richmond & San Pablo. I don't know specifics off the top of my head, but it is one of the poorest school districts in California.
Contra Costa County is a tale of two counties. Eastern Contra Costa County is as you described, with many wealthy suburbs, wealthy inhabitants and well-funded schools. This is the image that Contra Costa County would like to promote on it's website.
Western Contra Costa County is much poorer, with poorly funded schools & high crime rates. Richmond has a disturbing level of corruption in the government. Compare these two cities:
* RichmondWalnut CreekAbout 1.7% of families and 3.7% of the population were below the poverty line
I travel in both areas of Contra Costa Country regularly, and I'm always amazed at the difference. Walnut Creek has beautiful, clean schools located close to grass-covered golden hills. Many Richmond schools have a ton of graffiti, broken windows, boarded-up buildings, etc. Several times a year, schools in the parts of the Western Contra Costa County School district go into 'lockdown' mode due to leaks at the nearby chemical plants or oil refineries. Drive by shootings happen near the schools. In Richmond, you can hear gunshots just about every night.
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
The school owes IBM money and California farmers are paying higher prices for farm labor because of the border crack down. I say have the school send all the kids out to harvest lettuce and have their wages go to pay back IBM. They even have school buses to drive them out to the fields. Might have to chain them together so they don't wander off and get lost and we could make their parents buy them little orange jumpsuits so we could spot them if they tried running off.
The farmers get cheap labor, IBM gets its money and the kids all learn to swing a lettuce knife with deadly accuracy before they get to high school. Okay, a few of them will lose fingers, maybe hack a little arm off. Bo-ho liberal whiners. Here's a bandaid. It's a win-win-win for everyone.
If it works out we could start renting them out to companies doing asbestos remediation, hauling trash, put them to work in shoe factories and get those back in the US again! Then we could take all that money they're making and role back the property taxes for all us old people.
This is brilliant! Brilliant I tell ya!
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
The proof is in the government agreeing to an extended repayment plan. Admission that the debt is valid and owed. If there was any question as to the validity of the debt, it should have been raised 15 years ago.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
The upshot is that the shipper has the right to unload the goods on your sidewalk and walk away if you are being difficult. Obviously, they'd do all sorts of CYA stuff to document their actions - and this sort of ultimate action is never good for business. But in the end, the innocent third party has the right to walk away without burden (providing the shipping order doesn't place restrictions on the delivery. "Must be kept frozen" overrides "I waited five whole minutes for them to empty the freezer and then dropped the goods on the burning sidewalk."
It may be that you legally have the right to return the goods. But, you need to be careful about who has possession the goods, and have proof of transfer of possession.
"The most sensible request of government we make is not, "Do something!" But "Quit it!"
... that $3 million of the $5 million that the school district absconded with is being taken from the pockets of retired or soon-to-be-retired working Americans. (Sorry, old rhetorical trick I picked up in college to deflate the balloons of folks who liked to make every issue into The Class Struggle. Most billion dollar companies, once you trace through the intermediaries like pensions and mutual funds, as a series of thousand dollar chunks. Many of the owners or beneficiaries of these chunks would not strike you as being very wealthy, or even as being investors, if you were to bump into them in the checkout at the supermarket.)
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
IBM has already done the school district a favor by not selling their debt to a vulture credit company that would be way more heinous in how it dealt with the district. Normally when loans like this start taking longer than usual to get their money, companies like IBM write off the debt and sell it to vulture funds for pennies on the dollar, and then these vulture funds turn around and gauge the debtors for as much as they can get.
So the fact that IBM did NOT do this means they have a heart. Don't be stupid and keep on asking for more. IBM is a business, and if they let this customer go, they would simply have more problems in the future.
IBM would have no need to prove they delivered anything. They already have a settlement/agreement to make repayment. As such the school district has already admitted that they owe IBM $5 million. It's too late to start arguing that they never received the goods.