Scarp: Selling school overrides is like peddling soap

So long as it is expressed in general terms, most people will say they believe in something. But when they’re asked to engage in such conduct personally, well, then, that’s different.

Read Mark Scarp's blog, Scarpsdale

Examples are easy to find. Monday’s Tribune published a McClatchy Newspapers story reporting a poll revealing 90 percent of American adults think sending text messages while driving should be outlawed — yet 57 percent confessed to doing just that.

Likewise, most people would say that it’s not right that teachers often must reach into their own pockets to pay for school supplies, or that youngsters must use ancient lab equipment or must sit at desks held together with duct tape.

A survey commissioned by Yes to Children, which favors passage of two Scottsdale Unified School District budget overrides Nov. 6, found seven in 10 local voters in favor.

But then put folks into voting booths to decide on spending real money. Many of them turn into the guy who runs the orphanage in that musical version of Charles Dickens’ story of Oliver Twist, who turns down young Oliver’s plea for more gruel: “You want more?”

On November’s ballot will be two questions about spending for Scottsdale Unified School District schools. Early ballots go out late next week.

Officially, what’s at issue is 179 teaching positions, furniture, new computer technology linked to the kind of learning today’s students absolutely will need to compete for jobs, updated and safer playground equipment and replacements for worn-out musical instruments, uniforms and gear to outfit fine arts and athletics students.

Voters approved bonds in 2004 to rebuild four of the district’s five high schools, but it was announced then that the bonds wouldn’t cover what goes inside those new buildings.

On Tuesday, Yes to Children representatives came to talk to the Tribune Editorial Board about the election and how they hope to overcome the defeat of a similar override in 2006.

They agreed that, unfair as it is, these elections are not over the actual list of items to be paid for but are plebiscites on whether local schools are doing a proper job turning out graduates with the money they’ve already been given.

The group’s co-chairman, Brad Casper, chief executive officer of Scottsdale-based Dial Corp., said the solution to convincing voters to approve the overrides could be found in the marketing strategy he employs to sell soap and deodorant.

They can talk up positive aspects of how schools will benefit, he said, but it’s more effective to make a pitch based on the negative consequences if they aren’t passed.

“In my experience, he said, “selling (based on) B.O. and bad breath is easier than selling, ‘Don’t you want to be a rock star?’”

Finally, I told him, I learned the meaning behind his company’s decades-old slogan, “Don’t you wish everybody did?”