Looking for a leader: Caddo Parish School Board wants to outsource the search for its next superintendent by hiring a head-hunting firm. The decision to use a consultant will be officially put to vote on Feb. 19. However, the board is waiting until proposals are received from firms before determining how much will be spent on the search. In January, the board voted 8-4 not to offer Superintendent Gerald Dawkins a contract renewal after five years with the district. Superintendent search firms are common for districts nationwide and even in Louisiana. Last year, East Baton Rouge Parish’s school board hired Illinois-based PROACT, which led to the hiring of Superintendent Bernard Taylor.
Prognostication: Jacob Lew, President Barack Obama’s nominee for Treasury secretary, is urging Congress to avoid steep automatic spending cuts that are set to take effect on March 1, saying they threaten the broader economy. The $85 billion in cuts would impose “self-inflicted wounds to the recovery and put far too many jobs and businesses at risk,” Lew says in prepared remarks to the Senate Finance Committee. The committee is considering Lew’s nomination to succeed Timothy Geithner, who stepped down last month as the Treasury Department’s leader. The full story is here.
Sweetheart deal? Analysts believe General Electric Co. gave Comcast Corp. a great deal on the half of NBCUniversal that the cable company doesn’t already own. Analyst Matthew Harrigan at Wunderlich Securities says GE “mispriced” the $16.7 billion deal announced late Tuesday. Doug Mitchelson at Deutsche Bank says he had expected that GE would have held out for a better price. He even asked Comcast executives on a conference call this morning if they sweetened the deal somehow. Get more reaction to the deal in the full story here.
