For Debate: Who Picks School Board

[Sent to: Winnie Hu]

Terrific job with your article "For Debate: Who Picks School Board".

A suggestion for a follow-up piece would be not only who Picks the School Board, but also to examine how do candidates get on the ballot. For example in Connecticut, School Board candidates come through the local political ranks yet we always hear, "politics don't belong on the Board of Education".

Then there is another issue of strategically running just enough candidates and thereby severely limiting voter choice. In my town for example there are six BOE candidates and five seats to be filled; that is an 83% chance of winning a BOE seat based on shear numbers and no other factor --- is that an election? Voters are not even provided the opportunity to vote a poor performing member off the board under this archaic method. FYI, running just enough candidates is a very well thought out strategy by the local political parties to avoid cannibalizing votes with more candidates to ultimately win Board control which is the end game; but remember, politics don't belong a the BOE.

There will be a legislative bill re-introduced for a second time in February allowing Connecticut towns to have non-partison BOE elections, if they so choose. FYI, approximately 90% of all BOE's nationally are non-partisan and all candidates run as petition candidates.

For more information, please visit http://sites.google.com/site/ctnonpartisanboardsofecuation/

Thank you,

Doug Newman
Guiflord, CT
Cell: (203) 516-1006
Email: dougnewman676@gmail.com

Posted by Doug Newman at November 2, 2009 3:23 PM
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