Here’s the story behind this image from the Trib’s Attic.
So far four citizens have announced their plans to be candidates for the school board this summer. At the moment each of the three seats up for grabs has someone prepared to fill it. I know none of the prospective candidates. Under normal circumstances my pragmatic opinion would be that the “devil that you know is better than the devil that you don’t.” This would imply that the three retiring school board members would be more agreeable to me than anyone taking their place. Sadly, for me, I’d take new devils. Of course, the candidates who are running my turn out to be saints. Let’s hope so. Running for our dysfunctional school board is an act of either bravery or foolhardiness on their part. I presume that all the candidates who eventually file will be open minded and bring far fewer preconceived notions about what is going on and what has been going on to the Board should they be elected.
When I bemoaned the personality problems of our Board to the Trib’s education reporter Jana simply said that every school board in the area has such bumps and grinds. Its just that Duluth’s Board is the nine hundred pound gorilla that commands such attention. In some ways the constant attention acts on school board members like all the flashing lights of photographers acted on poor old King Kong.
Through the campaign I will be doing my best, despite being kept out of the loop, to fill in the what has been part of that information stream.
I’ve said all that currently needs to be said about Annie as for as explaining how personality has driven our Board. I’m pecking away on another post on Rosie and Judy’s relationship over the time I’ve known them. I’m preparing to go into painful detail about our current chair and her role, as near as I can divine it, over the past eight years. That will take some doing. As for the other two retiring board members – I have to say I was utterly unprepared for their actions. I was optimistic about them four years ago when they first ran for the Board. You can see that in the first post where I mentioned them together in a post. I did warn, even then, that being on the Board would be “no picnic.”
Sometimes its a curse to be a prophet.
