In his latest column, this one defending Edison from its many recent critics Loren Martell makes this observation: “If you hang around the school district for a while, you quickly learn Duluth is run by a tightly-knit little power clique.”
I am a little sensitive to this myself. One fellow came to a school board meeting during the talk about selling Central High and pointedly said he’d heard some Board members actually had family working at Edison. Then he went on to suggest that such Board members recuse themselves from voting on the sale. Of course, he meant me and, of course, since I have no financial interest in Edison I had no obligation to follow his request.
As Loren notes there are almost as many similar ties on the other side of the Board opposing the sale. Loren mentions that the PTSA chair spoke vehemently against the sale. He failed to note that this PTSA Chair has also been a chair of the Duluth League of Women’s Voters which includes school board member (and ex PTSA chair) Rosie Loeffler-Kemp who has diligently networked throughout the tightly knit little power cliques like the DFL the DFT and AFSCME.
