I’ve missed two great days to garden working on my election and School Board business. There have been lots of email and letters-to-the-editor to consider. Oh, there have been the regular reminders of the new Trump Dystopia we have brought down on ourselves. – Ivanka’s Chinese shoe manufacture having investigators imprisoned for recording the maltreatment of workers who were helping Ivanka’s bottom line. – President Trump catering to the Koch Brother’s desire to pollute without restriction by canceling an international climate control agreement. He says he did it for Pittsburgh not Paris. Pittsburgh’s City Council has rejected the help.
More importantly I sat in on a second round of teacher contract negotiations…………..Argggggerrrrregggggg*******!
Pardon my strangled words. At a closed meeting Tuesday I was sternly instructed by Rosie Loeffler-Kemp not to mention that they were happening on the blog. She has a firm grip on my throat. I was glad that Chair David Kirby joined me at the negotiations. Nothing explosive seemed to have happened as a result of our presence.
I’ve got another busy day planned that will put the gardening off – Drat! And tomorrow I will attend the Duluth DFL endorsing convention seeking Democratic support for my reelection campaign.
This is the letter I sent to about 800 eligible delegates two days ago. I’m guessing only one in ten will actually show up although Trump is probably keeping most of them every bit as on edge as he’s keeping me. Maybe a lot more will show up to convince themselves that can really turn the world back right-side-up:
Dear DFL delegate,
In 1976, 41 years ago, I called up Rep. Mike Jaros to tell him I would be running against him as a Republican and asked him to meet me for a cup of coffee. It was, like the last line in Casablanca: “…the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” That didn’t stop from me from running against him again two years later and getting a second drubbing. I am delighted that Mike, who Republicans called a “socialist” long before Bernie Sander’s, has agreed to Chair my campaign for reelection to the Duluth School Board.
Our community’s obligation to our children is under threat. Every year $3.4 million dollars that should be used in our children’s classrooms is being used instead to pay off the Red Plan’s debt. Add to that several millions more that the public could approve for the classroom if only they could once again trust the Board. $5 million dollars would allow us to hire another 50 teachers lost to the Red Plan.
Here are a few reasons, among many, why our schools, city and party would benefit by keeping me on the Duluth School Board:
1. My best days in politics began nine years ago when I attended a DFL caucus to support Barack Obama right through the day of his election.
2. My worst days in politics began with the candidacy of Donald Trump who I recognized immediately as a demagogue and a ferociously ignorant one at that.
3. I am the longest serving Duluth School Board member and I believe I have faithfully reflected our community’s wishes for over twenty years.
4. Since 1999 I have tirelessly explained the Duluth Schools to the public online, first at my website www.snowbizz.com, and for the past eleven years on my blog at: www.lincolndemocrat.com
I do not think that even my fiercest critics would tell you that I have ever been anything less than scrupulously honest. What’s more, I think that I am widely recognized as having the courage of my convictions.
I look forward to seeing you at the Duluth DFL convention at 9AM on Saturday at our beautiful new Lincoln Middle School.
Respectfully yours,
Harry Welty
At-large incumbent, and candidate, for the Duluth School Board
