That BUZZ.Duluth blog post reminded me of an important mini story on the incumbent Board members asking, what if they lose the election?
The four incumbents could be thrashed on Nov. 3rd demonstrating once and for all that their claim of speaking for Duluth’s voters has been little more than wishful thinking for the past two years. This illusion gave them the courage to steamroll an unpopular plan. Still, until the first meeting in January they will call the shots and could vote to continue letting more construction contracts.
$30 million worth of contracts could be authorized on the controversial Ordean site alone before a new school board is seated. This is why the City Council’s decision to hold off on granting more variances for Ordean is important. It might be the pressure needed to discourage a lame duck school board from acting.
Even that pressure might prove inadequate. Three of the four incumbents facing defeat sounded defiant when asked whether they would hold off on more Red Plan spending if they lost.
The Trib wrote of Mary Cameron:
“Cameron said she won’t be swayed to stop voting for the red plan’s implementation if she thinks that’s the best course of action at the time.”
As for Ann Wasson:
Wasson said she would continue voting the long-range facilities plan forward.
“I am a board member until my term expires” Wasson said. “I strongly believe in the long-range plan, and so I would continue to move ahead.”
Nancy Nilsen said she too would continue but then suggested no new projects would be added before January. Of course, Ordean is no longer a new project:
“Nilsen said she would continue to vote through work related to projects under way.
‘Any of the projects that we have started I think need to be completed, just even from a taxpayers perspective,’ Nilsen said. ‘I just can’t see leaving those buildings incomplete; that would seem very detrimental to our community.’
She said she doesn’t think the School Board would be voting on any new projects before January.”
Only Laura Condon indicated that she might hold off which still gives the Dixonites control. Its a case where the current Board would defer to the ambitions of a discredited superintendent soon to leave the City over the votes of 90,000 citizens doomed to live through the wreckage of his dreams and the privilege of paying for it over the next twenty years.
