Vote yes on superintendent question

By Steve Estes

Absentee ballots have hit the mailboxes locally, which means primary decision time in this year’s election cycle has begun.

Voters will have the opportunity to select a Republican candidate for both the District 2 and District 4 County Commission seats.

Incumbent George Neugent takes on challenger Danny Coll in District 2 while incumbent Mario Digennaro takes on challenger David Rice, former District 4 commissioner, in that venue.

The winner among the former two will face off against perennial candidate Sloan Bashinsky in November, while the winner among the latter two will face Michael Forster and Don Vasil in November.

Voters will also choose a Republican candidate for the State Representative seat currently held by Ron Saunders. The winner of the primary contest will face incumbent Saunders in November.

Primary voters will also decide on candidates for November for School Board District One and Five, Mosquito Control Districts Two and Five and will be asked to make a final decision on the county court judge seat now held by Reagan Ptomey, who is facing a challenge to hold onto that seat.

After all the candidate races have been decided upon by the voter, however, they still have one more job to do to finish the ballot.

On the back side is the local question of whether to change the elected schools superintendent process we have now with a superintendent selected by the board of education process.

This question has been asked before. Each time, it has come closer to approval by the voters.

This time, the time to rid us of the elected superintendent is at hand.

Anyone following any local news the last year has read or heard of the financial scandal that has plagued our local school district. The wife of the elected superintendent is being tried on charges of stealing more than $500,000 from the school system through various means, and the elected superintendent has been convicted of attempting to cover up those alleged thefts by using his position, and removed from office by the Governor.

Financial controls throughout the district were in shambles, and consultants were instructed to change job descriptions so that under-qualified, or unqualified personnel could fill the jobs, mostly as patronage for political supporters.

An elected superintendent is not answerable to the school board, the five-member body elected by a plurality of voters to oversee the administration. The best the board can force is a standoff in many situations.

And none of those situations make for good governance of any tax entity, let alone one supposed to safeguard our most precious resource—our children.

Voters have another chance to replace the elected superintendent with one picked by the five-member school board, one that is answerable to the school board for oversights, lack thereof, and poor performance.

More than 99 percent of the school districts in the country have an appointed superintendent. The reasons for that are many.

The primary reason, in our mind, is that persons wishing to fill the job would have to compete against other highly-qualified individuals for the job, not just win a popularity contest where nepotism and patronage can, and have in the past, played a huge part.

Superintendents selected by the elected board would have little choice but to carry out the policy wishes of the elected board.

And if the elected board fails in its mission, the voter replaces the board for a new direction, without the added problem of bringing a patronage system along for the ride that won’t change the culture of contempt for the student and the voter.

An appointed superintendent has always made a lot of sense. It makes more sense now that we’ve been exposed first hand to the end result of a system designed to keep the man in power in that position so the nepotism and patronage that fuel an empire can continue.

Vote to enact the appointed superintendent.

Our children will surely thank us for the action.