Organized labor is backing "labor-friendly" Wake County school board member Kevin Hill in the District 3 runoff election against Heather Losurdo.

The Triangle Labor Council AFL-CIO announced Friday that it was endorsing Hill, just like it had in the general election. Three of the group's five Democratic endorsed candidates won outright on Oct. 11 with Hill and George Morgan, whom the group supported over Christine Kushner, being the lone exceptions.

"Our endorsed candidates did very well in Wake County, but control of the Wake County School Board is still up for grabs," says this handout from the Triangle Labor Council AFL-CIO. "However, one of our candidates, Kevin Hill, in Wake County Schools District 3, fell 51 votes short of getting the 50% needed to avoid a run-off. Kevin Hill will be on the ballot in a special run-off election on Tuesday, Nov. 8. This labor-friendly candidate needs your support!"

Raleigh Mayor Charles Meeker and U.S. Rep. Brad Miller are cheering victories by their fellow Democrats in the Wake County school board elections in interviews with Cash Michaels on his "Make It Happen" radio program.

Excerpts of the interviews were included in this article in the latest issue of The Carolinian. Meeker said Susan Evana overcame "an especially gerrymandered district" for a "remarkable" win over school board chairman Ron Margiotta.

“They rejected not only his style of politics - the secret meetings, the rudeness and all of that - but also the substance, pushing divisive issues, bringing in racial parts, trying to allow under-performing schools…all of that has been rejected by our citizens," Meeker said.

The Wake Schools Community Alliance is now endorsing Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo in the District 3 runoff after having previously backed Jennifer Mansfield.

In a press release today, WSCA says Losurdo "has consistently supported neighborhood schools, advocated for the use of EVAAS and other objective data-driven measurements to meet our educational challenges head-on and called for civility and consensus-building on our School Board."

In contrast, WSCA rips into incumbent school board member Kevin Hill, citing his tenure as board chairman. They blame him for "falling graduation rates," "600 teachers fired, while protecting non-teaching administrators," "26,000 students reassigned," '"Wacky Wednesday' PLT’s were implemented, without regard to their impact on families" and "mandatory year round schedules forced on thousands of families."

Did Wake County school board member Kevin Hill make a political mistake by voting against the student assignment plan on Tuesday?

The no vote has given Heather Losurdo, who announced this week that she supported the plan now, something to campaign on against Hill in the Nov. 8 runoff. In a column Tuesday for the liberal Independent weekly, Bob Geary writes that "a yes vote was the better choice for Hill politically."

"But Hill, like his fellow Democrats, is not a politician and he doesn't think like one," Geary writes. "(Sutton is the exception, and he was thinking like a politician; unfortunately, Morrison and McLaurin either didn't get it that he was giving them a good reason to vote no — with Hill — or they simply couldn't bring themselves to cast a political vote.)"

Geary adds that "sure enough, John Tedesco started Facebooking and Tweeting immediately that Hill's vote was partisan, and naysaying." Geary accuses Tedesco of spreading around a "fictitious campaign"  that a new Democratic board majority would fire Superintendent Tony Tata.

It should come as no surprise that The Independent is endorsing Wake County school board member Kevin Hill in the runoff election, just as it did previously.

In this week's issue of the liberal weekly, the Indy writes that "voters in District 3 (North Raleigh) can finish the job of restoring responsible leadership to the Wake County Board of Education by re-electing Kevin Hill in the only school board runoff."

The Indy calls last week's election victories by Democrats "a stunning repudiation of Republican Party partisanship as applied to Wake's public schools after the 2009 elections." The weekly says Hill's election would create "a moderate 5-4 majority."

"Hill has pledged to work with Tata's plan and protect the diversity element, which Margiotta's majority was fixing to gut," the Indy writes. "By contrast, Hill's opponent in the runoff, Republican Heather Losurdo, is for the pure 'neighborhood schools' approach that Margiotta and the rest of the Republican slate advocated and which voters—turning out in historically huge numbers—rejected."

It looks like we should expect another flurry of mailers from Common Sense Matters targeting Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo in her runoff campaign.

A campaign finance report received Tuesday by the Wake County Board of Elections shows that the 527 group received $25,000 last Tuesday from the N.C. Futures Action Fund, the group led by Dean Debnam. This comes after the more than $52,000 that Common Sense Matters spent on mailers going after Losurdo and school board chairman Ron Margiotta before Oct. 11.

When you throw in the other Democratic-leaning 501 and 527 groups that were involved pre-Oct. 11, tens of thousands of dollars more could be spent in the next three weeks in mailers and television ads to defeat Losurdo.

Wake County Republican Party Chairwoman Susan Bryant is attributing last week's school board election results to "President Obama’s national organization" while also trying to rally people around Heather Losurdo's runoff efforts.

In the first post-election issue of the Elephant Express, Bryant writes today that "President Obama, Governor Perdue, and Reverend Barber won last week." She charges that the various Democratic-leaning groups that sent out mailers attacking Losurdo and school board chairman Ron Margiotta are linked to Obama.

"Make no mistake!" Bryant writes. "President Obama’s national organization was very much involved in the recent elections, with particular emphasis on Ron Margiotta’s and Heather Losurdo’s campaigns. They hired 'volunteers' and spent tens of thousands on mailers cleverly disguised as coming from non-related groups.

Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo is praising Democratic school board members Carolyn Morrison and Anne McLaurin for joining with the Republicans to pass the new student assignment plan.

In a press release today, Losurdo says "their courageous action represents a commitment to public service of the highest order." She says she regrets that McLaurin and Morrison are leaving and adds that they need more leaders like them "who follow their conscience and work for the public good instead of making everything a partisan matter."

"The new assignment policy is our chance to put the bickering and squabbling of the past four or five years behind us, and get to work on improving our schools," Losurdo says in the press release. "I salute Carolyn and Anne for helping make the process of moving from confrontation to cooperation easier."

Wake County Democratic Party Chairman Mack Paul is accusing school board candidate Heather Losurdo of not caring about schools and being guided by her ambition in requesting a runoff against incumbent Kevin Hill.

In a message today to party members, Paul writes about how the $150,000 that could be spent on holding the runoff "represents more than $3,000 per vote that separated Kevin Hill from the outright majority that would have closed the door on the contentious school board conflicts of the last several years."

Paul says that $150,000 "could pay the salary of school employees and teachers who are now being threatened with layoffs due to budget cuts. It could mean the difference between a hard working janitor cleaning the classroom or a teacher having to pull double duty and cleaning after teaching all day."

Wake County school board Heather Losurdo says that a local Tea Party group is not hosting an event for her.

Triangle Conservatives Unite! had put on its website an Oct. 30 event at state Republican Party headquarters to help Losurdo. But Losurdo said Triangle Conservatives Unite! had simply cross-posted a pair of volunteer events this week she had listed on her website and that no event is taking place Oct. 30.