Efforts by liberal groups to impact the District 3 and District 8 races on the Wake County school board are continuing with yet another different organization urging people to vote on Election Day.
In this new campaign mailer targeted at voters in both districts, it says "there are lots of little reasons to vote on the school board...and one big one: because you care about Wake County's future!"
The flier also reads "having good schools for all Wake County schools makes our economy stronger, our communities healthier, and keeps the whole county a great place to live and work."
The mailer doesn't say which candidates to support. But it's not hard to figure out who they'd like you to pick.
The mailer's sponsors are Common Cause and the NC A Philip Randolph Institute. API is the "senior constituency group" of the AFL-CIO, whose Triangle chapter endorsed Kevin Hill in District 3 and Susan Evans in District 8.
In the past week, a succession of outside groups have targeted both races.
Comments
Union Thugs?
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:16 — WhalerCaneYea, there is some thugish language here.
"There are lots of little reasons to vote on the school board...and one big one: because you care about Wake County's future!"
"Having good schools for all Wake County schools makes our economy stronger, our communities healthier, and keeps the whole county a great place to live and work."
It doesn't even say who to vote for. That is extra sneaky. Yea, that some hard ball liberal politics there. Certainly encoraging folks who care about our schools, community and economy to get out and vote must be a threat to democracy. Definately a big Obama plot. Right up there with the UN shoving sustainability down our throats.
Yep, this is definately some evil union thugish mail.
I mean, really?
.
Ask the folks in the auto
Sat, 10/01/2011 - 10:22 — woodstockAsk the folks in the auto industry communities -- or I should say former auto industrry communties -- how the unions have helped make them "stronger" and "healthier." You can start with Detroit and Cleveland. Unions have helped to destroy entire industries and devastated economies in large regions of this country with their bullying tactics to advance wildly inflated and unsustainable wages and benefits for workers.
But...
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:43 — Bob_SconceIsn't that because both organizations CAN'T put candidate-specific ads in.
As to "union thugs":
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2016144477_longshoremen09m.html
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/nasty-union-violence-legal/story?id=14572790
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJE5MqesHlw
http://www.nrtw.org/free-tagging/union-violence
http://www.nilrr.org/node/54
From this last one:
Since 1975, the National Institute for Labor Relations Research has collected more than 9,000 reports of union violence
How about this, where the Teamsters were forced to promise not to "batter, assault, spit on . . . threaten to kill or inflict bodily harm . . . challenge or threaten to fight or assault employees, threaten to sexually assault non-striking employees or their family members, . . .": http://www.1-888-no-union.com/images/Teamster_Overnite_Posting.pdf
Yes, union thugs. Absolutely.
Give me a break Bob_Sconce
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 21:40 — SatchHHThose "union thugs" in the clips have nothing to do with Wake County - which is snug in the middle of a "right to work state" = no unions allowed. These liberal tactics shown by the flyers are not thuggish at all. I venture to say, they're probably too polite given the ugliness of the right = skunky.
Pfft..
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 01:59 — Bob_SconceYou're right -- because the unions occasionally don't rough people up, they should be respected. Of course they're not going to run an ad that says "Vote for XXX, or we'll come to your house and rape your family" -- they're thugs, but they're not idiots. But, as evidenced by the settlement I posted, that's exactly the kind of threat they've made before.
Why don't you and others who
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 10:45 — virginiadareWhy don't you and others who "aren't from around here" realize you're in North Carolina now? Satch is right -- we don't have unions and we don't have union thugs! Most people from here have no acquaintance with such! It has no place or relevance to our school board races.
And as an aside, I really can't understand the Republicans' war on the middle class! Why are they trying to destroy public workers such as teachers, nurses, firefighters, policemen, etc., just because in some states they have joined unions to advocate for their interests? I just don't get it.
Hmm..
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 11:08 — Bob_SconceNorth Carolina does have unions. When the Teamsters went on strike again UPS a few years ago, so did North Carolina members. Further, there were, even in NC, a few acts of violence related to that strike. NC is a right to work state, and public employees don't have the right to collectively bargain, but we still have unions.
But, supposing you're right -- why does the AFL-CIO care about a Wake County school board election? Further, supposing you're right, then the AFL-CIO folks must be from those other states where they do have union thugs.
I could go on for a year about why public employee unions are bad beyond just the thuggery and corruption. Here's one anecdote: when I was in high school, a unionized school janitor decided it was a good idea to drop his pants in the girl's locker room as the girls were coming back in. He was promptly fired. The union filed a grievance and the entire mess ended up costing the taxpayers around $15K.
In general, unions defend poor performers at the expense of better performers, distorting the market for workers and creating lousy incentives for workers.
Citizens United Bob
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 21:40 — WhalerCaneThey could put anybody they want on there.
Uh...
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 01:46 — Bob_SconceI've read Citizens United. I'm guessing you haven't. And, guess what -- it says nothing of the sort.
OT Alert - Meet Jennifer Mansfield THIS Saturday night!
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 18:45 — petehsMeet Jennifer Mansfield, District 3 School Board Candidate
How did our local school
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 10:04 — virginiadareHow did our local school issues become a political football?
It started with Ron's lone partisan agenda when all the other Republicans and Democrats on the school board were working together, making the hard decisions required by the massive growth and the gross underfunding, which was caused by Ron's buddies in the Wake County Tax Association and the Republican majority on the BOC. Then your group joined forces with those groups and individuals who do not value and in fact want to do away with public schools and will not adequately fund public schools to take advantage of parents' unhappiness and elected a majority to join Ron's partisan agenda. That agenda would result in the resegregation of our system with "neighborhood schools" as well as further erosion of funding. No longer would our system be the crown jewel of our our community, as Superintendent Tata described it.
Jennifer Mansfield has not advocated FOR Wake County schools. She advocated against them when she tried to keep the last bond from passing. I hate to think what shape our school system would be in now if she had gotten her way and the second bond referendum in a row had failed in the midst of some of the highest growth of any district in the nation, proving that our community did not support the public education of our students.
The only candidate in this district school board election who whole-heartedly supports public education and our school system is Kevin Hill. His decisions have been made based on what is best for the system as a whole and the depth of knowledge he has as an educator. He has no partisan agenda.
I think you're trying to
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 11:19 — CaryCurmudgeonI think you're trying to re-write history. Our group didn't join forces with any other groups. The Republican party, Civitas, JLF and others may have also favored neighborhood schools, but we did NOT work with any of them. In fact, the Republican party initially worked against us. They endorsed Jerry Ballan against our candidate Deborah Prickett. Also, their Republican party officers Jeff Morse and Heather Losurdo started a PAC (Take Wake Schools Back) and told us we should shut our PAC down. If Jerry Ballan's past transgressions hadn't been dug up, it would have been a 3-way race.
The kids didn't become a political football until the Republican party started using the school board win as leverage in other elections, and board members started showing up at meetings talking about how "conservative Republican values" had won the day.
Jennifer Mansfield was advocating for equitable assignment back when the Republican party didn't give a darn about the school board. Jennifer was a leading advocate for using EVAAS to end the practice of racial discrimination. Jennifer has always advocated for stronger curricula at base schools.
Kevin Hill. His decisions have been made based on what is best for the system as a whole and the depth of knowledge he has as an educator.
You worked towards the same
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 12:08 — virginiadareYou worked towards the same goal as they did, so I would call that joining forces. I believe you chose candidates that have since revealed their lack of integrity, character, and civility as well as their inability to work with the entire community or to govern effectively. I'm glad to see you admit that it is the Republican party and the candidates which you helped elect that have made our kids a political football.
It is absolutely false to say that the first two years of Hill's time in office were some of the worst in academic performance. There were achievement gains as well as increases in SAT scores. All the cherry-picking of statistics in the world won't negate the fact that we were continuing to improve in the face of the massive growth and grossly inadequate funding. The AdvancEd report was correct in stating that the majority school board members just refused to believe the data that was right in front of them indicating the progress that Wake County was making! The reason teachers' jobs were able to be retained during the last two years is because the one-year contracts were not renewed at the beginning of the funding cuts. They were not "laid off." Standing up for teachers IS standing up for students! Teachers, of all people, have the best interests of their students at heart.
Stronger curricula, better assignment policies, or using EVAAS (which I still do not believe is the magic bullet) are all for naught if we don't have the classrooms to seat the students or the funding to operate our schools adequately. Jennifer has fought against the people advocating for those resources in her war against magnets and ITB families.
You're playing semantics.
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 12:15 — CaryCurmudgeonYou're playing semantics. Those teachers that lost their jobs -- would it have been any different for them to walk in at the end of the day and say "Sorry honey, my contract wasn't renewed?" They lost their jobs, period.
Stronger curricula, better assignment policies, or using EVAAS (which I still do not believe is the magic bullet) are all for naught
Semantics like in the last
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 14:05 — virginiadareSemantics like in the last election when you and your candidates kept repeating the lie that 1500 teachers had lost their jobs?
Jennifer did say in the past that she did not feel we should be asking for more money until the board began spending it in a way that she saw fit. It's only recently that she's said anything about funding issues, and maintaining the inadequate per pupil funding we've had in the past just won't get it. And when did it take "guts" to advocate for funding that will make our schools better?
Yes, Kevin has had the courage to make decisions that weren't very popular in his district because he knew they were the decisions that were best for the system as a whole. That is what board members always used to do, make the unpopular, hard decisions when it was the right thing to do. Funny how no one complains that Deborah Prickett did exactly the same thing with Leesville when she recommended going against what the majority of families there said they wanted. No, it wasn't exactly the same thing, because what she did was what her supporters and doners wanted her to do. Kevin doesn't make decisions based on whether it will get him re-elected or not, but on what he, in his professional judgement, believes will do the most good for the most people. That is integrity.
Pfft...
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 14:26 — Bob_SconceHill's decisions were NOT always best for the district as a whole. We're now going on two years that the district has been overspending by running WES as a year-round school since he blocked its conversion back to a traditional calendar. Had he pushed for that conversion when he first joined the board in '07, we'd be going on 4 years of savings. Yes, it would have benefited people in his district, but it also would have benefitted the district as a whole.
Also, consider his duplicitous handling of the Bedford -> Heritage situation -- in one side of his mouth, he supported the neighborhood, and in the other, he told Heritage's principal that he would "stonewall" (his word) changes. That's a strange definition of 'integrity."
District 3 has its own problems that need to be addressed -- how many 'schools of progress' does the D3 have? What has Hill done about it? You can't tell me that improving those schools isn't in the district's best interest.
His decisions were made
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 15:46 — virginiadareHis decisions were made based on what he thought, based on history and best guesses, would be best for the system. In '07 no one knew that the economy would collapse, stopping the unrelenting growth we had been experiencing. Even when he blocked the conversion back to a traditional calendar, it was because he thought the capacity would be needed in that area, and that it was better to have excess capacity than to wait until it was a crisis situation. No one can predict the future.
I don't remember all the details of the Heritage situation, but I do not believe that he was duplicitous. Perhaps the neighborhood mistook his listening to them as agreeing with them, or he could have changed his mind based on new information. Wasn't he trying to keep the populations of each high school balanced? I still believe, knowing him, that he acted according to what he genuinely thought would be the best for the majority of the students involved, rather than doing the bidding of potential donors, unlike the new majority.
If he hadn't been having to try to prevent the destruction of the system by the majority who wanted to resegregate our schools, acted willfully to prevent our schools from receiving additional funding, were not concerned about maintaining accreditation, and threatened our magnet program, perhaps he could have focused more on improving individual schools in your district. I think what he was doing was much more important to the district as a whole, and if he were successful, would result in better schools throughout the county.
By George you've got it!
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 16:33 — FSandYOUThat's it! HE DOESN'T THINK, HE ONLY OBSTRUCTS!
Put him back in a classroom and see if he can do better there. He can save the resegregated system one student at a time. As it should be!
Well...
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 16:15 — Bob_SconceAs to your last paragraph, I obviously disagree with your characterization of the last two years, but note that he had two years before the board's direction changed, and didn't address any of those issues then.
The WCPSS school board was specifically designed with the intention of having board members represent individual districts and not the school district as a whole. That is, after all, why the merger divided the county into districts -- the very purpose was to make sure that the interests of people outside of downtown Raleigh had their interests addressed. It's no surprise that there is still a big split between the districts representing the areas that used to comprise the "City" districts and that "County" districts.
In 11 days, we will see how well Hill's "at-large" approach resonates with the voters of his district. Based on the volume of sheer vitriol aimed at Losurdo from a thousand liberal allies (the AFL-CIO?? Really?), I'm guessing that the PPP poll from a few weeks ago showed Hill to be in trouble.
Even before the board
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 16:56 — virginiadareEven before the board changed, he was fighting those forces -- dealing with the growth that was strangling the system, the woefully inadequate funding made worse by that growth, and the lawsuit by those dissatisfied by how they were dealing with those difficult issues. Though board members are elected to represent the interests of their districts, I believe (and isn't it even in their oath of office?) they should put the interests of the system as a whole first. And you're right, we shall see October 11.
Interest of the system?
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 19:23 — starsonoursI am trying to follow the logic of "interest of the system". Any large organization divides itself up into subsets to make it easier to manage. If you are given the responsibility of one of the subsets, what is in the best interest of the system is for you to manage and lead your subset. All the other subsets have leaders, if they are doing the same as you are and making sure thier group is represented, the system as a whole is represented. To often the "interest of the system" is used to explain why someone is going against what is best for the people they represent. Wake county is a large diverse county. What is best for schools in district 1 may not be what is best for district 9. But if the board member for each district focuses on what the solution is for the residents of their district, the interest of the system is also taken care of.
Prediction....
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 17:55 — KevPerdueRun off in District 3 and Kevin Hill losing. I would bet money on that one! I believe RM also wins. The others are up in the air! Bottom line this board maintains control.
Oath
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 17:09 — Bob_SconceAccording to the statutes, at least, the only oath they're required to take is the same one found in the NC constitution:
I, _______________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and maintain the Constitution and laws of the United States, and the Constitution and laws of North Carolina not inconsistent therewith, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of my office as _______________, so help me God.
Less talking points
Fri, 09/30/2011 - 10:57 — WadingInAgain with the talking points. Hill has been on the BoE for 4 years yet cannot highlight his accomplishment for the District 3 voters.
Let's look at his Board of Commerce materials...
“I understand and can explain both the intended and unintended outcomes that decisions made by the Board have on students and teachers.”
Glaringly absent in this ‘pat on the back’ is any mention to the inarguably most important party in a child’s education – their parents.
“Board members must be held accountable to the practices of good governance”
Completely agree and we need to hold Hill accountable for both educational red-lining and collusion against his constituents.
Regardless of your position on bussing for SED, Hill was caught after a Freedom Of Information Act petition of his email records. Which WCPSS policy / procedure governs the backdoor politics of student assignment collusion with a principal to red-line a neighborhood / families within his district?
“… and the Board has authorized budget cuts that do not appear to impact learning and teaching”.
One would think that budget cuts that do not impact learning and teaching would be considered a good thing??? Hill touts his “experience as a former educator within WCPSS” yet has never brought forth any budget reduction ideas forth during these difficult economic times.
“The Wake County Public School System has received tremendous national acclaim for the quality education our children receive."
Healthy schools… not focused at the child level. It has taken a while (fought all the way) to peel the onion to see the sham.
What ideas has Hill brought forth to improve the placement / education of students? He has fought against eliminating "EI" and the use of EVAAS.
Hill voted against Tata for WCPSS Superintendent.
Thanks, but no thanks...
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:39 — paulastam"Peths", What you fail to mention in your campaign message is that Mansfield is a "wannabe Republican candidate" for the board but the GOP swung to the extreme right and came-up with Losurdo over Mansfield. I suspect the GOP may now regret turning Mansfield away given all the baggage attached to Losurdo...
Paula, "Independent, Fair & Speaking Up for MY Kids."
Hmm..
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:56 — Bob_SconceIt's quite likely that they regret choosing Losurdo. As to Jenn, you obviously don't know her -- she thinks for herself.
'R'
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:52 — ApexRes98If Ms. Mansfield wanted to be a Republican, don't you think she would change her political affiliation?
that's for sure
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:44 — EBDarcyEven if Mansfield wins, the plan is going to be voted on 10/18 and she won't be sworned in until December. By that time the implementation will be well underway.
You are correct
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:56 — FSandYOUIt will be a done deal on Oct. 18th.
Wow, this is great news! To
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 09:41 — woodstockWow, this is great news! To garner this much attention from the union thugs -- who, fortunately, remain impotent in NC -- and their left-wing followers, apparently Margiotta and Losurdo are polling very high and will enjoy landslides victories on Oct. 11.
Ohh...
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 09:36 — Bob_SconceThat's a tactical mistake. Get the AFL-CIO in there, and now you're talking about teachers unions. Hill wasn't particularly vulnerable there before, but now that they're supporting him, you have to wonder what the quid-pro-quo is going to be.
Thanks Keung.
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 09:28 — AgentPierceThanks Keung. I was wondering who the union thugs would be supporting. This answers my question. I always learn something with your blogs.
Union thugs?
Thu, 09/29/2011 - 20:41 — paulastamWoody, please point me in the direction of the picket lines in Nth Carolina...
Paula, "Independent, Fair & Speaking Up for MY Kids."