MY TURN: Partisan school board races are unwise
“It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong.”—Thomas Sowell
At a recent Henderson County Commission meeting, five Republican Commissioners basically voted to give a crutch to Republicans running for Board of Education by asking state lawmakers to make the race partisan. This despite a chairman once being Republican and other Republicans winning without this crutch. This offends unaffiliated voters who may lose one of the few races they are allowed to freely run in.
It's hypocritical to complain about teachers bringing up partisan politics when now demanding the same from candidates for Board of Education.
What if Independents need petitions filled to file? Petition requirements are inherently immoral and are darn near impossible. In the age of data mining, who wants to sign a petition?
All races should be non-partisan. Your right to run for office is the most important right you have. Stop treating unaffiliated voters like second-class citizens.
When I spoke, I pointed out, again, that Donald Trump only carried this state seven years ago by less than 4% of the vote in 2016, while Governor Pat McCrory, with a built-in advantage, lost. Trump only won this state by half that margin in 2020, the Republican nominee for Governor lost.
Why? A small group of unaffiliated voters who considered Trump but refused to consider a Republican nominee for Governor decided both races twice. And it will likely happen again.
There is no “Trump coattail” in the “purple” state of North Carolina.
537 votes separated George Bush from Al Gore in Florida in 2000, deciding the Presidential race. That is less than six votes per county in North Carolina.
Sometimes the enemy says it better. Governor Roy Cooper said recently that Democrats can win the White House next year without North Carolina’s 15 electoral votes, but Republicans can’t. Well, he’s right.
When Independents are the #1 registration in this state, and Republicans are #3, it takes a galling amount of myopic hubris to think Republicans can continually offend Independents like this and then expect them to be lapdogs on Election Day.
So I offered at the meeting an alternate idea: a “2X + 1” formula for Board of Education races. One year, we had 16 candidates. Instead, what should happen is if there are nine or more candidates seeking four seats, there is a primary to get it down to eight candidates. If there are three seats available, then the primary gets it down to six. But it’s non-partisan.
If lawmakers are going to go along with this, then I suggest making the County Commission races the exact same format. For over a generation, our “hybrid” system has been allowed and it never made sense. 80% of voters in a County Commission race don’t even live in the district. This is as stupid as Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, and South Carolina residents voting for our Governor. “Take the plank out of your own eye…”
There should already have been a bill filed for hard district lines for County Commission races, or at least five at-large seats, before Commissioners had the chance to vote on this nonsense idea.
The irony is County Commissioners would green-light teachers who haven’t talked politics to do so, and discourage retired educators who sincerely never got involved in politics but are otherwise competent from running.
There’s too much on the line in other close races to risk offending unaffiliated voters like this.
Don’t let this bill pass. Republicans shouldn’t need this crutch
Dennis Justice is a former President of the Henderson County Republican Men’s Club.
This article originally appeared on Hendersonville Times-News: MY TURN: Partisan school board races are unwise
