RFP Staff
♦ The November 4th School Board election shapes up as an election too close call.
The advertising campaign for the incumbent school board is impressive and so are their supporters at least in Salisbury at the early polls. Will the daily Rowan Alliance advertising smear, appearing on the Post, accusing the 3 challengers Travis Allen (R), Phil Hardin (R), and Dean Hunter (R) of being Tea party puppets of Jim Sides have any affect? It may have some affect in downtown Salisbury, yet the reverse affect may be true in the conservative county. None of the 3 challengers has ever been affiliated with the Tea Party other than to appear at Tea Party candidate forums.
The incumbents Miller, Norman, Overcash, and Kennedy are in lockstep with their record:
• Every single one of the school board incumbents (Miller, Overcash, Norman, and Kennedy) voted to sue the Rowan county taxpayers and only stepped away from the suit when the mediator Witchard chided the incumbents for failing to work things out.
• The N.C. State Education READY Report clearly demonstrated Rowan-Salisbury’s Schools performed well below the state level. The composite scores made Salisbury schools particularly unattractive to both parents and to businesses considering moving into the area.
• Why are so many graduating from our high schools with the inability to read or write? All on the incumbents’ watch.
• The school system’s ratings dropped to among the lowest ranking school systems in the state.
• The taxpayer and the school system lost many, many thousands of dollars to fatten their attorney’s wallets to waste time and energy on Miller’s legal action against the county and ultimately the taxpayers and our school children.
• Why did the school board incumbents make an “unconsolidated” Central Office’s a top priority and pushed hard for it to be built on contaminated 329 S. Main without a parking lot? Wasn’t 329 S. Main pushed hard merely to promote it as an economic magnet to attract developers to the decrepit Empire Hotel to take 7 banks off the hook? The Empire is best suited for controlled demolition before gravity and age haul it down
• The school system, especially in Salisbury, is well known for their gang, drug activity, discipline problems. And the 3 suicides at Irwin? All on the incumbents watch.
• Our children are going to school in trailers and in buildings without proper water. Where were the incumbents on that issue? They were too focused on building an unconsolidated and over-priced Central Office on a contaminated postage stamp at 329 S. Main. Now they are trying to do the same for the 500 block of North Main.
• Many are interested learning about the Freedom of Information Act Inquiry that showed Miller entertaining the thought of a “no bid” contract?
• Instead of addressing the school systems multitude of issues, the School Board entertains us with positive smoke screens about championship golf and tennis teams and getting Judy Grissom an expensive Technology award in Houston at the cost of buying a warehouse full of IPads that were never put into play and sold at a major loss when they were still fully useful.
• The incumbent school board’s record of having little if any transparency is a shocker. Time to let in the “sunshine”. Information is regularly kept from Josh Wagner and Chuck Hughes. The school board meetings post no videos of their proceedings (Possibly the only school board anywhere who fails to post its proceedings on videos and claims the lame excuse it is too expensive to do.) Their overwhelming record of their conducting of closed sessions is mind-boggling.
Travis Allen, Phil Hardin, and Dean Hunter offer a major upgrade for a stuck-in-time school board needing to be cleaned out.
