Saturday, October 31, 2015

A Scary Get Out the Vote Story

A Low Interest Year

It's really hard to generate interest in a school board election, especially when there are no state or federal elections happening at the same time. But the school board has elections every year and this is one of those low interest years.

In 2011, the last time there was an election like this, all three reform candidates were defeated. Who defeated them? Candidates financed by people with a history of redirecting school funds to friends and family. And this year is shaping up to be a repeat performance.

The Usual Suspects

The usual suspects, Carmelo Garcia, Frank Raia, and Michael Russo, have united to support a cobbled-together slate consisting of perennial candidate and Raia-favorite, Britney Montgomery (city council 2013, school board 2014, and now school board again), perennial candidate and scary-angry ex-school employee John Madigan (school board 2002, 2003, 2010, 2011), and newcomer Alanna Kauffmann who, judging by her debate performance, is far out of her depth.

I leave it to Hoboken Donkey and GrafixAvenger to provide an overview of the candidates. As for, Garcia, Raia, and Russo, volumes have been written (here, here or here for example) on how they tirelessly work to divert taxpayer funds from the city and schools to benefit themselves and their friends. Madigan himself was a recipient of one of these jobs, until it was deemed "inconsequential" and eliminated by a reform school board in 2010.

Scared Yet?

Which brings me to my video. The prospect of any one of Montgomery, Madigan, or Kauffmann being elected and sitting with the reform school board we've worked so hard to elect is appalling. Their role would be to disrupt board meetings (something Garcia himself was renowned for) with the goal of discouraging parents from participating in improving our schools. This, in turn, sets the stage for low parent interest in future school board elections, which leads to further election victories for the bad guys.

In no time they will regain control of the school board and start stealing from the classrooms to provide jobs and perks for friends and family. So if this isn't a scary enough story to motivate you to vote 2-4-6 Kluepfel, Dallara, Velez for Hoboken Board of Education, you must be dead!