Monday, October 29, 2007

Don't Let Apathy Win

As of July 2007, the number of registered voters in the Hilliard City School District was 43,751.

What a shame it is that in the 2003 election, only 12,823 people chose to vote for school board candidates. The 2005 election was even worse, with 11,129 people voting for school board candidates.*

There was a slightly better turnout for the 2006 bond levy - 15,394. The vote was 8,229 FOR to 7,165 AGAINST. Think about this a second: Less than 20% of the voters in our community made the decision to commit 100% of us to paying off the $75 million mortgage for Washington Elementary and Bradley High School.

In the coming four years, the Hilliard Schools Community is going to face a gut-wrenching financial situation: how do we deal with a projected $40 million annual funding shortfall? The way that question is answered will affect the quality of life, the cost of living, and property values in our community in very significant ways.

If you haven't cared before, you need to start now. You need to decide whether you want to return to the Board the incumbents who led us into this mess, or replace them with experienced business executives who fully understand the situation and know what to do.

I recognize that the folks who read this blog and SaveHilliardSchools.org are ones who do care, and are going to vote on November 6th. The folks that need to be reached is everyone else.

As far as media goes, the best way for reaching the people of the community remains the community newspapers: Hilliard Northwest News and This Week Hilliard. Both have run decent articles during the campaign. A couple of friends and I have passed out 1,000 flyers, and there are a number of yard signs posted in strategic places (although a couple of mine have disappeared).

Still, the most effective way to reach the voters is personal contact. Not just from me, but from each of you. So please take this as a request: Please tell everyone you know to come out and vote.

If you are so inclined, I would appreciate your recommendation that they vote for me.



* approximation calculated by taking the total number of votes cast for board candidates and dividing by the number of open seats. There may have been cases of people not voting for as many candidates as were allowed, which would throw this calculation off by a very small amount

2 comments:

  1. The vote was 8,229 FOR to 7,165 AGAINST.

    It's sad that motivated voters are usually those with a conflict-of-interest. I don't know the total employment of the Hilliard school district - i.e. teachers, bus drivers, janitors, administrators, etc... - but it has to be a significant portion of those 8,299 (given that they likely voted monolithically for it).

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  2. From the last Comprehensive Annual Financial Report, the employment makeup was 904 teachers, 64.5 administrators, 184.84 auxilliary staff, and 448 support staff, for a total of 1,601 employees (the largest employer in the City of Hilliard). Not all would necessarily live in the school district, but many likely do.

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