Catherine Huddle’s argument for partisan school board elections is misguided on so many fronts. First, she used the argument that only 58% of the actual voters, who turned out in November 2024, voted in school board elections. That is actually a good thing in this day age. The 42% who did not vote knew nothing about the candidates and presumably, the 58% had at least some knowledge of the candidates’ beliefs. An informed voter is the best kind, and the media and non-partisan groups need to do a better job of ensuring that each and every voter knows what visions each of the candidates have on the issues facing the running of the schools. If we had partisan candidates, most of those 42% would just vote for their party’s candidates without knowing anything about them.
Secondly, having partisan candidates would limit the number of candidates. In some districts in 2024, there were like 10 candidates running for 4 seats. If partisanship occurred, there would theoretically be only 8 candidates, 4 per party. Yes, there could be independents, but currently, independents tend to come from both right and left radical parties.
Ms. Huddle also maintains that her school board has mostly members from one party despite the fact that Chapin is mostly a town in which the other party dominates. There is certainly no proof of that in any town in SC at the moment. Ms. Huddle also speculates that many board members are “woke” and since it has been proven that the schools are not focused on any type of political agenda, her premise is quite false.
The voting public needs to put the best people on the school board. The one argument Ms. Huddle has is that because of this presumed “woke” mentality, the school board is raising the taxes too high, although homeowners in any SC town pay little towards schools, just debt service. Businesses bear the brunt of school taxes, along with the state and federal governments. Of course, that money does ultimately come from the taxpayers, the educational funding that each individual tax payer pays is relatively small.
Democracy needs informed voters, and the improvement in that area should be the focus, not partisanship.
Anne Mellen
Lexington
