There aren’t a lot of signs in this image, but this is fairly typical — two for school board, none for anything else.
Couple of things I neglected to say in that last post, and it was way to long to add to it.
So here’s a sequel.
Actually, the first thing wasn’t so much “neglected to say” as I got it wrong. I mentioned that I was supporting Mary Burkett for school board, and needed to identify one more, because we vote for two.
That was wrong. I’ve got to pick three by the time I go vote next week (early voting starts Monday), according to my sample ballot: “You may vote for Four, less than Four, but not more than Four.” (And apparently, when we do so, we must capitalize the number “Four.” For some reason.)
Well, that’s going to be a lot of work. Because if there’s any segment of the electoral universe about which I feel particularly ignorant, it’s school board. As you may recall, I have many times donned sackcloth and ashes over my utter failure to give school boards sufficient attention — or any attention, usually — during my time as editorial page editor. All that work on endorsements at every other level from president to council members in small municipalities. I felt and feel terrible about it, because I think that if there’s any electoral office in the land that needs and deserves a spotlight, it’s school boards.
But I just couldn’t, with the scores of other offices for which we were interviewing, further researching, debating and endorsing in each cycle, we just barely got through election seasons, and I wasn’t ever fully satisfied that we’d had enough time.
And I did the math a number of times: Just doing the seven school boards in Richland and Lexington counties would have doubled our load. And if we did that, we wouldn’t do a good job on any of them. So we didn’t.
And I would go the polling place on the day of an election I’d been slaving over for months if not years, and would end up asking my neighbors in line whom they were backing for the board, if anyone. Of course, I still seldom voted for one, as I have to be convinced I know a candidate — and the candidate’s competition — well enough to pull that lever.
Consequently, to this day, I seldom vote for school board. But I’m going to do my best this time.
And part of the reason I’m determined to do so is… yard signs.
There’s another factor regarding signs in my neighborhood that seems different this year, one that I meant to mention in that other post:
Without doing a census or anything, I’m pretty sure that there are easily more school board signs in my neighborhood than for president, Congress, Legislature, and countywide offices combined.
And that makes me proud of my neighbors, and shamed into trying harder to be as smart and dedicated as they are regarding these important offices. Of course, with some folks it might just be that this position is so hyperlocal that they personally know the candidate whose sign they are displaying, so they’re just doing a favor for a friend. Which is OK, of course, up to a point.
But I prefer thinking they’re just savvier and more diligent than I am. Because I like being proud of my neighbors…
More signs in this one. Four in the near distance, and more you can’t quite see in the far distance. All school board.
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