What's best way to fill State School Board

Webb: The shortness of our political memories is rather amazing. A number of years ago, many leaders were concerned about the quality of candidates running for the State School Board. These positions are very important, but they're also quite obscure, so few voters knew the candidates or had any idea who they were voting for in the voting booth.

Thus, some pretty strange characters were elected to the board. Clearly, we weren't getting the best and brightest.

To ensure that top-notch, capable people would be elected, the selection process was changed so that the governor appoints a 12-member nominating committee of smart, fair, upstanding citizens, who in turn screen candidates who file for school board slots and pare the list to the three best. Those names are then sent to the governor, who selects the best two finalists to go on the November ballot. It's quite similar to the process of selecting state judges, except the judges don't go on the ballot.

Seems like a pretty reasonable process, but some partisans and editorial writers hate the system because it is apparently producing some candidates they don't like. So they argue the system is somehow being manipulated by special interest groups. The reality is that these do-gooders are worried that conservatives who support vouchers might somehow get on the ballot, and they don't like it.

So there will be a push in the next legislative session to return to the old system of nonpartisan direct democracy, where all candidates for a school board slot run in a primary, with the top two vote-getters continuing to the final election. Once again, few voters will know who they're voting for, and getting good people to serve will be mostly a matter of luck.

If we're going to return to direct democracy, we should at least run the candidates through the partisan election process so they are thoroughly vetted and scrutinized in the caucus, convention and primary system. Candidates will be forced to campaign hard, convince delegates and win significant support before getting on the final ballot. Do-gooders will argue that such a process will only produce conservatives, but that's not true. Note that conservative incumbent legislators Glenn Donnelson and Aaron Tilton got dumped in that very process this year. Clearly, we'll get better final candidates through the partisan process than a random, nonpartisan election.

Pignanelli: "The partisan, when he is engaged in a dispute, cares nothing about the rights of the question but is anxious only to convince his hearers of his own assertions." —Plato

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