NEW ORLEANS — Things have gotten so nasty in a school board race here that one candidate has landed in court over whether she did or did not vote for President Obama in 2008.
And the strong feelings aren’t just local. Today’s runoff election for three seats on Louisiana’s state school board has taken on national significance — so much so that New York City mayor and charter school booster Michael Bloomberg has donated more than $100,000 to the cause.
The most-watched of those three elections — and the one that involved the aforementioned judiciary tussle — pits two female, African-American Democrats against each other in a New Orleans district. It seems to be a clear-cut battle for the soul of urban education: Charter schools and reform vs. control by teachers unions.
In recent years, New Orleans has emerged as a laboratory for educational change — which Bloomberg and other high-powered donors support. The billionaire gave $100,000 to a political action committee that supports reform candidates and $5,000 to the campaign of Kira Orange Jones, who is running in the heated New Orleans race.
The state took over the New Orleans public schools after Hurricane Katrina decimated the city in 2005. Today, almost 80 percent of the city’s public school students attend charter schools, exempt from teachers unions and regulations.
Jones represents the reformers coalition, which needs to win two of three runoff elections today for a permanent supermajority of eight seats on Louisiana’s 11-member board of elementary and secondary education. That would likely give Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal’s candidate, John White, the votes needed to become state schools superintendent.
Jones, a 33-year-old born in New York City’s Bronx borough who has a graduate degree from Harvard, is trying to unseat incumbent Louella Givens.
“We in the city face the opportunity to do what no city has been able to do before, which is actually close the achievement gap that exists in this country between low-income children and their more affluent counterparts,” Jones told backers at a rally last month.
She has the support of Sen. Mary Landrieu and her brother, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, both Democrats. Orange Jones is also thought to be Jindal’s choice, though he has not made an endorsement for either candidate in the heavily Democratic district.
Givens, a 64-year-old lawyer who ran a home health-care agency, has the backing of a coalition of teachers unions.
Public school teachers are among the angriest over what happened after Hurricane Katrina. About 4,000 were fired as the district struggled to avoid bankruptcy. They argue for a return to local control.
But the year before Katrina, 95 percent of the students fell below basic proficiency in English and math. The district was $300 million in debt, and corruption was rife. The president of the Orleans Parish School Board has gone to prison on a bribery conviction, one of 24 school leaders to be indicted.
Givens and her supporters have portrayed Jones as an outsider who wants to tell New Orleans residents how to educate their children.
The contest has been so bitterly contested that three retired teachers went to court to bar Jones from publishing ads saying she voted for Obama in 2008. They accuse her of misrepresenting her record to appeal to African-Americans in her bid for a seat on the board.
“I resent someone who only registered to vote in August of 2011 telling me that I’m not qualified to serve you,” Givens said at news conference this month.
Jones has acknowledged she did not register in New Orleans until August, four years after she moved to the city. She said she was registered in New York City, but New York’s Board of Elections said this week it had no record of her. She said the focus on her voting record was an attempt to make the election about anything but the children of New Orleans.
Givens has problems of her own, including a drunken-driving charge and $1.3 million in unpaid business taxes owed to the IRS.
Jones refrained from attacking Givens on her arrest or tax troubles before the first round of voting last month, but not this time. Radio ads that began running this month take on both issues.
“The truth is, we trusted you and you let us down,” the narrator says in the ads. “Our children deserve better.”
– Video by Jackson Loo and Devon Puglia
Noreen.Odonnell@thedaily.com
Click here to see the New Orleans Election Timeline
And the strong feelings aren’t just local. Today’s runoff election for three seats on Louisiana’s state school board has taken on national significance — so much so that New York City mayor and charter school booster Michael Bloomberg has donated more than $100,000 to the cause.
The most-watched of those three elections — and the one that involved the aforementioned judiciary tussle — pits two female, African-American Democrats against each other in a New Orleans district. It seems to be a clear-cut battle for the soul of urban education: Charter schools and reform vs. control by teachers unions.
In recent years, New Orleans has emerged as a laboratory for educational change — which Bloomberg and other high-powered donors support. The billionaire gave $100,000 to a political action committee that supports reform candidates and $5,000 to the campaign of Kira Orange Jones, who is running in the heated New Orleans race.
The state took over the New Orleans public schools after Hurricane Katrina decimated the city in 2005. Today, almost 80 percent of the city’s public school students attend charter schools, exempt from teachers unions and regulations.
Jones represents the reformers coalition, which needs to win two of three runoff elections today for a permanent supermajority of eight seats on Louisiana’s 11-member board of elementary and secondary education. That would likely give Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal’s candidate, John White, the votes needed to become state schools superintendent.
Jones, a 33-year-old born in New York City’s Bronx borough who has a graduate degree from Harvard, is trying to unseat incumbent Louella Givens.
“We in the city face the opportunity to do what no city has been able to do before, which is actually close the achievement gap that exists in this country between low-income children and their more affluent counterparts,” Jones told backers at a rally last month.
She has the support of Sen. Mary Landrieu and her brother, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, both Democrats. Orange Jones is also thought to be Jindal’s choice, though he has not made an endorsement for either candidate in the heavily Democratic district.
Givens, a 64-year-old lawyer who ran a home health-care agency, has the backing of a coalition of teachers unions.
Public school teachers are among the angriest over what happened after Hurricane Katrina. About 4,000 were fired as the district struggled to avoid bankruptcy. They argue for a return to local control.
But the year before Katrina, 95 percent of the students fell below basic proficiency in English and math. The district was $300 million in debt, and corruption was rife. The president of the Orleans Parish School Board has gone to prison on a bribery conviction, one of 24 school leaders to be indicted.
Givens and her supporters have portrayed Jones as an outsider who wants to tell New Orleans residents how to educate their children.
The contest has been so bitterly contested that three retired teachers went to court to bar Jones from publishing ads saying she voted for Obama in 2008. They accuse her of misrepresenting her record to appeal to African-Americans in her bid for a seat on the board.
“I resent someone who only registered to vote in August of 2011 telling me that I’m not qualified to serve you,” Givens said at news conference this month.
Jones has acknowledged she did not register in New Orleans until August, four years after she moved to the city. She said she was registered in New York City, but New York’s Board of Elections said this week it had no record of her. She said the focus on her voting record was an attempt to make the election about anything but the children of New Orleans.
Givens has problems of her own, including a drunken-driving charge and $1.3 million in unpaid business taxes owed to the IRS.
Jones refrained from attacking Givens on her arrest or tax troubles before the first round of voting last month, but not this time. Radio ads that began running this month take on both issues.
“The truth is, we trusted you and you let us down,” the narrator says in the ads. “Our children deserve better.”
– Video by Jackson Loo and Devon Puglia
Noreen.Odonnell@thedaily.com
Click here to see the New Orleans Election Timeline
