With all the madness this past year with elections we may have forgotten that there is another local one just a couple of months away.
The school board election will be stand alone with 13 vote centers and a strong emphasis on early voting at the IPC. The school board approved the date at the January 11, 2021 meeting in the consent agenda, so there was probably little fanfare. While I don’t take issue much anymore with vote centers, I think they need to make sure that they are fairly spread out in the city unlike during the bond election where I believe there was either only 1-2 precincts North of Russell Ave. I still think this is a form of voter suppression and I asked the ACLU to look into during the school bond election with NO response. They are too busy in Pierre chasing wing-nuts during the annual gathering of paranoid bigots we call our state legislative session (not all of them, just 90%).
School board members Todd Thoelke and Kate Parker terms are up, not sure if they are going to run for re-election, but it sounds like Kate is leaning yes and Todd is leaning maybe. Would like to see someone with a little clout challenge them, especially since Kate has been there since 1953.
Has anybody heard of any names? Maybe we need to recruit Pam Nelson back to the board she got her political start in.
Every precinct should be opened. Else, its voter suppression. Elections should not be seen as a bother, rather as a duty of the district.
Plus, if Mickelson had to be subjected to all of the precincts, then why not Parker and Thoelke?
(….”Rounds had to deal with all of the precincts, but with Thune we are just going to have some super precincts”…(?))
The Trump Department of Justice prosecuted a single Voting Rights Act discrimination case in 4 years – against the Chamberlain, SD, School Board. A Biden DoJ and the likely passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act suggests SD school boards should proceed with caution and avoid even the appearance of limiting voter participation by polling place location decisions.
https://www.mitchellrepublic.com/news/crime-and-courts/6510358-Department-of-Justice-Chamberlain-School-District-agree-to-restructure-school-board-elections