Quick Ask of Readers

I won't be interviewing candidates until after the primary as interviews take a lot of time and energy. However, I will continue to put up information about candidates as I learn it.  

I can say except for D2, it looks like a strong field in each race. (I find D2 candidates a little underwhelming.) 

There are 16 people running for positions on the Seattle School Board. That's a lot of people to track. 

I did the quick Google searches on each candidate but I hope to learn more in the coming months. 

If you read my post on these candidates, you can see that if I found a website for a candidate, I linked it. 

My ask is if you see a website pop up for a candidate who does not have a website currently, could you please send a link? Likewise, if you attend any forum, please let me know what you hear. I would appreciate the help. 


Comments

Seattle is Lost said…
Thanks for your work. I look forward to hearing more.
5/13/25, 10:37 AM
Fielding Mellish said…
Melissa, you do valuable work and I am grateful for it. Here is an ask of you.
Go to a local school, perhaps in the SE during pick-up time to interview random parents. Here are some questions to ask:
What is a school board? What does it do? Name any current member and ask if they knew who the person was. Ask if they ever voted in school board elections. Ask who Brent Jones was. Ask if they ever heard of SOFG. Ask of AJ Crabee.
Then repeat the same thing with teachers.
Then reach out to King County Elections and ask what percentage of voters ever voted in School Board elections.
It would be a fun read. After that we could all ask ourselves what democracy is, and what is it all for, this school board business.
5/13/25, 10:52 AM
Melissa Westbrook said…
I might try that but, Fielding Mellish, you bring up a couple of points that I think WILL be quite pertinent to the school board elections.

1) What DOES a school board do AND what do YOU think they should be doing? I think many parents don't know about SOFG or the smaller number of committees and board meetings. What they DO know about is the lack of access to Board members. Board members can talk about public engagement until they are blue in the face but if they are not doing at least one community meeting in their district a month, parents notice.

Given the volume of email directors get, I'd bet it's rare for parents to get an answer. (Or you get an AI generated one.) I think the ability to directly communicate with their elected board director is something most voters would expect.

I also think many voters don't feel heard but also, that the district and Board are not interested in all students. In many ways, the Superintendent and the Board have shown parents that they just think many kids "will be okay."

The second thing you said was about going to look at King County elections. I can tell you right now that you can look at the stats for past elections that include school board and the major races - senator, mayor, city council - will get much higher voting volumes than school board.

And, incumbents have a much better chance at getting elected than a challenger.

What makes this election different?

- This is not the normal time for the majority of the Board seats to be up for election.
- Two of those seats are held by "incumbents" but neither (Clark or Mizrahi) were elected (they were appointed) and I'd bet you could ask 20 random voters and no one would have heard of them.
- So who votes in school board elections with those lower vote totals? Usually unions and parents. That might be the same this time but I think the volume of parents might be much larger and that they will work to put the word out.
- The district has had a lot of news stories out on them and most are largely not good - shootings, rapes, low test scores, shrinking offerings for HC, closing schools and a departing superintendent. What have voters heard and what will influence their vote?

Will it be clean house and get rid of anyone associated with that? Or stay the course for stability's sake?

What this school board election means is the balance of power on the Board. You currently have 4 members who are all in for SOFG. However, two of them are leaving. If you get two people elected who think SOFG has been a drain on finances with no real outcomes, things might change for Board direction and governance.

It is unclear to me where Mizrahi and Clark stand on that and it's a good question to ask.

Actually, it's a good question to ask ALL candidates and ALL superintendent candidates.
5/13/25, 2:58 PM
Anonymous said…
I’d be super curious to analyze a cross section of who votes. You could probably make some assumptions who might be a parent based on age and neighborhood, and I’d feel a lot better if parents were the primary voters. My personal theory is that a disproportionate number of uninformed/uninvested voters read the Stranger or other non-serious outlet and vote the “cheat sheet,”. Nobody seems to vote like they pay property taxes or have any clue about school operations.

Just My Opinion, Man
5/13/25, 4:00 PM
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