By Armchair Mayor

‘Kids are more important than potholes’

Oct 10, 2018 | 7:13 AM

KAMLOOPS — IT WAS AN ENCOURAGING turnout at Tuesday night’s school board election forum. That is, if you consider 50 or 60 people out of a population of 93,000 encouraging.

Eleven candidates laid out their qualifications and priorities, one of them describing the crowd as “a large group.” And I suppose it was by school board forum standards.

It’s always hard to resist comparing the under-the-radar school trustee election with the comparatively high-profile Kamloops City council election and this was no exception.

One candidate wryly commented that “kids are more important than potholes.”

It was a light-hearted remark but it’s long been a plaintive cry from school boards.

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As the debate got going, some incumbents must have been thinking “We’re already doing that!” as the newbies offered their thoughts on what needs to be done with the system, and there was a lot of motherhood-and-apple-pie stuff about helping kids reach their full potential.

There wasn’t much to disagree about on topics like Kindergarten, the importance of fine arts, and the need for more provincial money to be put into Kamloops schools.

But a question about public consultation turned into a spirited discussion. The example of Stuart Wood School was given, with the questioner saying the board made up its mind to close the school before asking the public about it.

Another example was the contentious decision by the board to keep spring break to one week despite widespread opinion that it should be two weeks as it is in many other school districts.

Despite such issues, one candidate’s remark that school board meetings are “mind-numbingly boring” might apply to people’s general impression of education issues.

But school board elections deserve more attention than we give them. As forum moderator Christopher Foulds of Kamloops This Week pointed out, School District 73 trustees look after a district the size of Belgium with a budget bigger than the City’s, and they get paid half as much as City councillors.

I’m Mel Rothenburger, the Armchair Mayor.

Mel Rothenburger is a former mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and newspaper editor, and is a director on the Thompson-Nicola Regional District. He publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website.