Paid for by Citizens for Colburn Committee. Authority John W. Phillips, Jr., Treasurer

3 for elected BOE testify
Talbot residents appear before Md. House Ways and Means panel on HB 119
By GREG MAKI
Staff Writer - Star Democrat
March 14, 2005

ANNAPOLIS — A trio of Talbot County residents, familiar faces in Annapolis now, testified before a House committee Thursday in support of a bill that would allow the county’s voters to elect the members of the school board.

The House Ways and Means committee held a hearing on House Bill 119, which is sponsored by Dels. Jeannie Haddaway, R-37B-Talbot, and Addie Eckardt, R-37B-Dorchester.

The bill would establish seven election districts, including one in which racial minorities as the majority of the voting age population.

Keith Nielsen, the father of two Talbot County students, said school board elections are “well overdue.”

“It’s the best thing that could happen in the county at this time,” he said.

The delegates introduced the bill and Sen. Richard Colburn, R-37-Mid-Shore, cross-filed legislation in the Senate in response to a straw poll last November in which Talbot voters favored switching from gubernatorial appointments to elections by a margin of greater than three to one.

“The strength of the vote … shows the intensity of support for elected school board members,” said Bob Burris, who was an Easton High School teacher, coach administrator for 28 years.

“The people of Talbot County have spoken, and our legislators listened to them,” said Juanita Ward, president of the Easton High School Alumni Association.

All three witnesses testified last year on the bills that placed the straw poll on the ballot in November. Ward and Burris also testified last month in support of Colburn’s bill. At that hearing, Hilary Spence, vice president of the Talbot County Council, asked the committee to delay a vote until the council held public meetings of its own. Two days later, the council decided not to hold additional meetings.

“It seems as if the last vestige of opposition to this bill has dissipated,” Ward told the committee Thursday.

The county council opposed the straw poll bill last year after initially asking the local delegation to the General Assembly to introduce the straw poll legislation.

The bill would establish the boundaries of the original election districts, which would be redrawn after each census. A board member must be a resident of the district he wishes to represent.

Whenever the boundaries are due to be redrawn, the county council would have to appoint a redistricting commission that would include four people nominated by each political party that got at least 15 percent of the vote in the last general election and one additional person. Elected officials could not serve on the redistricting commission.

Elected school board members would serve four years, beginning Jan. 1 after their election. Voting members could not serve more than three consecutive terms.

To avoid having an entirely new board, the terms of the elected members would be staggered. Members from districts 1, 3, 4 and 7 would be elected in the 2006 general election, and every four years thereafter, and members from districts 2, 5 and 6 would be elected at the 2008 general election, and every four years thereafter. The governor would appoint someone to fill any vacancy.

According to amendments Haddaway introduced Thursday, one non-voting student member would serve on the board. Bill drafters inadvertently wrote the legislation to include a student member from each public high school, she said. The board’s current practice is to include one student member, alternating between the two high schools from year to year.

The Senate bill passed last month by a 44-to-1 vote.