By Walter Elliott
NEWARK – Registered voters here and in Irvington have 11 candidates to fill an overall seven board of education seats on or by April 21.
A majority of the said candidates are more familiar to voters than others. There are six incumbents – three each sitting on the respective Irvington Public Schools and Newark Public Schools boards – are running together with municipal office holders and/or political party committee endorsement and/or support.
At least two Newark Board of Educator challengers have run last year, including one competing against a relative newcomer for a fourth, unexpired term.
At least Newark and Irvington voters will get to approve their respective 2021-22 school board budgets – and their property tax shares – for the third straight year. The final budget question figures will be posted on ballots as soon as the current IPS and NPS boards ratify them in their late March meetings.
April 21, 2020 voters will be mostly using Vote By Mail Ballots, with limited polling station locations and hours. This year’s school board elections will not be on the same ballot as the nonpartisan municipal elections as they were due to the COVID pandemic last year.
Speaking of nonpartisan, “Local Talk News” will be looking for whether school board candidates will allow themselves to be identified as “Democrats” or “Republicans.”
School board candidates are nonpartisan by state election law. With eight other public school districts having moved their election in the last decade to November, that line has become blurred.
Orange’s three Democratic Committee-supported candidates – two incumbents and a newcomer – allowed themselves to be called “Orange’s BOE Democratic Team” in the five weeks leading up to the Nov. 3 General Election.
Such identification ran counter to the spirit, if not the letter, of state election law. A majority of registered city voters split their tickets, returning an “Orange BOE Democratic Team” incumbent and a newcomer with another runner. from another platform.
In IRVINGTON, there are three incumbent IPS board members on the ballot. They, barring an unanticipated write-in campaign, are most likely to get re-elected.
Annette L. Beasley, Ronald Brown and Gloria Chison are running together.
Beasley and Chison, whom voters elected to complete the respective unexpired terms of Romaine Graham and Orlander “Glen” Vick last year, are seeking their first full three-year terms.
Mayor Anthony “Tony” Vauss had appointed Beasley and Chisholm in 2017 when Vick and Graham respectively accepted Democratic Committee appointments to the Irvington Township Committee and the Essex County Board of Chosen Freeholders. South Ward Councilwoman Sandra Jones and Freeholder Lebby Jones (no known relation) had died in office.
Brown is looking for his third elected term.
Beasley, Brown and Chison since 2018, are running with the “Team Irvington Strong,” “Irvington Schools Strong” or a variant. Such labelling is permitted so long as the name of a political party is not added.
Both Irvington and Newark hold nonpartisan May elections for their mayor and council members.
In NEWARK, voters, and four ticketed candidates and (presumably as of press time) and four independent candidates for four seats.
Former NPS BOE Vice President Dawn Haynes and Asia J. Norton are running for their second elected terms together with recently appointed colleague Vereliz Santana on the “Moving Newark Schools Forward” team.
Moving Newark Schools Forward was formerly known as “Newark’s Unity Team” through 2017.
This team supported candidates who previously ran for or were considered by the opposing “Newark Children First” and “For Our Kids” slates. The annual competition between the two slates were replaced in 2016 by a fusion ticket as a condition of the State of New Jersey returning autonomy to Newark Public Schools and its BOE.
It is not coincidental that the “Moving Newark Schools Forward” banner is similar to “Moving Newark Forward” used by Mayor Ras Baraka since 2014.
Baraka, among the 15 city and state-level legislators on MNSF’s website March 10, are endorsing those three and a fourth candidate for the unexpired term.
The names and endorsements are permitted – so long as no one adds “Democrat” or “Democratic” to the ticket’s name. (Note: “Local Talk” would be calling this out if the political party here or in Irvington was “Republican,” “Libertarian,” “Green” “Garden” or some other.)
The three challengers for the three-year terms are newcomer Nadirah A. Brown, Yolanda Johnson and Phillip “Phil” Wilson. Johnson and Wilson ran solo campaigns in 2020.
There are two people looking for voters’ approval in completing the late Tave Padilla’s remaining two years.
Santana, who was appointed to succeed Padilla earlier this year, was initially thought to be running for his term’s remainder. She instead was “promoted” to run for a three-year term when incumbent Yambeli Gomez decided not to pursue re-election. (A majority of participating registered voters elected Gomez with Haynes and Norton April 23, 2018.)
MNSF is fielding Daniel Gonzalez for Padilla’s leftover term. Competing is Sheila Montague.
Octavio “Tave” Padilla, 57, suddenly died Nov. 25. Padilla, who was first elected on the Unity Team in 2016 and re-elected in 2020, was five months into his third term.
Those who want to register for the April 21 elections, who have other related questions, are to contact essexclerk.com.
