(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers Oct. 19, 2015)
The mechanics of a major change in state policy—the Legislature’s overhaul of city and school board elections, moving them from the spring in odd-numbered years to the fall of odd-numbered years—appear to have worked.
The local, closet-to-home, all-year-long politicians are going to see their election dates change in 2017, with only minor complications here and a bit of local procedure changing there, a legislative interim committee was told earlier this month.
The simple reason for the change is that the prime target—school boards members—are often elected in low-turnout spring elections that are heavily larded with schoolteacher, school employee and teacher union voters. Now, that’s annoying to most conservative legislators who believe that if you could just get more voters involved, that education industry influence would be diluted.