It would be easy to lampoon the rich, the wise and the well-born who have decided to contribute big bucks to influence the races in the upcoming the Hamilton County Board of Education elections, but that would be too easy.
We might ask where they were while Hamilton County test scores were sinking, while school maintenance needs went unmet, while teacher salaries remained below where they should be and while public frustration with the state of education leadership in our county mounted.
But that would be unfair, because their money has been put into foundations which pay for various programs that help schools, into arts programs which open students' imaginations to a world they might otherwise not know, into businesses which create jobs to give parents of children in low-performing schools a hope of cycling out of poverty.
That fact is, without opening the personal financial statements of the six people who contributed in the second quarter to challengers in all four contested school board races and to the eight others who contributed to challengers in three of the four races, we'll never know.
So, we'll just say thanks for being involved in public education in this way, in wanting change in what sometimes has been a dysfunctional school board, in wanting to improve a school system which currently doesn't turn out enough students ready to be trained to take the family wage-paying jobs available in the county, in not wanting a district repeat of the last eight months of a rape scandal, secret low test scores and a superintendent payoff.
Since their money went to three of the candidates this page endorsed (Dr. Patti Skates in District 1, Tiffanie Robinson in District 4 and Joe Wingate in District 7, we hope the contributors have studied these candidates' stances, checked out their backgrounds and are confident that these candidates consistently will vote for and support a new direction for our public schools - and are not committing their money to have change for the sake of change.
We trust their $1,500, $1,250 and $1,000 checks to candidates not in the district in which they live are examples of their civic duty, an acknowledgment that stronger public schools will make a stronger business community and a stronger Hamilton County - for everyone.
But to put the prodigious spending in this year's race in perspective, where one 2016 candidate (Robinson) collected $23,646.40 in contributions, the 2012 second-quarter reports for the same four school board positions show $15,354.24 in total contributions to six candidates (though one candidates' report is not available on the Hamilton County Election Commission site).
On a side note, from this year's second-quarter candidate filings, we're also interested in the endorsements and the spending by the Hamilton County Education Association (HCEA). The teachers' union endorsed two of the three candidates in District 4 and both candidates in District 7, and of the six of 10 school board candidates they recommended for four seats, they gave $500 contributions to three.
In fact, HCEA President Dan Liner told Times Free Press reporter Kendi Rainwater that they gave contributions to the candidates who asked for donations. It will be curious to see if third-quarter candidate filings list any or all of the remaining six candidates they recommended who got the sudden intuition that's it's important to ask for what they want.
The HCEA president said only a small part of the money in the contributions comes from member dues. And although the school board races are nonpartisan, we remain leery of union member dues going to candidates over which the individual union member has no say-so.
No matter the source of the campaign contributions, though, we'd like to believe the contributors - the wealthy, the teacher's union and everybody else - have seen opportunity dimming for the success of every child in public education in Hamilton County and believe there is still a way to turn it around.
We hope, in turn, they will continue to put their money, their time and their voice to efforts to make that happen.