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LOST & FOUNDRY
Stuff that falls through the cracks
IN THEIR FACES The crewd that turned out to address the board o f education on Thursday, Jan. 13, brought along some heavy hitters.
Many in the group were there to protest the firing of Superintendent Lucian Harris, and among the speakers lined up by NAACF
President Fred Smith, Sr. was Fred Smith, Jr., whose impassioned summations figured powerfully in the Clarke Central High School Mock
Trial Team's national championship last spring. Smith cut loose with some fine oratory. Perhaps the most effective speaker, though, was
Louise Neat who described problems with the old Cedar Shoals High School building. By the time she finished her marvelous catalogue
of sick-building symptoms and their effects on the human body, I think everybody in the room was ready to go help demolish the old
joint, if we hadn't been feeling so ill.
IN HER WORDS At the school board meeting, Cheryl Chasteen, in accusing the board majority of collusion in finng Harris, read from a
September, 1995 Flagpole column by present board member Anne Cooper. The column contained remarks that Cooper had made to the
school board on the occasion of that board's firing of Superintendent John Balentine. Cooper at that time had called on the board to
resign, and Chasteen used Cooper's own words against her and called for this board to resign. If Chasteen had read more of the column,
however, she would have demonstrated how eerily prophetic Cooper's 1995 words turned out to be: "Sirs, you have more ^ an
enough for the Clarke County School District. It is time for this community to elect a new Board, representatives and citizens who will
make our children and our school system, not themselves, the first priority of the Clarke County Board of Education. Cooper ran *9 a,nst
and defeated one of those members and in the next election three more of them were defeated and one did not run for re-election.
Whether the present board will be turned out because it fired Harris remains tc be seen.
IN THOR POLITICS The last thing African-American citizens need is advice from me, but here it is anyway. You were saying youre
going to run against the offending board members, and that's good. But while you're at it, you ought to be trying to get the AOiens-
Clarke County Commission to do away with the "super districts" and instead create 10 smaller districts. Since the school board districts
are the same as the commission districts, that could have the effect of adding two more open seats to the school board, and all the
districts would be smaller, — — —
meaning that more of them
could have a chance to elect
minority candidates. The same
would be true for the ACC
Commission, also. Get rid of
the super districts; create 10
smaller districts, and more of
them could elect minority can
didates there, too.
IN THE GAME The protest
against the firing of Lucian
Harris sort of had the feel of
ballplayers arguing with the
umpire. Not much chance of
changing this decision, but
maybe bracing the ump for the
next call. And thafs good, too.
Surely this board will have its
eye out for any well qualified
African-American candidates
who apply. In the last analysis,
Dr. Harris was pretty much a
man alone, with no real con
stituency anywhere, and that
lack of connectedness more
than anything else probably
kept him from being effective.
Pete McCommons
THIS miHM WORLD
TOM TOMORROW
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JANUARY 19, 2000
