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Letters to Artvoice

JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS

In Geoff Kelly’s article “The Write-Off Vote” he says that “Only two conclusions can be drawn from the alleged problems voters faced in Tuesday’s elections for the Buffalo Board of Education: one, a lot more Buffalonians wrote in the names of candidates, or tried to, than do usually, and two, Williams voted for Jayne K. Rand.” I have a couple more conclusions that can be drawn. First of all, if School Board candidate Jayne Rand had submitted enough valid petitions to get on the ballot she wouldn’t have had to be a write-in candidate, thus no complicated procedures—just pull a lever.

It amazes me that she wanted to change the rules that everyone else had to play by so that she could get on the ballot. After the Board of Elections declared that she didn’t have enough valid petitions, she tried to get a favorable ruling in the Supreme Court, but failed. What a terrible lesson it would have taught our school children if she had prevailed. And what is that lesson—if you don’t like the rules, just change them?

As a former football player for the Buffalo Bills there were a lot of rules I never liked, but I still had to play within them, and if I didn’t, I got penalized. Mr. Kelly’s article tried to make as many excuses as possible for why Ms. Rand didn’t get on the ballot. It kind of reminds me of parents who try to make excuses for why their children fail in school. One of the biggest reasons children fail is because they learn bad habits from their parents. When they constantly see their parents blaming others for what is happening to them, then they, too, begin to believe that it is the “system” or “others” that are the real problem.

This is not to say that there aren’t times when parents need to stand up for their children and have advocates in the community that will also stand up for them, which brings me to one other conclusion that can be drawn: Joyce Nixon has always been an advocate for children and has attended many suspension hearings and court cases involving our Buffalo school children. She is also the Executive Director of an agency that has been operating youth development and delinquency prevention programs for 25 years. But what has Jayne Rand done for Buffalo’s school children? Rand was the spoiler in a race she never had the slightest chance of winning. She took away just enough votes from Joyce Nixon (138) to allow the Buffalo Teacher’s Federation candidate, Mary Kapsiak, to win. Whose interests do you think Ms. Kapsiak is going to have in mind when she votes for issues regarding teacher pay, teacher benefits, teacher health plans, etc.? It’s too bad our school children can’t vote.

One last thing that might be concluded from the election. Why, if he really did, would James Williams vote for Jayne Rand? Do you think it might have something to do with the fact that she is part of the powerful Rand Corporation and received the endorsement of the powerful Editorial Board of the Buffalo News? My guess is, Mr. Williams probably wanted those two groups to know he voted for her. He’s not stupid, but he did miss out on an opportunity to vote for the best candidate: my wife, Joyce Nixon.

Sincerely,

Jeff Nixon

Buffalo