Second of two parts
Re “Mom on the Campaign Trail Reflects Our Weather: Sunny Streak”
[img]2115|right|Barbara Honig||no_popup[/img]Since three adult members of the politically prominent Honig-Silbiger family have been elected to office in the past 15 years, it was a fair question.
After son Karlo Silbiger on July 1 dramatically, abruptly reversed the School Board’s intention of plunging forward in pursuit of an expensive, financially risky bond measure, did that unite or divide the family’s political wing?
“Totally united,” said mom Barbara Honig, who served two earlier terms on the School Board, bridging the change in centuries.
“The bond issue is incredibly complicated. It can’t be run in too quickly.
[img]493|left|Karlo Silbiger||no_popup[/img]“I went to that Board meeting” where Mr. Silbiger, her son who is running for re-election, turned off what seemed to be a hugely popular faucet, which still is leaking two months later. In a breathtaking moment, he delivered his richly detailed, clock-stopping, momentum-sparking prepared statement that his colleagues needed to pause and conduct more research of data and the community or risk failure.
“Before I knew what anyone else was going to say, I told the Board members that it is not just putting the bond on the ballot. It is winning. There were a lot of unanswered questions.
“If your only interest is putting the bond measure on the ballot and you have not done your groundwork, not only does that bond lose, future bonds will, too.
“People don’t forget when you lose.”
The strongly disputed halt to the bond measure campaign for this election cycle arose again at Board meeting two nights ago when numerous parents heartily endorsed the bond.
Ms. Honig was a sitting School Board member, serving the first of two terms in the ‘90s when the community’s most recent attempt to pass a bond measure was victorious.
In a close election, she thinks there was “a good chance it would lose.
“Even if it had won, we might have done the wrong thing, financially speaking,” Ms. Honig said. “The question people had, was this bond measure fiscally appropriate, never was answered. And it was asked by the people who will be paying for it.”
