Is it really good for our community to have local power-seeking, political groups, such as the United Parents of Culver City and now the Friends of the Culver City Natatorium popping up, endorsing candidates based on political litmus tests?
Future Endorsements Coming?
Will the emergence of these relatively small, but locally active, political groups make the venerable PTA re-evaluate its longstanding policy of not endorsing political candidates?
Will the individual schools’ booster clubs start funding political campaigns for the sake of their own students? Will the high school’s Academy of Visual and Performing Arts perform fundraisers for their selected candidates? Will the CCHS Booster Club start endorsing its own candidates to influence policies at the high school?
Following the Money
Will receiving UPCC Political Action Committee money and its organizational support be seen as so important, so advantageous to campaigns that candidates will start hedging their positions on local issues?
Local Peddling
Has allowing PACs at the state and national levels helped or hindered our democratic process? Will it turn out to be different at our local level? Do we really want more or less political money being handed out during our election seasons?
Political Machines
Is this newly-formed Friends of the Culver City Natatorium for real? Or is it just a short-lived, election cycle shill for the endorsement of Robert Zirgulis? Hasn’t Mr. Z raged at length about how other such past political machines caused his failure in his previous campaigns? Does he now have one of his own?
More Divisiveness
Will these influence-peddling groups politicize our School Board elections well beyond their intended nonpartisanship? Do we really need more partisan pettiness brought into our elections?
What Do We Want to Be?
Is this what we want our small, still close-knit community to be in the future?
Ultimately, the only question that should concern Culver City is this: Which type of community has the best chance of providing our children with a good education – a fractured one or one that is a more united in its commitment to our children’s future?
Mr. Laase may be contacted at GMLaase@aol.com
