The most intriguing question about new School Board member Scott Zeidman one week after his election is whether he can maintain the frenetic pace he has set for himself.
An international businessman and lawyer who is no stranger to the departure terminals at LAX, he has, if anything, accelerated his production pace the last seven days.
After the election, this is what he did:
A storm of research, a blizzard of emails, a round of meetings, all crucial accoutrements to his new personality as a member of the School Board.
He means to be pro-active.
He wasted no time plugging the fissure he said throughout his campaign exists between the schools and families.
Curiosity has been a driving force in his energy-filled life, and that somewhat amorphous concept helps to explain his impressive triumph.
The Zeidman Mantra
From the moment he decided to run for the School Board in the late spring, when the community-wide kindergarten flap was being awkwardly handled, Mr. Zeidman bore down on the lessons he needed to learn.
Organize and listen — his mantra that he slept with every night of the campaign..
From his workaday parenting of his third-grader, he had a smoky sense of the driving issues. But he needed much more information. Strands and strands of details.
Sleeve-Rolling Time
He soon plunged into familiarizing himself with all of them.
But he didn’t let the data rattle around in his head like plastic toys in a playpen.
He hit the streets. He began talking to people, to professionals (educators) and to amateurs (parents/families), digesting what was new and what was only vaguely familiar.
It Is About Meeting and Talking
From having participated in the startup of the family business 27 years ago, when he was a stripling of 18, he understood the primacy of direct, accessible, constant communication.
You can have beliefs from here to Kansas City. But if you aren’t mingling with voters and hearing to their concerns before sharing your beliefs, a bulging slate of convictions won’t make much difference on Election Day.
Who Is at the Door?
Everybody knows that in a small town, you knock on doors.
But so did runnerup Steve Gourley, Mike Eskridge, Alan Elmont and Roger Maxwell.
He visited the school campuses and interviewed administrators. So did some of the other candidates, and it didn’t help them.
Perhaps his most inspired stroke was recruiting an army of students from Culver City High School. This was like running an already high-octane car on two batters instead of one. This student-candidate hookup instantly became a match made in Candidate Heaven. Each quickly gravitated toward, and was motivated by, the other’s enthusiasm.
The Student Connection
In an interview shortly before the election, he explained the students’ presence.
Why do you think you have so many students working on your campaign, and do the other candidates have any?
“I’d like to think that these students are working with me because they believe in what I say. But I’m not certain that this is the true reason. Most likely, the students are working with me because I am accessible. I make myself available to them, and I try to make the assignments interesting and educational. The other day, one of the other candidates approached a group of seven students while I was speaking with them. He told them that he “needed two students to work for him on his campaign.” None of the seven joined him.”
Night of Tribute
At Café Roberto last night, the 45-year-old peripatetic Mr. Zeidman hosted a tribute dinner for dozens of supporters.
By precise count: 29 adults, 32 children.
Like much else that Mr. Zeidman touches, it was a tidy, carefully tailored event. Especially with so many children present, by 9 o’clock, two hours after the starting bell, families were on their way home.
Behind the Winner
Three stars of the evening were Culver City election veterans who knew the voter turf. Mr. Zeidman says that Madeline Ehrlich, Sandi Levin and Richard Marcus engineered his School Board victory, that “I was just the face of it.”
Verbal expressions of gratitude were insufficient.
He purchased and delivered a bushel of gifts to illustrate his gratitude.
Who Knew Him?
Despite his considerable career achievements, Mr. Zeidman, a nearly native, probably came into the 2 1/2-month campaign with the lightest name recognition.
Through remarkably hard work, a punishing, energy-driven — and imaginative — campaign schedule, he roared from the back of the five-man field to become the top votegetter.
The Visible Bottom Line
Mr. Zeidman’s victory was neither a fluke nor a mystery.
His victory was brilliantly mapped out, starting with the most available asset of all, his presence and hard work.
To take an unquantifiable concept, Mr. Zeidman likely worked harder than any other candidate to neutralize the lack-of-name-recognition gap.