Anoka-Hennepin school district school board elections

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Yep, you're probably thinking how could these ever be interesting...well they're actually some of the most interesting elections.

To understand why the Anoka-Hennepin school district is one that covers most of Anoka County and a few suburban areas in northern Hennepin County, hence the name. It's not a particularly socially conservative area and voted for Biden by about 3 points by my estimate and voted for Obama twice, but in the past the school board elections have been targeted by extremist social conservatives in non-partisan elections without much attention paid to thus resulting in disproportionate influence. Around 2009 candidates backed by a socon group called the Parents Action League (sponsored by the Minnesota Family Council) won a majority and started passing controversial socially conservative policies such as a "free speech" defense for students which was really about allowing most anti-LGBT bullying and harassment and a "neutrality" policy that prohibited teachers from "promoting" LGBT "lifestyles", basically a ban on allowing teachers to provide support for bullied students for that. After this there were multiple student suicides in the district, at a per capita rate over twice the state numbers. The State Department of Health intervened suspending those policies and eventually the extremists on the board were voted out and the board voted to repeal them altogether. The Parents Action League meanwhile was designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center and went effectively defunct. The whole incident got national attention and a notable Rolling Stone article.

Today meanwhile conservatives have upped the culture war in school districts again with Ron DeSantis' policies in Florida getting attention, and a push for similar ones nationwide. The PAL is dead, but there's a new group called the "Minnesota Parents Alliance" who announced their campaign kickoff with a rally of crossed out LGBT flag signs who backed some candidates for various school districts in 2022, although almost all of them lost. And yet they're making a push here with standard new dogwhistles about "parental rights" and whatnot, making their candidates easy to identify. Anoka-Hennepin has three competitive districts this year, all being challenged by such a candidate.

District 1: This consists of Anoka proper, part of west Andover, part of west Coon Rapids and south and western Ramsey with the incumbent being Erin Heers-McArdle. She has a challenger in Linda Hokeman. Hokeman's platform is full of dogwhistles about "parental rights" and "fiscally conservative" and "keeping politics and ideology out of the classroom" which in effect all means the sort of stuff Ron DeSantis implemented. Heers-McArdle has always been endorsed by the teachers union, but this is one of the more conservative districts on the board and narrowly voted for Trump but also for Walz in 2022 by a hair, but in an odd year the electorate will be quite different from both.

District 2: Based in Blaine and part of eastern Coon Rapids. An open seat with two candidates: Zach Arco and Susan Witt. Witt is a retired former elementary school teacher backed by the teachers union and has openly opposed book bans and these sort of anti-LGBT policies, while Arco has been sending out mailers using the conservative dogwhistle talking points in a way that sounds like it was authored by ChatGPT. This is a district both Biden and Walz won by a small but solid margin.

District 5: parts of Brooklyn Center, Brooklyn Park, southern Coon Rapids and all of Fridley, this is a three way race: Michelle Langenfeld, Scott Simmons, and Cyrus Wilson. Langenfeld is a retired school superintended backed by the teachers union. Simmons is a conservative attorney openly endorsed by the local Republican Party, as well as the Minnesota Parents Alliance. Wilson is an IT professional who seems to be running a bit of a woke-tinted campaign using terms like "equity" and openly supports expanding DEI programs. This is the most liberal district in the entire school district and both Biden and Walz won over 60% here, but of course odd year electorate and a 3-way race could result in Langenfeld and Wilson splitting the vote although I doubt that because Wilson seems to have no establishment backing and this is not the sort of place where that sort of stuff appeals to even the Democrats, but there's a clear partisan choice.

Will report on the results in November. Again in 2022 almost all such candidates were rejected, including in more conservative districts, but that was also a year with much higher turnout and Walz romping at the top of the ticket.

[Sol]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

One school district covering all of Hennepin County would not go well to put it mildly.

[Sol]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

One school district covering all of Hennepin County would not go well to put it mildly.

FWIW, that's how (most) school districts in North Carolina work, and aside from suburban grumbling it seems to work fine. Apparently all of Miami-Dade is one district also?

(North Carolina actually has a few municipal school districts, though the distribution is kind of uncorrelated with being urban vs. rural; the largest city with one is Asheville but most are big towns in the Piedmont, like Thomasville, Lexington, Kannapolis, etc.)

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

One school district covering all of Hennepin County would not go well to put it mildly.

FWIW, that's how (most) school districts in North Carolina work, and aside from suburban grumbling it seems to work fine. Apparently all of Miami-Dade is one district also?

(North Carolina actually has a few municipal school districts, though the distribution is kind of uncorrelated with being urban vs. rural; the largest city with one is Asheville but most are big towns in the Piedmont, like Thomasville, Lexington, Kannapolis, etc.)

Minneapolis would hate this just as much as the suburbs. You'd have a majority suburban board running Minneapolis schools. Teachers unions wouldn't like it either because their candidates usually win Minneapolis School Board elections (and thankfully they usually support candidates similar to the ones here, not complete weirdos like those ones who got recalled in San Francisco or the "woke segregationists" who seem to be gaining influence in some school districts.)

[Minnesota Mike]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

Naw, this would be a disaster in most of Minnesota. I live in a small town in the corner of a county, we have kids from four different counties in our school district. How does it make sense for kids who literally live a half mile from the our school to go to another school district? Honestly when it comes to communities of interest school district lines make a whole lot more sense than county lines that were drawn 150 years ago.

[Sol]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

Naw, this would be a disaster in most of Minnesota. I live in a small town in the corner of a county, we have kids from four different counties in our school district. How does it make sense for kids who literally live a half mile from the our school to go to another school district? Honestly when it comes to communities of interest school district lines make a whole lot more sense than county lines that were drawn 150 years ago.

I mean there are always boundaries right? There are always going to be peripheral areas on the edge of a school district, regardless of how the districts are drawn.

In any case, students usually go to local schools in their area, regardless of how the districts are drawn. The difference is going to be basically administrative, and it seems to me that aligning school district boundaries with other local government entities makes local government more transparent to voters who aren't paying as close attention.

[Minnesota Mike]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

Naw, this would be a disaster in most of Minnesota. I live in a small town in the corner of a county, we have kids from four different counties in our school district. How does it make sense for kids who literally live a half mile from the our school to go to another school district? Honestly when it comes to communities of interest school district lines make a whole lot more sense than county lines that were drawn 150 years ago.

I mean there are always boundaries right? There are always going to be peripheral areas on the edge of a school district, regardless of how the districts are drawn.

In any case, students usually go to local schools in their area, regardless of how the districts are drawn. The difference is going to be basically administrative, and it seems to me that aligning school district boundaries with other local government entities makes local government more transparent to voters who aren't paying as close attention.

It's so much more than just administrative, it's everything from bus routes to having a vote in the School Board election for the school your kids go to.  I don't want to derail this thread because Anoka-Hennepin school district is very different than my local district (Anoka-Hennepin is probably at least 100X larger) just would like to reiterate that basing school districts soley on county lines would be unworkable and stupid where I live.

[Sol]

Always very perplexing to me that most states don't organize school districts by county.

Naw, this would be a disaster in most of Minnesota. I live in a small town in the corner of a county, we have kids from four different counties in our school district. How does it make sense for kids who literally live a half mile from the our school to go to another school district? Honestly when it comes to communities of interest school district lines make a whole lot more sense than county lines that were drawn 150 years ago.

I mean there are always boundaries right? There are always going to be peripheral areas on the edge of a school district, regardless of how the districts are drawn.

In any case, students usually go to local schools in their area, regardless of how the districts are drawn. The difference is going to be basically administrative, and it seems to me that aligning school district boundaries with other local government entities makes local government more transparent to voters who aren't paying as close attention.

It's so much more than just administrative, it's everything from bus routes to having a vote in the School Board election for the school your kids go to.  I don't want to derail this thread because Anoka-Hennepin school district is very different than my local district (Anoka-Hennepin is probably at least 100X larger) just would like to reiterate that basing school districts soley on county lines would be unworkable and stupid where I live.

I'm sorry, I just don't understand how organizing school boards by county would be unworkable--could you explain? I'm sorry, I just really don't get it.

[Minnesota Mike]

I'm sorry, I just don't understand how organizing school boards by county would be unworkable--could you explain? I'm sorry, I just really don't get it.

At least concerning the SD I live in I think this may be a case of not understanding how things work in a rural area. I live in a town of about 2,000 people, the SD encompasses the town and the rural areas surrounding the town extending about 10-15 miles surrounding the town. Maybe 60% of the kids are from my town and 40% from the farms/acreages that surround it.  That area is parts of 4 different counties. There is 1 grade school (K-6) and 1 middle/high school (7-12). If you align school districts with counties do you ship the kids out in 4 different directions? Do you close the local school (and as good as kill the town)? Will those decisions be made by a school board dominated by members of a much larger town 20 miles away? The current SD boundaries make a whole lot more sense than forcing boundries based on county lines drawn 150 years ago.

[Sol]

I'm sorry, I just don't understand how organizing school boards by county would be unworkable--could you explain? I'm sorry, I just really don't get it.

At least concerning the SD I live in I think this may be a case of not understanding how things work in a rural area. I live in a town of about 2,000 people, the SD encompasses the town and the rural areas surrounding the town extending about 10-15 miles surrounding the town. Maybe 60% of the kids are from my town and 40% from the farms/acreages that surround it.  That area is parts of 4 different counties. There is 1 grade school (K-6) and 1 middle/high school (7-12). If you align school districts with counties do you ship the kids out in 4 different directions? Do you close the local school (and as good as kill the town)? Will those decisions be made by a school board dominated by members of a much larger town 20 miles away? The current SD boundaries make a whole lot more sense than forcing boundries based on county lines drawn 150 years ago.

There are similar areas in North Carolina and they have a few different approaches:
-Some towns, like I referenced upthread, have their own school districts. This probably wouldn't be the case in the scenario you describe, but it is a possibility
-In a few cases, school board boundaries are tweaked so cities which substantially span county boundaries are put in one district. For example, areas of Chapel Hill in Durham County are all in Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools.
-It's also very common to allow people from a town split by a county line attend school in either district. In Watauga County, people from areas in Blowing Rock in Caldwell County can go to Watauga County schools.

I don't know where you are but I assume they would shift around the school catchement areas without closing schools if they switched to a different system. I.e. students come from further away areas in the county, while those across the line go to schools in their county.

To clarify, I'm not saying that MN has to switch to that system, just pointing out that it works just as well (and is potentially a bit more redistributive).

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Here's an interactive map of all of the school districts in Minnesota: https://education.mn.gov/Maps/EdMap

As you can see in rural areas there's often still multiple ones per county, and nesting them by county wouldn't be very logical. Also it lets you view the schools themselves, and you can see in rural areas they're usually very centrally located.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

One of the few negative spots tonight:

Nonpartisan   Linda Hoekman   2,490   55.74%   
Nonpartisan   Erin Heers-McArdle   1,971   44.12%   
WRITE-IN   WRITE-IN   6   0.13%   

Nonpartisan   Susan Witt   2,189   49.83%   
Nonpartisan   Zach Arco   2,202   50.13%   
WRITE-IN   WRITE-IN   2   0.05%   

Nonpartisan   Scott Simmons   1,405   43.16%   
Nonpartisan   Cyrus Wilson   67   2.06%   
Nonpartisan   Michelle Langenfeld   1,775   54.53%   
WRITE-IN   WRITE-IN   8   0.25%   

The board still has a 5-2 liberal/moderate majority though.