LETTER: Timing, coverage of school-bond vote criticized
The timing of the vote and the lack of discussion relative to the Kalispell school bond issue has given many people the impression our local schools purposely orchestrated the election to maximize their potential for success by minimizing citizen participation. And our local paper didn’t help.
Everyone knows our citizenry uses our short summer months for recreation. If you want to keep discussion to a minimum, have a vote early after the summer has ended. Such was the case with the latest school bond election. It was not till after Labor Day when our citizens started to pay attention to this matter leaving a scant four weeks before the matter was decided. Many question why the bond issue vote was not held on our regular election day, giving us both time to discuss the issue and maximizing the number of voters having the opportunity to express their opinions. The percentage of votes cast were a small fraction of our local school district population.
On top of that, the articles in the Daily Inter Lake gave the appearance our reporters have become a mere extension of our educational community promoting a sales campaign for them rather than exploring deeper and more profound issues involved in this decision. Although it is a lot easier to be a cheerleader than a coach, many rightfully expect more insightful investigation and meaningful analysis of the questions and concerns of our citizenry by our local paper.
In the future I would hope our education community would time bond issues with the goal to promote discussion and maximum participation of our citizenry in the process. Otherwise they give the appearance they are a self-serving public entity — an appearance which I hope they would avoid at all costs. Collaterally I would hope the Daily Inter Lake would review their reporting standards to make certain their articles give a full picture of all the concerns and questions regarding our local schools. I should think it would be imperative with bond issues of the magnitude of the one just passed. —Mark Agather, Kalispell
(EDITOR’S NOTE: The Inter Lake’s school-bond election coverage was designed to let readers know what they would be getting if they decided to pay for the improvements sought by the school district. We are proud of the work done by reporter Hilary Matheson in detailing weaknesses in the current schools and where the money would be spent if the bonds were approved. We provided information; the voters provided the verdict.)