School Board Candidates Stay on Message

    Challengers and incumbents for three Central School Board seats maintained their campaign stances at the CCA School Board candidate forum Tuesday evening.  The incumbents touted Central’s excellent schools.  The challengers also recognized the academic successes, but are concerned about the impact on taxpayers and the lack of competitive teacher pay.  
    Challengers Philip Zeigler, Nick Carmena and Felicia Braud asserted that the way to maintain Central’s excellent schools is to fairly compensate Central’s teachers by giving them cost of living raises, which they have not received in over seven years.  They maintain that Central’s low pay scale is causing teachers to leave for better jobs in neighboring school systems.
    The challengers pledged to address the $20 million unfunded retirement liability that has accrued over the first seven years of the system’s operations, and to develop long term facilities plans that minimize property taxes.
    Incumbents Will Easley, Ruby Foil and Sharon Browning are staking their re-election on the past successes and reputation of the school system.  Easley stated “If you are looking for a lot of changes in the school system, don’t vote for me.”  Browning added “I will continue to be the same type of Board Member that I have been for seven years.”