Big Business Backing School Board Candidates - Follow the Money
Read campaign finance reports. They are enlightening.
There are a million reasons to vote, but let me give you a really important one. Some of the richest people in El Paso have gotten together to invest some campaign money into candidates. The group is known by a lot of names, but Creed is probably the most noteworthy.
They have dropped some major cash into the school board races in Ysleta and EPISD. You need to know that. And thanks to State Rep Marisa Marquez, now you know where the cash is coming from and who its going to.
Ironically, its going to Forma Group to run their campaigns.
The big business people have dumped about $8,000 just on one candidate in the Bel Air trustee district. The candidate is Mary First Perales. Before I go further, let me explain that she is a really nice lady. Ironically, she really does have a great sense of humor. She and her family are really nice people and I don't think they have any motive to run other than to do the best for kids possible. And her husband is probably the coolest of the whole family. I'd drink beers with Mr. Perales any day. Kinda reminds me of my Uncle Paul.
That being said, what makes her contributions particularly noteworthy is the fact that candidate has no experience with multi-million dollar budgets, no experience teaching students, and no high school diploma.
Those are facts. And yet she received all that money from people like Paul Foster, Woody Hunt, Richard Castro, Raymond Palacios, The Ferrigan Living Trust, Rick Francis, Harold Han, and a host of other big donors.
I doubt a single one of them live in the Bel Air area or even in YISD for that matter.
And that is just one candidate. There's at least one Creed candidate in every EPISD race and to find them all you have to do is look at finance reports and find the ones that paid money to Forma Group. Forma are lobbyists in addition to political consultants.
As you can see here, they are lobbyists for the Texas for Education Reform, not to be confused with the Texas for Lawsuit Reporm, whom they also work for as you can see in this screen shot.
Look, if you support their agenda for more charter schools and privatization of education, thats fine with me. But you should at least know who is funding these people.
By the way, if you're wondering why this is happening now you can blame a recent trip to Tennessee made by the city and business big shots where they heard all types of presentations.
One of which was about their local school districts. Their district was apparently in bad shape and the business community got together and dumped a ton of money into races to get business oriented people into the school board in an effort to improve their education system.
I'm not saying that is a bad idea in and of itself, but I'm saying voters should know who is backing these people.
Personally, I'm suspicious of their motives based on the amount of money they are spreading around. If you think thats a good idea for public education, then by all means vote for those candidates backed by the big dollars.
Its a free country.
There are a million reasons to vote, but let me give you a really important one. Some of the richest people in El Paso have gotten together to invest some campaign money into candidates. The group is known by a lot of names, but Creed is probably the most noteworthy.
They have dropped some major cash into the school board races in Ysleta and EPISD. You need to know that. And thanks to State Rep Marisa Marquez, now you know where the cash is coming from and who its going to.
Ironically, its going to Forma Group to run their campaigns.
The big business people have dumped about $8,000 just on one candidate in the Bel Air trustee district. The candidate is Mary First Perales. Before I go further, let me explain that she is a really nice lady. Ironically, she really does have a great sense of humor. She and her family are really nice people and I don't think they have any motive to run other than to do the best for kids possible. And her husband is probably the coolest of the whole family. I'd drink beers with Mr. Perales any day. Kinda reminds me of my Uncle Paul.
That being said, what makes her contributions particularly noteworthy is the fact that candidate has no experience with multi-million dollar budgets, no experience teaching students, and no high school diploma.
Those are facts. And yet she received all that money from people like Paul Foster, Woody Hunt, Richard Castro, Raymond Palacios, The Ferrigan Living Trust, Rick Francis, Harold Han, and a host of other big donors.
I doubt a single one of them live in the Bel Air area or even in YISD for that matter.
And that is just one candidate. There's at least one Creed candidate in every EPISD race and to find them all you have to do is look at finance reports and find the ones that paid money to Forma Group. Forma are lobbyists in addition to political consultants.
As you can see here, they are lobbyists for the Texas for Education Reform, not to be confused with the Texas for Lawsuit Reporm, whom they also work for as you can see in this screen shot.
Look, if you support their agenda for more charter schools and privatization of education, thats fine with me. But you should at least know who is funding these people.
By the way, if you're wondering why this is happening now you can blame a recent trip to Tennessee made by the city and business big shots where they heard all types of presentations.
One of which was about their local school districts. Their district was apparently in bad shape and the business community got together and dumped a ton of money into races to get business oriented people into the school board in an effort to improve their education system.
I'm not saying that is a bad idea in and of itself, but I'm saying voters should know who is backing these people.
Personally, I'm suspicious of their motives based on the amount of money they are spreading around. If you think thats a good idea for public education, then by all means vote for those candidates backed by the big dollars.
Its a free country.
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