Madison School Board Candidate (Seat 2) Candidate Lucy Mathiak, via Kristian Knutsen:
Although I understand your interest in exploring the political impact of on-line communication, I was dismayed to see a piece that went beyond questions of blog influence to focus on my campaign in a way that made it appear that the memo in question was a thinly-disguised campaign ploy.
Certainly your omission of the coverage and support given to Arlene Silveira’s campaign on the SIS blog makes it appear that this resource is the personal territory of Maya Cole and me. Similarly, you neglected to mention that Michael Kelly and Juan Jose Lopez are not a presence on the site because they have chosen to not use the blog to communicate with potential voters.
Kristian includes some useful links with his post, including incumbent School Board candidate Juan Jose Lopez’s statement on blogs.
I mentioned some of the many techniques used locally to (try to) influence the media here. Having said all that, I’m ecstatic that there’s a growing discussion, online, regarding these local school board races. Perhaps we might have a bit of coverage of the upcoming middle school math forum, next Wednesday (2.22.2006).
Juan’s statement says, “Most of my work as a Board member involves reading documents, listening and responding to people’s concerns through personal conversations, telephone calls, and emails.”
However, he rarely, rarely answers any of my e-mails to him. He does answer when I say something that so irritates or angers him that he seems compelled to answer. Otherwise, I get no response at all.
At the board meeting to consider an outside analysis of the MMSD’s business services, Juan came into the meeting and said, “I haven’t read the [materials] on the evaluation of business services, but I’m gonna’ tell ya’. I’m voting against it.”
The reality of my experience with Juan does not support his statement on blogs and communications.