School Board candidacy explained

I recently wrote an essay about Tim Carr as a candidate for the Newark City Schools board of education. Folks who commented about it raised the question about why Molly Ingold chose to run for Tim’s seat, rather than for one of the vacant seats.

I asked the two candidates that question. Here’s what Molly told me:

“Bruce: I would be glad to address your question.

“Coming into 2009 I had planned on completing my term this December. At that time I believed the current superintendent was planning on retiring in 2010. We (at least I) received a surprise when Mr. Richards decided to retire in 2009. I began to think about the transition from one superintendent to the next and realized it was important to have some consistency and experience on the Board. I decided it was important for me to continue, but wanted to do so for a shorter period of time than 4 more years. Having already served 6 years, 2 more years would complete 8 years - 2 terms, so to speak.

“The night I took out my petitions, I called Tim to personally notify him of my decision so he would hear it from me and not anyone else. At that point he did not have any petition signatures and I thought he might choose to look at a 4 year term having only 9 months under his belt. He obviously decided to stick with the 2 year term as well.

“So I don't look at it as either Molly choosing to run against Tim or Tim choosing to run against Molly, but rather two individuals who made what they thought was the right decision. (Having talked with Tim about this, I know that both of us prayed about the decision before taking action.)

“Thanks for asking. I hope this helps answer your question. Feel free to share this with the other folks you spoke about..........Molly”

And here’s what Tim said:

“Molly told me she only wanted to serve two more years. All of our conversations previously were that she didn't want to run again. She did know my intentions to run for the two year term and to her credit, she called me several weeks later to say she was running against me. I am not aware of any other reasons.

“Sincerely, Tim Carr”