Three Egg Harbor Twp School Board candidates support Liberty and Prosperity positions.

Six candidates are running for three open slots on Egg Harbor Township Board of Education.?? Five came to our Saturday breakfasts. ?We?evaluated the candidates and are?posting our unanimous findings.?? We believe these?three candidates have the knowledge and commitment to advance Point #7 of our Nine Point Program for Liberty and Prosperity in NJ for 2015.

They are (in order of ballot position) #1 Amber Umphlett, #3 Pete Castellano, and #5 John ?Jack? Haines.?? They presented themselves as?smart, articulate, effective, and supporters of?our principles.???They have a strategy to limit spending and taxes. They effectively oppose administrators who want to waste money on their pet projects. They support proven, effective education methods?not expensive fads. They oppose Common Core curriculum and unnecessary standardized tests. They respect home schoolers who take an enormous burden off the taxpayers.2015-0129-eht-high-school

Incumbent candidate Lisa Dagit was also very knowledgeable and prepared.???But our education committee reported that she?has not pushed back against unnecessary spending.?? At our breakfast, she spoke in support of the?Common Core curriculum and more standardized tests.?? Also, Dagit is?an administrator in Hamilton Township Public Schools, which we believe puts her in a conflict of interest with EHT taxpayers.???Candidate Mike Price seemed unprepared and?unfamiliar with the main issues. Gary Battisti did not attend any of our breakfasts. School Board candidates will appear in a special section of the Tuesday, November 3 ballot.

This is a preliminary report.??Before publicizing it,?we invite you to discuss them with us at our breakfast this Saturday, 9:30 AM to 10:30 AM at the Shore Diner, Tilton and Fire Roads by Parkway Exit 36 in Egg Harbor Township.

6 thoughts on “Three Egg Harbor Twp School Board candidates support Liberty and Prosperity positions.”

  1. This email is in response to the article regarding the 3 EHT School Board Candidates. While we all have the freedom to vote for the candidates that we believe will best meet the needs of our community (students, educators & taxpayers), it is most important that one’s facts are accurate when making such decisions.

    “But our education committee reported that she has not pushed back against unnecessary spending”. Your education committee has a strong bias for candidates and as a result has reported falsely to your organization! The she referred to is me, Lisa Dagit. I, Lisa Dagit am the ONLY candidate to vote “NO” to the EHT School District Budget for the past three years! Two of the candidates that you are supporting, that you quote in your article “They have a strategy to limit spending and taxes” have voted YES”!

    Be careful for what you wish for……………….these two candidates have NEVER once in the last three years during my tenure on the board looked for cutting taxes for the taxpayer. They may be expressing a dislike for a current Reading Program and the associated materials and professional development required for startup of this program, as well as associating these costs as wasteful, but I guarantee you if given the opportunity to reallocate these funds in another way, they will move to find other directions for spending the funds, rather than give back to the taxpayers!!! NEVER once have they proposed to going below CAP and providing suggestions on how to do so! When I, Lisa Dagit have repeatedly made this suggestion for the past three budgets, they have both looked the other way!!

    I stand by my INTEGRITY……a most valuable characteristic to possess!!

    Do the two incumbents you are supporting have integrity? Time will tell!

    Truthfully,
    Lisa C. Dagit

  2. There was much interest, discussion, and participation in making this decision. I cannot speak for everyone who participated, or on every detail. I can say there was a consensus from those who attended EHT Board of Ed meetings that while Lisa Dagit did in fact routinely vote against the final budget, she routinely voted with administration for spending requests during the school year that forced the final budget to be too high. The members were impressed with Lisa Dagit’s knowledge and preparation and conceded that this was a difficult decision. But they concluded that the students and taxpayers would be better served by an additional citizen board member not tied to the professional education establishment. We know that the voters have been hearing both sides of this discussion, and hope they end up doing what is best.

  3. While I appreciate the organizations interest, discussion and decision making process, there are always two sides to every story.

    While I, Lisa Dagit may have voted yes for educational materials for curriculum, instruction and programs that I believed would benefit our students’ education (my yes votes were based on my 30 plus years in education, almost 10 of them in curriculum & instruction) I did routinely vote “NO” to hiring additional staff members in a district that has declining enrollment. I provided an avenue (personnel related) to administration and shared it openly at board meetings on how to reduce the budget and bring it in under CAP. I, Lisa Dagit did not force the budget to high…I voted “NO”. With that being said, when you are the only one of nine members moving in this direction with NO support from any other board member, one NO vote is not going to bring about the change needed to bring the budget in under CAP and thus providing the taxpayers relief! If reduced taxes are a desire of this organization, the first step is to vote NO to a budget that is at CAP!!!

    I am curious who these organization members are that routinely attend BOE meetings, other than the two I am aware of, as they were in attendance the morning I spoke at your meeting! Maybe they missed the meetings where I have voted “NO” to personnel or maybe they have a selective memory in order to create a bias!

    As stated in my original comment, PLEASE make sure you have your facts correct before voting and of course vote your conscience!

  4. Please do not mistake bias for a decision based on a couple of years of observations and careful consideration of the facts by multiple people with broad perspectives. And the facts are not limited to the active endorsement of the adoption of the expensive American Reading Company (that many parents and teachers had tremendous issue with). Your support of Common Core State Standards and PARCC also factors in heavily. The committee, in good conscience, had no choice. Clearly Amber Umphlett, Pete Castellano, and Jack Haines aligned more closely with the L&P values.

    We do wish you the best in the election.

  5. Just curious…..in addition to having concerns with Common Core and PARCC does
    Liberty & Prosperity also desire reduced school taxes in EHT?

  6. I want to know what candidates are going to push back on this LGBT agenda that is happening in this state! The department of child welfare should be the one that handles any issues not a public school. Period! Governor Murphys push to take parents rights away is against our god given rights! No one in the school system in this state should allow this to happen!

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