Letter to the Editor

 I am one of the biggest proponents of school funding that I know and I strongly support the school budget in our school district, but I was appalled by the methods that were used to sway votes for the Owego-Apalachin School Budget at the Owego and Apalachin Elementary Schools (OES and AES).

 There is a long-standing law that prohibits campaigning at voting places that is meant to prevent warring political factions from pressuring voters, and at OES and AES, the Teacher's Association set up a veritable propaganda war. Aside from scheduling the OES ice cream social and AES science fair for that night in an effort to accumulate votes from uninformed or apathetic parents, there was also a contest between classes, organized by the teachers, over which class (K-12) could round up the most votes from parents, who had to deposit a slip of colored paper into a drop box at the voting place. Outside OES, some students begged voters to approve the budget as they entered the school to vote, saying things like, "We don't want to lose our music program!"

 Furthermore, AES had only one voting booth, causing voters to wait in line for an hour to vote. While they waited, the pro-budget faction held its rally (the open house and science fair), deliberately barraging voters with propaganda. When time ran out and the emergency write-in ballots had to be passed out, it was two members of the Teachers' Association that did the distributing - which to me is the same thing as candidates for a public office passing out voters in their own election.

 Talk about pressuring the voters. School budget votes should be organized by a third party and should not occur at the schools that the budget will affect. I don't like cheating, even if it is on my side.

Peter Berg
OFA Student, Class of 2003 Salutatorian