So much to write, so little space....I complained last week about school board candidates who didn’t have the intelligence or integrity to turn in their required financial reports on time. Another report was due eight days before the election, making it due by April 4.

I’m happy to report that most of them turned their reports in on time, with the exception of Ann Hopkins and Ken Bryant, who didn’t turn them in at all.

Even Noel Pinnock, who has had trouble getting his financial reports in on time and filled out correctly, turned his in on May 2. However, he sure has bought a lot of signs with the $1500 a union has given him, That is his only contribution this go round, he claims, The cover sheet summary lists the $1500 expenditure, but Schedule F where it should also be entered along with an explanation of how, where and for what it was spent, is blank.

So even though it was on time, and although this is his third campaign, he still doesn’t know how to fill it out. Or doesn’t care. Or doesn’t want to reveal the true nature of his contributions and expenditures. However, I’d sure like to have the name of his sign company because if he has only collected as much as he says he has, he got a heckav deal!

Now Ken Bryant, who claimed in his first report that he had neither received nor spent a red cent, has done three mail-outs with no money, even a loan from himself (which also has to be reported). This time, he didn’t even bother filling out a report. I know you think I’m probably angsting on this too much, but I think how candidates treat their campaign funds is a future indicator of their honesty and integrity.

Rickert did report some contributions and expenditures this time. (Last time she reported, late, that she had none).This time she said she collected $6,600 contributions, and spent $8,561. Now this would be a typical way that Rickert claims to be a fiscal conservative --spending more than collecting. But she loaned herself $10,000 so her reports shows that she has $9,383 left over. What a way to keep books---all perfectly legal.

The biggest taxes you pay.....After the IRS, the biggest taxes you pay are your school taxes. So whether you have children in school or not, you should keep up with what is going on in your local school district. This is so you can make an informed vote to elect a school board member. The board of trustees is about the only voice you have in school policy. You saw what happened when we let unqualified people run and win a spot on the school board. They put our district back about three years.

Both Lisa Rickert and Ken Bryant are running for re-election. They and some of their cohorts (who we can take care of next year), are directly responsible for the chaos that ensued in the past three years. We MUST pay attention to whom we elect to the school board. Please vote. And if you don’t know who to vote for, ask a teacher. Or read the front page editorials of this paper.

Pandering to the left, pandering to the right.....But the worst example of campaigning has got to be the way Rickert and Bryant, and Bryant’s stalking horse Stan Magee, have contacted every dissent group that ever came before the board in FBISD and promised to support them in the future.

It started with the Chinese student who was sent to alternative school for changing a shoot-em-up computer game to reflect Clements High School topography.

The school district hired two special teachers to teach him the last few weeks in alternative school. His mother, who appeared before the board to protest long before going through the disciplinary rungs to have his punishment rescinded, was told the student would graduate, but could not walk across the stage with his class.

Rickert, Bryant, and Magee tried to have the discipline levels aborted by calling a special board meeting, although the student and his parents had been told they could accomplish all the levels before graduation. However, the other board members did not show up for the special meeting, which then lacked a quorum. Then, lo and behold, I received an email from an ice hockey mom saying she had received a phone call from Lisa Rickert stating that she was in favor of granting the group club status. This mom reported further meeting with Bryant and Magee and included a plea to vote for Ken Bryant and Lisa Rickert with her email, which I assume went out to all the ice hockey parents.

This pandering became so flagrant that I was laughing about it with a friend and jokingly said I’ll bet they try to enlist the votes of those Colony Bend parents protesting the demotion of their principal who subsequently resigned.

My friend said to hold on; he was emailing me just such a pander.

Sure enough, it was an email from Stan Magee telling the recipient of the email what the community could do about reinstating Principal Tammie Carpenter. It ended with a plea to vote for Ken Bryant as Ken felt, according to Magee, just like the parents.

For Missouri City residents.....I’m sorry for running on so. I always tell my writers that nobody will read something as long as this is getting to be, but I have one more topic to cover before I close.

I have checked with numerous sources and it appears there is indeed some question about Cynthia Lenton-Gary’s residency. Lenton-Gary listed a home in Hunters Glen as her residency but many people claim she lives in Plantation Colony on the west side of FM1092. That would put her legal residency as District C, instead of the District B she is running for.

As Stafford Mayor Leonard Scarcella can tell us from his dealings with a school board member in Stafford MSD, proving someone’s legal residency is hard when they claim they live some place else. Most court rulings have come to say that it is the person’s “intent” which is important. Or where they plan to “return.”

Here are the facts: Cynthia Lenton-Gary has a 2002 Ford auto registered as of July 14, 2006 at 4003 Royal Plantation--Dist. C.

Cynthia Lenton-Gary has a homestead exemption on a house at 4003 Royal Plantation as of May 7, 2007--Dist. C

C.E. Lenton Sr. owns a house at 1311 Mossridge Dr. in Hunters Glen at of May 7, 2007--Dist. B He has an over-65 exemption and homestead exemption for this house--Dist. B.

Cynthia Lenton Gary was born in 1958, making her 49 years old. Either her 66-year-old father or her 66-year-old ex-husband owns the house in Hunters Glen Dist. B which she uses to run for office. Her voters register is for the Mossridge address--Dist. B and her drivers license is for Mossridge--Dist. B.

Since even the Supreme Court has not dealt decisively with the residency issue (remember that Dick Cheney really lived in Texas yet he ran for Vice-President from Wyoming), it would seem that even if Lenton-Gary is not living in the district for which she is running, there’s not a whole lot anyone can do about it.