For those who contend we dump on members of the Fairfax County School Board with regularity and a degree of unbridled enthusiasm – we plead guilty! – it’s worth noting that, every once in a while, we are in agreement with that body.
And it does seem perfectly reasonable to us that members of the School Board voted June 27 to up their pay to $48,000 for members and $50,000 for chairman from the current $32,000/$34,000.
The salary level, set to go into effect Jan. 1 after November’s general election, seems commensurate with the duties involved. And it was less than school-system staff had proposed (roughly $60,000 for members and $62,000 for chair). So there was a degree of restraint not often found among elected bodies, which tend to be ravenous particularly when serving in a one-party community.
(One irony to consider: Three of the current School Board members are leaving their jobs to seek election to the General Assembly – which pays even less than current board members are paid.)
In politics as frequently in life, top performers invariably are underpaid and those who are just phoning it in are grossly overpaid. What type of School Board the Fairfax County public has after November will depend on how the elections turn out.
Voters need to be paying attention; School Board races too often have been run under the radar, allowing for those with fringe ideas (left or right) to find themselves in office. An informed electorate can help to make sure such things don’t happen here.
