The Orange Unified School District teachers union is going in big time for left-wing Democrat Area 3 candidate Florice Hofffman, throwing a whopping $18,600 in to Hoffman's campaign.

Art Pedroza describes Hoffman as "a caring individual who sincerely wants to make a difference at OUSD."

Terrific. School boards are stuffed with people who "care about the children" and "sincerely want to make a difference," and have been for decades.

They are the same folks who, sitting in the passenger seat next to the public school unions and the bureaucracy, have ruined public education.

Hoffman is a left-wing labor lawyer and hard-core partisan Democrat. Maybe that's some OUSD voters cup of tea, but let's at least take a clear-eyed view of her candidacy.
The "issues" section of her campaign website is boilerplate rhetoric you can find on almost any school board candidate website: "fiscal responsibility," genuflection to the class size reduction totem, improve graduation rates, more technology, yada, yada, yada.

If there were a Wikipedia entry for "generic school board candidate rhetoric" it would be a link to Hoffman's site. Not a single word about anything remotely innovative or effective like "expanding charter schools" or "making parental choice a top priority."

That would be explained by the most salient fact about Hoffman's candidacy, which should be illuminated in neon for the benefit of every OUSD voter: she is the candidate of the OUSD teachers' union. As of Sept. 30, they had invested $18,600 in her candidacy. They may have have given her more since then, and this big dollar drop doesn't include however many thousands the teachers union will spend on pro-Hoffman independent expenditures.

Teachers unions don't lavish money because they are moved by the depth of a candidates devotion "to the children." It's an investment on which they expect a return in the form of loyal support for the union's demands on the taxpayers. The OUSD teachers union clearly believes electing Hoffman to the school board if worth a significant investment, which should tell OUSD voters all they need to know about what Hoffman's priorities will be.

OUSD voters interested in a continuation of the same, ossified approach to public education that has ruined a once great California public school system, and who want to ensure union demands have a strong voice on the OUSD Board of Education -- they should vote for Florice Hoffman.

Fortunately there's an alternative. If OUSD voters want a departure from the groupthink that characterizes the OUSD School Board; if they want a candidate who is not beholden to the special interests that dominate public education; if they want a Trustee who will govern for the benefit of parents and children instead of unions, bureaucrats and the status quo -- then they should vote for Alexis Deligianni.