Seven candidates are vying for three seats on the South Orange-Maplewood Board of Education in the Nov. 5, 2024 election. Village Green invites voters to submit Letters to the Editors in support of candidates. See guidelines below.
Jeff Bennett works tirelessly for this School District and we are excited to submit this letter in support of Jeff’s bid for a seat on the Board of Education. We are grateful for Jeff’s commitment to improve our children’s education and we are confident that he will bring to the Board the same resolve and determination that he has displayed in his advocacy work over the years. It stands out that in much of Jeff’s advocacy, his own children are not the direct beneficiaries of his work. But luckily, many other children throughout this District are.
After this year’s unfortunate accident where two children were hit by a car on Prospect Avenue, and last year, one child hit on S. Pierson and another on Parker Avenue, holding our District leaders accountable for transporting our children to school safely is the number one priority on most parent’s minds.
As many folks recall, in the summer and fall of 2022, it became apparent that the District did not complete a hazardous routes analysis when it implemented its updated transportation policy. We represent the parents who filed pro se petitions for emergent relief with the New Jersey Commissioner of Education to get our children to school safely. When the District failed to conduct the hazardous routes analysis, and then provide the legally-mandated busing in line with the analysis, it left hundreds of our youngest students (ages 5 and up) to navigate routes to and from school that required them to walk along congested county roads and cross at unguarded intersections.
Jeff spent countless hours researching bus capacity and efficient bus routes and compiling important reports. He traced proposed walking routes and gathered information about why those routes were dangerous for our elementary aged children to use as a means to get to and from school. It is because of his resolve and determination that we were successful in finally getting the District to conduct a hazardous routes analysis.
Shortly after the District incorporated the hazardous routes analysis into the transportation policy, additional families voiced concern over new mistakes in the policy. Once again, Jeff volunteered his time by researching routes and collecting data points to help these families, of whom he had never met before. Because of Jeff’s unwavering commitment to improve policies for families, more kids than ever are on buses to school, and every child who is entitled to a bus by law now has one. This community would be lucky to have a thoughtful, data driven leader improving outcomes for all children.
This endorsement is submitted on behalf of:
Letters to the Editors guidelines: Village Green publishes Letters to the Editors in support of candidates. Publishing these letters is at the discretion of the editors. We do not publish letters attacking competing candidates or any person. We aim to publish as many letters as we receive; however, if there is a large volume of letters and they are received late in the race, we cannot guarantee that they will be posted. Letters to the Editors can be submitted to villagegreennj@gmail.com. Please send as a Word or Google document, not as a PDF. Letter writers should provide their name and place of residence (town and state). The deadline for submitting a Letter to the Editor for the Fall 2024 election is Tuesday, October 29, at 5 p.m.
