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Page 8, May 10, 1973, PHOENIXSchool ElectionsDisappointmentThe recent school board elections are both a disappointment and a lesson.It is a tragedy that after all the wrangling and fighting that was done for the right to select community school boards, there should be fewer local people voting to make that choice the second time than voted in the first elections three years ago. It is appalling that the administration of the election should have been so sloppy, from the setting of the date through the voting process, that it becomes the basis for legal action that casts doubt on the results. It is particularly appalling that a worse job is done the second time proportional voting took place than the first. ( It%u2019s not as though there was no modern history of using this method of balloting in New York either. While some of the Board of Election habits and customs hark back to the Neanderthal Age, the period ending in the 1940%u2019s when the New York City Council was elected by this method seems to have been erased from the Board%u2019s recorded history).What's the lesson? It seems to be one that wasn%u2019t given. With all the experts on teaching that must be sitting around 110 Livingston St., it fell to the heroic, if meagerly-financed efforts of a private group, the Public Education Association, to find ways to get information to interested voters about candidates and the voting process. There was little or no attempt by either the Citywide educational structure, or by the local boards to do much of this. We think that all the educational talent that is on the public payroll in this town should have been able to teach us dimwitted voters what it meant to vote, and how and why the system used should be more fair. Public schools in California, among other places, use proportional representation and find it works to better advantage, than straight voting. Here, given the poor public information system, it works worse.Finally, there almost seems to be a conspiracy between the Board of Education and the Board of Elections to make certain things go poorly at school election time. This was the second time, and it was worse than the first. From the setting of the date, through the administration of the voting, things were conceived and done badly, if not illegally. The date was apparently set by one board without consultation with the other. The Board of Elections deliberately set out to administer the voting in a way that was a clear violation of law, and providently the Legislature changed the law, rather than see a 11th hour postponement of the vote, which would have made a mockery of the entire process.At the polling place we voted at, there were 8 voters clustered around a 4-by-4 foot table (no booth) with two pencils and one sample ballot (the gift of one of the many slates competing for votes). Four of the eight voters were clustered around a fifth (the other three of us thought we knew what we were doing) who mercifully had the sample ballot which provided a %u201c road map%u201d to the process. When one of the election inspectors summoned the policeman on duty to complain that they were copying each other%u2019s ballot, one of the voters got irate: %u201cWhat business is it of yours how we vote?%u201d he asked. %u201cWe%u2019re here aren%u2019t we? We%u2019re doing our duty.%u201d Which is probably more than you can say about those who put the thing together.Do you have something to say?W# w elcom e your contributions totbo PHOENIX Community Forum PagoProfor 500-750 word longth.Send Your Material to: Editor,PHulN IX, 132 Clinton St., Brooklyn.Michael A. Armstrong, Publisher132 CLINTON ST.,BROOKLYN 11201TEL 643%u20141032A waterside park on the historic Brooklyn waterfront, or this kind of vista? The choice right nowappears to be no choice. On May 24 the anniversary of the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge will be celebrated, but it isn%u2019t going to help the area around the base of the bridge. The ceremonies are set for the more tidy Cadman Plaza Park, in front of the State Supreme Court Building. An ambitious proposal has been floated in the current issue of the \ South Street Seaport, for creation of a Bicentennial Park that would include Fulton Ferry as well as other East River edges, and we will report on it here in coming weeks.Lewis Rudin, chairman of the Association for a Better New York (ABNY) has urged local officeseekers to temper their rhetoric about New York%u2019s problems to save the city from becoming a %u201c wounded noncombatant.%u201d%u201c Too often, New Yorkers only defend their city when they are out of town,%u201d Rudin said. %u201c We have to %u2018talk it up%u2019 at home. That is the only cure for the general malaise afflicting New York. This is $ particularly important in$ this election year.Vi Words(Breakj: I Citym(Bones%u201c In the midst of political battle, New York often becomes a wounded noncombatant. It is our hope that those seeking elective office will temper their remarks about the city, itself, and concentrate on developing positive issues.\%u201cThis city,\%u201c desperately needs more old-fashion boosters, people who are unafraid to say: %u2018Yes, I love this city. It's not perfect, but what community is? I believe that New York is the best of the lot and that%u2019s why I live here.%u201d %u2019II&sst1'Don%u2019t Quote Me, But .JBY SCORPIOIf This Is What It Means To Be Friends Department: Just after the November election at which local Congressman John Rooney was returned to his umpteenth term, he sent the following letter to Sebastian Leone, Brooklyn Borough President, who like Congressman Rooney, is a regular recipient of support from the Brooklyn Democratic organization: %u201c This is toacknowledge receipt of your letters of recent date with regard to a number of drug treatment and prevention program which will appear on the Board of Estimate Calendar. I do not know the first thing about drugs; have no staff acquainted with the subject and under the circumstances I cannot be of any value to you to assist in your duties. With kindest regards, Sincerely, John J. Rooney.%u201d%u2605 %u2605 %u2605An interesting memo has gone out from the Bay Ridge Block Association Council, Inc., that bears repeating in every neighborhood in town. Addressed to %u201c All Politicians,%u201d its subject was \Posters.%u201d While the memo was a contrived political blast at Borough PresidentCandidate Steve Solarz for his postering activity all over the Borough, it made an eloquent testimony, applicable to all candidates for every office, pleading for restraint in slapping political posters on every smooth surface in sight.%u2605 %u2605 %u2605Tom Cuite, Majority Leader and local councilman for a good hunk of South Brooklyn and Park Slope may have bitten off more than he bargained for in the latest maneuvering to prevent Intro 475, the Gay Rights Bill, from coming to a vote. The publicity given his famous private and personal arm-twisting habits is going to cause other councilman to be less and less susceptible to his techniques, which depend on privacy. We may be watching a real revolution in the City Council in the next tew years, and one of its casualties is likely to be Cuite, no matter whether he retains his seat or not here. %u2605%u2605%u2605Just in case anybody reading this column didn't get an invitation, as a public service we want to report that a $100-aticket benefit cocktail party isset for the St. Regis Hotel in Manhattan, May 23, for a legal defense fund for Norman A. Levy, former president of the City Tax Commission and leader of the John V. Lindsay Association of Brooklyn. Treasurer and the only officer of the fund is City Councilman Fred Richmond. Address of the Fund is 43 Pierrepont St., Brooklyn, Mr. Richmond's local residence.%u2605 %u2605 %u2605The Biaggi affair,\as newspapermen are calling it, seems to have cast a pall over political campaigning this year across the town. Local council candidates are the worst casualties of all, especially the challengers. No one seems to care about the candidates for Mayor, much less someone on the bottom of the ballot. Here, Councilman Fred Richmond appears to be conducting no campaign at all in the HeightsHill areas. Challenger Bob Wittich is out at the subways, on street corners, and at the usual block party affairs, but his workers say privately that between Watergate and Biaggi, everybody seems to be %u201cturned off.\