Each of the three incumbents on the Orange County Board of Education, as well as Superintendent Al Mijares, are poised to win another term in the election.
Each incumbent leads the race by a wide margin as of Thursday evening, according to the Orange County Registrar of Voters.
Unlike most races, the board’s June elections are final once certified, meaning candidates that win this election can officially claim seats on the board.
Mijares, who has served as superintendent since 2012, gained 55.1 percent of the vote, while challenger Stefan Bean—a superintendent managing the Los Angeles region of charter school system Aspire Public Schools—is at 44.8 percent.
In the race for District 2—which covers the southwest portion of the county—incumbent and board president Mari Barke leads with 59.8 percent of the vote, while opponent Martha Fluor, a former Newport-Mesa Unified school board member for 29 years, gained 30.3 percent of the vote, and architect Christopher Ganiere trails with 9.8 percent.
Barke told The Epoch Times she looks forward to continuing advocating for parental choice and school choice.
“You know, the last election, I won by barely 5 percent,” Barke said. “This year, I won by about 30 percent. That really tells me that voters want me to continue the work we’ve been doing with charter schools, with protecting parental rights, and with always putting the kids first. They want to be heard, they want us to listen to them, and they want us to educate them about the various education issues coming out of Sacramento.”
Incumbent Lisa Sparks has the widest lead in the race for coastal District 5 with 65.1 percent of the vote, while opponent Sherine Smith, a former superintendent of Laguna Beach Unified School District, trails with 34.8 percent.
In northwest Orange County’s District 4, candidates are running to fill a partial term—the remaining two years left by incumbent Tim Shaw, who was elected to the seat in 2020 and has been temporarily blocked from serving on the board due to a recent court ruling.
Shaw resigned from the board in November 2021 over a lawsuit that alleged he had a conflict of interest by serving on both the board and the La Habra City Council simultaneously. Just one month later, however, his fellow trustees voted to re-appoint him to his old seat.
In April, Shaw was blocked by a judge from serving on the board again due to another lawsuit that claims Shaw’s re-appointment violated state law.
Shaw is currently leading the District 4 race with 50.8 percent of the vote while opponent Paulette Chaffee—an attorney, former teacher, and wife of the county Supervisor Dough Chaffee—gained 30.3 percent.
Other District 4 candidates Ellisa Kim, a business owner, and David Choi, an accountant, trail behind at 10.4 percent and 8.3 percent respectively.
Shaw told The Epoch Times he feels “relieved” to see his election numbers so far, and that he looks forward to putting the past year behind him.
“It was a long campaign, but I’m grateful to the voters for giving me this opportunity and thrilled to be re-joining my great colleagues, putting the political stuff behind us, getting down to work for the schools,” Shaw said.
Shaw said the incumbents’ leading numbers tell him Orange County voters supported the trustees’ positions on education.
“People know what we stood for and what we believed,” Shaw said. “I think it’s ratifying of the positions we’ve been taking in favor of parental choice ... and against the sexualization of children and other weird curriculum coming out of Sacramento. We stand against that, and I think the voters of Orange County agree.”
Though Mijares currently leads the polls, Shaw—who endorsed Bean along with Barke, Sparks, and fellow trustee Ken Williams—said he has spoken with election experts and is still unsure of the superintendent race’s outcome.
The board majority has sued Mijares multiple times in the past few years, arguing that the board should have more control of the education department’s budget rather than the superintendent having the final say.
Barke said she will continue the fight for more control over the budget.
“We’re going to fight for the rights that we have as trustees legally given to us by the [state] education code,” she said. “And I will continue to do that will continue to hold [the superintendent] accountable to the voters, to Orange County, and to us.”
Shaw said he hoped the board and the superintendent could one day have a good working relationship.
“Whoever wins, I’m happy to work with a superintendent who will respect the prerogatives of the board, and the board [will] respect the prerogatives of the superintendent,” Shaw said. “If we could have a good working relationship, that would be ideal and something I’m more than happy to engage in.”
Mijares recently said he hopes to find common ground and work together to better serve the school community, according to the Orange County Register.
“We must remember that is important to us, where possible, to lay aside our political differences and find common ground in order to more effectively serve our students and their families, as well as the staff and faculty who serve them,” Mijares said.
The election results will be certified on July 7.
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