Editorial: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

The virulent, hateful tone that marred several District 15 school board election campaigns of recent years did not re-emerge this time. When the polls open on Tuesday, May 11, the two slates of candidates who face off will do so after having conducted a largely uneventful and respectful campaign.

This is emphatically not to say that this election is unimportant - it is very important. In fact, it demands the attention of all voters in the district.

We urge everyone eligible to do so to make certain that they vote, and we recommend that they vote to allow the incumbents, Solomon Blisko, David Sussman and Nahum Marcus, to serve another term.

We are not averse to the idea of throwing incumbents out of office (see: Albany, almost everybody), but the current board, led by Murray Forman, is doing a fine job overall. Particularly with the touchy issue of the teachers’ contract coming up, we urge that they be allowed to continue, and cement their accomplishments in the area of responsible raising and spending of tax dollars, as well in running an overall solid educational program and making significant improvements in the physical plant of the schools.

In addition to our overall belief that the incumbents are well suited to continue their service, we offer several specific thoughts about their challengers.

First, we sincerely commend and appreciate the overall tenor of the campaign conducted by Jay Silverstein, Annie Reyes and Nicole Di Lorio. While true disagreements remain over how the school system is being run, the three challengers conducted themselves in the best spirit of community cooperation.

Dr. Silverstein, on paper, is well suited to be a school board member. He is a professional educator with experience in District 15. However, he recently parted ways with the district under unpleasant circumstances and is currently suing for damages. While Silverstein volunteered to recuse himself from discussions concerning his lawsuit during future service on the board, it just seems to us that, at the very least, this was the wrong time for him to be a candidate.

Nicole Di Lorio seemed to be a nice person and we respect that she wishes to serve. But she brings no real experience to the table, and certainly no reason to turn aside a current trustee in her favor.

Annie Reyes, as former head of the Five Towns Community Center, has concrete experience that would facilitate service on the school board. Also, Black and African American students make up a large percentage of the student body in District 15, and arguably deserve a representative of their own at the table. Nonetheless, our original point stands. The current board is doing a fine job, has done nothing, in our view, which would warrant their replacement, and with the teachers’ contract coming up, it is in the community’s best interest to have fiscal conservatives at the bargaining table. The last contract, absurdly rich, was handed to the union on a silver platter, and we are still paying for it in myriad ways. It is a mistake that cannot be repeated.

The current board has proposed a budget for the 2010-11 school year will raise the tax levy 4.9 percent, compensation for an expected drop in state aid. We recommend voters adopt the spending plan as proposed.

New Yorkers had a close call this week when a terrorist placed a car bomb in Times Square. Through siyata d’shmaya a disaster was averted, and thanks to the quick and expert work of the New York City Police Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other members of the law enforcement and intelligence communities, a suspect, Faisal Shahzad, was swiftly apprehended, moments before he would have successfully caught a flight out of the country. Other arrests have been made overseas as well.

Specifically concerning Shahzad, an American citizen of Pakistani descent, we were glad to learn that he is cooperatively admitting all to his interrogators, reportedly providing a great deal of valuable information.

Watching the initial coverage on Motza’ei Shabbos, and with each passing day, we feel a sense of overwhelming relief that Shahzad’s evil plan failed, but we also feel a sense of great anger that he would have undertaken it at all.

Bearing in mind that he is a terrorist, clearly now an enemy combatant, despite his erstwhile status as a US citizen, we urge the Obama administration to restrain itself from its likely but misguided tendency to treat him as a common criminal, with all rights accorded thereof. Instead, when all the information he holds has been obtained by investigators, we urge that Shahzad be returned to Pakistan expeditiously. For burial.