Incumbents loom large in school board race

Suzie Harrison

The race for the Laguna Beach Unified School District Board of

Education favored incumbents Jan Vickers and El Hathaway over

first-time candidate Mark Itnyre.

Election results showed strong support to re-elect Vickers who

received 6,942 votes or 42% and Hathaway with 6,409 votes or 39.5%.

Itnyre lagged with 2,893 votes or 17.8%.

The League of Women Voters results indicate that education

leadership is a priority in Laguna Beach. More Lagunans cast votes

for school board candidates than City Council by 1,030 votes.

Vickers has been a board member for three nonconsecutive terms

since 1981 and is looking forward to four more years.

“Before the election I was nervous, I’m the kind of person that

thinks things can go wrong,” Vickers said.

Vickers believes many factors contributed to her re-election.

“I do a commendable job and am very accessible,” Vickers said. “We

did 10,000 door-to-door fliers and got the word out ... I assume

people appreciate the effort.”

Vickers said the continuity of maintaining the same board would be

beneficial to the district.

This is Hathaway’s second term and will be his last. His children

will have graduated from the district by next election.

“I enjoyed the process and before the election I felt confident,”

Hathaway said. “It’s an opportunity to report the status of how

things are at our schools, which I believe is exceptional.”

Hathaway said he is interested to serve one more term to follow up

on the board’s endeavors, particularly the individual education

program.

“It’s a high priority, we’re doubling our counseling staff,”

Hathaway said.

Both Vickers and Hathaway iterated that they were thankful the

election was over. Both lauded the community and residents.

Itnyre did not return phone calls by press time.