This and That: Voter turnout, Tulip Time, renaming schools

Ottawa County recall and voter participation

Congrats to the citizens of Ottawa County, who learned the Keystone Cops majority group of commissioners was reduced by one after Lucy Ebels, an Ottawa Impact member, was replaced by a newly elected representative, . He won by a 20-point spread. That’s the good news. Let us hope Ebel’s ouster is a bellwether for the rest of the group in November.

The bad news is a mere 20% of voters in the district cast a ballot. That is an horrifically low percentage, especially given the madness offered by Ottawa Impact over the last year and a half. Are you kidding me? Only one of five voters in the district cared about the county’s governance and direction?

The low turnout would be typical in many situations, but to see such abysmal participation after Ottawa Impact’s path of destruction speaks poorly of the district’s electorate. Low voter turnout speaks poorly for all of us.

A huge portion of the world’s people are unable to choose their leaders and have no significant voice in government affairs. Americans do, yet the majority choose not to use it. How distressing.

Holland’s Stem Fest

Once again, visitors in Holland were disappointed by petalless tulips. Even advancing Tulip Time a week in May (done several years ago) is insufficient to combat the effects of global warming. The flowers bloom increasingly earlier, year by year.

We can deny global warming all we want, but we cannot fool or win against Mother Nature. Her methods are ingrained in all life, and they are often harsh. If we choose to not understand them and predict consequences, we will suffer.

You might think man, especially politicians, would heed her warnings. You would be wrong. Apparently we humans choose our leaders by focusing on greater issues such as “drag queens” reading books, athletes standing or kneeling before a song at sporting events, which candidate is “woke” and who of our potential leaders can create the greatest anger and fear to rile up the electorate.

Southern rationalization

Losing is difficult. How often do we complain and rationalize our losses?

The refs were bad. They made a bad call at a pivotal time. They were biased the entire game. That’s fake news. The election was stolen. The media has always been against him. They cheated. There were ballot dumps. And on and on and on.

Officials in Shenandoah County, Virginia, decided to rename their schools which had been renamed only four years ago. Mountain Valley High School will again be called Stonewall Jackson High School and Honey Run Elementary will again bear the name Ashby Lee Elementary. Both names represent Southern Civil War leaders.

Apparently the previous decision to rid the schools of honoring secessionists was a “knee-jerk reaction” which did not properly consider the community’s involvement. At least that’s what one supporting school board member claimed.

Of course one school board member claimed the decision to again honor Southern slaveholders had nothing to do with race. Instead it was to rectify past procedural errors. Somehow, the name change didn’t reflect the wishes of the people. My guess is Black folk will have a difficult time accepting the rationalization.

As Mark Twain stated, “In the first place God made idiots. This was for practice. Then he made school boards.” (My apologies to school board members who serve with logic, reason and virtue.)

— Community Columnist Ray Buursma is a resident of Holland. Contact him atwritetoraybuursma@gmail.com.