As the deadline approaches for candidates to complete the nomination process for seats on local school boards, the fall election lineup looks like a combination of familiar faces and new hopefuls.
Five of eight incumbents in the three major school boards serving the Garden Grove-Stanton-Westminster area have qualified by returning the proper paperwork as of Tuesday afternoon. The deadline is Friday at 5:30 p.m.
In the Garden Grove Unified School District, the list of people who have taken out nomination papers has grown to six, although only one had returned the completed documents by Tuesday afternoon, according to the Orange County Registrar of Voters.
The list of hopefuls includes incumbents Bob Harden and Lan Nguyen, as well as potential challengers Shaun M. Curtis (municipal administrative analyst), Bao Quoc Nguyen (educator), Nam Pham (community volunteer) and Bob Tucker (labor relations representative).
Two seats are on the ballot; only Tucker had qualified as of our deadline.
The GGUSD is a K-12 district that serves most of Garden Grove as well as parts of Anaheim, Cypress, Fountain Valley, Santa Ana, Stanton and Westminster.
In the Westminster School District, the only candidates so far are the three incumbents. David Bridgewaters, Mary Mangold and Andrew Nguyen have taken out nomination papers, although Bridgewaters has not returned completed papers yet.
The WSD is a K-8 district serving most of Westminster as well as parts of Garden Grove and Huntington Beach.
There will be at least one new face on the Huntington Beach Union High School District Board of Trustees. Incumbent Matthew Harper will not be seeking re-election to the school board as he’s pursuing a bid for the Huntington Beach City Council.
The other two incumbents, Brian Garland and Bonnie Castrey, have taken out papers. So far, only Castrey and one challenger, Tom Dern, have qualified by submitting completed documents. Another challenger is Kathleen Iverson.
The HBUSD is a 9-12 district serving most of Westminster as well as most of Fountain Valley, all of Huntington Beach and a small portion of Garden Grove.
In all races, if an incumbent doesn’t return completed nomination papers by the deadline, the filing period for non-incumbents can be extended to Wednesday (Aug. 11). The general election is set for Nov. 2.
