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Thursday, January 30, 2014

Hey, Cami Anderson–don’t run away, answer the question | Bob Braun's Ledger

Hey, Cami Anderson–don’t run away, answer the question | Bob Braun's Ledger:



Hey, Cami Anderson–don’t run away, answer the question

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Cami Anderson
Cami Anderson
I’ve listened to the tape many times and, as best as I can determine, Natasha Allen said this to Cami Anderson at Tuesday night’s Newark school board meeting: “I’m trying to figure out, like, do you not want for your brown babies what we want for ours?”  That’s when the superintendent abandoned  her responsibility and ran away.
Natasha Allen
Natasha Allen
I spoke to Ms. Allen afterwards and asked her to repeat what she said and she offered a fairly close paraphrase. Ms. Allen was not speaking from a script, she was speaking  extemporaneously and from anger, so the words might have been a little different when she repeated them to me.
I took it as a sincere question from one young mother to another that really meant this:
Why can’t you understand we want for our children what you want for yours?
I found nothing offensive about the remark. I found it poignant and honest and direct–and maybe the most important challenge thrown at Ms. Anderson the entire evening. And I am seriously puzzled by why the superintendent chose that moment to run away from her responsibility to explain her disruptive plans to the residents of