Michelle Monte missing "inaction" (pun most definitely intended)

As anyone following the meetings of the Oshkosh Area School District's Board of Education has noticed, Michelle Monte - elected to the Board of Education only eight months ago - has been noticeably absent from the last several board meetings. Teresa Thiel blogged about these absences last night. In her post, she mentions one of the possible reasons for Monte's absence, though I'm not sure if that's true or not. Someone else told me of another situation they believed was going on in the Monte household. Because there's no verification of that, however, I will not mention here what it is that people are saying (a courtesy that, based on Mrs. Monte's past behavior, I doubt she would extend me, but I will extend it to her, nonetheless). We've also heard announced by board president Ben Schneider II that there was some swine flu illness in her household.

Sooner or later in a person's political career, everyone will miss a meeting from time to time, but this many meetings in a row with no explanation from her directly to the people strikes me as both ridiculous and irresponsible. Moreover, at the end of the day, the reason isn't necessarily as important to me as the fact that she has not been doing her job, even though, according to Mrs. Thiel's post, there was a way in which she could have participated in the meetings without actually being present in the boardroom. And if that's the case, I find that even more offensive than her missing the meetings in the first place.

Whatever the reason for her not being present, she has a duty and a responsibility to explain to the electorate why she is not at meetings. And while she's at it, she might want to explain why she hasn't exercised the other option Mrs. Thiel says is available to her for meeting participation. I'm not convinced that she or her family members remain so sick that she can't jot off a quick post and put it on her blog and/or contact the media with a short press release. I bet the district would even post it on their web site if she'd send such a press release to them.

It is quite hypocritical that for the last several years while running for office, and possibly even before, we heard from her about practically every event going on in their lives and she stopped at nothing to attack every little thing certain board members and her opponents - both political and personal - did or said. Now that she's been elected and is being paid with our pennies, nickles and dimes, we don't even get the courtesy of being told, by her, why she's not representing the people at the meetings, yet - as Mrs. Thiel pointed out - she is cashing the checks. That, of course, leads to the other hypocrisy of Michelle Monte's, referenced in the Teresa Thiel blog posting.

But everything comes full circle and I imagine, as will likely also be the case with some of her political playmates, that if she runs for re-election when her term is up, the public will have questions about her past (in)actions, as well as concerns about her future ability to "serve."