Who needs "Reality TV" when you have school board meetings in Northampton?

FROM KEITH GROLLER

I spent four hours in the cafeteria at Northampton High School tonight and, wow, what a night it was.

You talk about letting it all hang out -- the folks at the school board meeting really unleashed over four hours.

The first two 2.5 hours were about the solar panel issue, and that was certainly an eye-opening experience on a subject that I frankly knew nothing about. People did not hold back on that board. The discussion was hardly civil at times; borderline ugly at other times.

It got quite petty in certain segments as it seemed to me that some at the microphone were looking to make a name for themselves as well as making their points.

There was plenty of nastiness on display. It was clear that people were upset because, evidently, there wasn't a lot of information on this issue before approval was given.

The board, at a minimum, committed a PR blunder and they heard about it.

By comparison to the solar panels, the discussion on the varsity baseball opening -- which eventually went to Mick Sugra -- was muted, but still had venom at its core.

What I came away with is sadness; not necessarily at who was named, but how it all went down.

High school sports, at its best, brings whole communities together. Fights over jobs like this can tear people apart and this fracture over this opening has definitely done that.

I have a good relationship with athletic director Mike Schneider. I admire him as a former athlete, coach and administrator. I haven't always agreed with him, but I have never doubted him wanting to do what's he thought was best for Northampton.

There's a reason he's one of the most respected people in the Lehigh Valley Conference and District 11.

I don't know Mike Sugra as well, but I got along with him for years as he was the boys basketball scorekeeper for the Konkrete Kids. He was a nice man, a solid guy, always helpful. Never had a problem.

I just find what has happened to the friendship between Schneider and Sugra as being very sad, and their friction is really at the core of all the controversy in Northampton ever since Sugra retired as coach.

When Mike McDaniel got the job last year, it seemed as though the board didn't know what to do with the Schneider-Sugra tiff and so they plopped a third guy in there.

Having seen the board in action for myself on Monday night, I saw a few who came across as the types who are easily manipulated, if they cared at all.

One of the woman board members almost treated the baseball position like it was a complete nuisance to her, even though it impacts several dozen student-athletes each year.

It's almost as if she wanted to vote on the issue Monday night, as late as it was, just to get it out of the way. Her way.

That woman, by the way, wasn't Jane Erdo who at least showed some passion and moxy and gave it back as good as she got during both the solar panel and baseball discussions.

But what I disliked the most is that some people evidently went to a lot of trouble to dig up negatives on Andy Simock and ruin his chances for this job and I find that quite sad as well because the bottom line is that Simock knows baseball and knows how to coach.

If you look hard enough, you can find people who will dislike any coach and usually those people are disgruntled parents who thought their sons should have had more playing time.

The person who got this job should have received it based solely on his positives and not on someone else's negatives.

I don't know Mick Sugra. Met him for the first time when I interviewed him, and that was a rushed two minutes late Monday since this thing lasted deep into the night.

He said he won the job through his hard work, and evidently, many of the kids on the team like him and that's a plus.

Once the emotions settle down, you hope that for the kids involved -- especially the ones who had no preference about this position -- that the soap opera will end and there will be some normalcy in Northampton.

But somehow, I doubt it.

http://blogs.mcall.com/groller/