“In all fairness, Superintendent Ritz was a librarian, OK?” — David Long, Indiana Senate president.
There aren’t too many nice ways to interpret that statement, made by the state Senate’s leading Republican about the embattled Glenda Ritz, the lone Democratic statewide officeholder in Indiana.
It was timely and, obviously, dismissive snark aimed at the superintendent’s credentials, as Long tried to frame why the General Assembly was looking at a handful of bills this session that would marginalize Ritz’s role as chairwoman of the Indiana State Board of Education. One of those, House Bill 1609, advanced out of the House Education Committee on Thursday.
“She has never run a school system,” Long said Jan. 23 during an interview with WFWA, on the Fort Wayne PBS station’s “PrimeTime 39.” “And that is a bit of a problem for her — she’s on a learning curve there.”
Someone might have nudged Long and let him know the only thing missing was the word “just” — as in, “Ritz was just a librarian, OK?” — to sum up the disdain implied.
Off the cuff or intentionally placed in that lengthy interview, Long’s take is a fair place to start when looking at the trajectory of a turf battle that began in earnest in November 2012. That’s when Ritz unexpectedly toppled Tony Bennett, the Republican torchbearer for all things related to an aggressive school reform movement.
(Long’s one-liner also serves as a go-to way in the future to line up credentials across the Statehouse. Because, in all fairness, our governor was a radio host, OK? And a congressman, but you get the gist.)
Ritz has known the broadsides were coming, as she indicated Thursday during testimony before the Indiana House Education Committee on bills being marketed as ways to smooth tension between the superintendent and Gov. Mike Pence’s appointees on the State Board of Education.
“This political power move,” Ritz said, “is unnecessary.”