School board candidates will need to indicate party affiliation on the ballot if a Republican bill in the Michigan House passes.

House Bill 4588, introduced by Rep. Jason Woolford, R-Howell, would require candidates for school board races to declare their political affiliation. This would change Section 168.303 of the Michigan Compiled Laws, which deems that school board offices be strictly nonpartisan. 

Local opponents of the bill say the change would be incongruous with the Michigan school board system and the community of Hillsdale in particular.

“House Bill 4588 would not benefit Michigan’s school board system,” said Stephanie Gordon, a Hillsdale Community Schools parent and the wife of HCS board member Matt Gordon. “Most school board candidates are typically active community members with strong ties to their local school system. They run to support students, families, teachers, and district growth. It is not a political race.”

Woolford, while presenting his bill to the House Election Integrity Committee in a Sept. 30 meeting, said this bill would enact a simple change that could transform school board elections. 

“Our schools are battlegrounds for big issues, and those right now are curriculum, parental rights, and funding,” Woolford said. “Right now, candidates can hide their true leanings because ballots don’t show this party affiliation, which then forces you to dig through their records or guess what their stances are.”

The bill was assigned to the House Election Integrity Committee in June, but has not been voted out of committee. 

Rebecca Portteus, secretary of the HCS Board of Education, said the measure would not be helpful in Hillsdale. The heavily Republican county voted for President Donald Trump in the 2024 election by 25 points. 

“In a community like Hillsdale, it would likely have minimal effect on who is elected, given the political makeup of the community and, unlike the last election, we generally barely have enough people that run,” Portteus said.

Per Michigan law, counties are responsible for printing ballots and supplying them to local precincts, and these ballots must separate the parties by columns on the primary ballot. If the changes made by House Bill 4588 went into effect, school board members would be added to those ballots and separated by parties. Depending on the political division of the county, a ballot might be close to needing a second page, resulting in high costs and confusion.

“With Hillsdale in particular, we are so heavily Republican that the Republican column ends up being super long compared to the Democrat column,” Hillsdale County Clerk Abe Dane said. “So if that column gets to be too long, then we’d have to go to a second sheet of paper for every voter in the precinct.”

From an election administrator’s perspective, Dane said the second page is significant for two reasons: cost and voter fatigue. 

Unlike in federal elections, the county pays for local election ballots out of its budget. Dane said the cost of ballots can range from $20,000 to $30,000, depending on the year and quantity of elections. 

“It wouldn’t break our budget, but especially over time, it would be a huge expense,” Dane said.

Lengthy ballots can cause voter fatigue, Dane said. 

“We go through and audit some of the precincts after every election, and part of the audit is to go through the ballot so we see how people fill out their ballots,” Dane said. “Voter fatigue is a real thing. There’s also such a thing as people filling out a blank ballot, like not filling it out at all and just putting it through, just so they can.”

Gordon said the bill would introduce possible conflict into the collaborative nature of school boards.

“Labeling school board candidates by political affiliation risks division in a space that promotes collaboration. Potentially turning this role into a partisan position would only create more partisan school systems,” Gordon said. “A school board collaborates, regardless of political affiliation, to make informed decisions, both simple and complex, with the district’s best interests in mind. It is a selfless position and must remain nonpartisan.”