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Activist Joy Moore bows out of Board of Education race

By David Scharfenberg, Daily Planet staff
Saturday June 29, 2002

Nutrition activist Joy Moore made it official this week: She will not run for the Board of Education. 

Moore, a community outreach worker, expressed strong interest in running earlier this year, but said this week she will not pursue office. 

“There’s enough people running,” she said, referring to the seven candidates who have declared for the three slots on the board up for election in November. 

When Moore publicly expressed interest in April, only four candidates had entered the race. 

The field now includes incumbents Shirley Issel and Terry Doran, parent activists Nancy Riddle, Derick Miller and Cynthia Papermaster, Berkeley High School discipline dean Robert McKnight and recent BHS graduate Sean Dugar. 

Moore, who serves on the Child Nutrition Advisory Committee, a parent group which advises the board, said she will actively support “a candidate or two” in the race. One of those candidates, she said, will be Doran. Moore has not decided on any others. 

In April, Moore, who is African-American, raised child nutrition and racial diversity on the board as key issues. This week she said the emergence of two African-American candidates, McKnight and Dugar, had allayed some of her concerns about an adequate minority presence on the board.  

But, Moore said she hopes some Latino candidates step forward. 

“I don’t think Latinos have representation on the board right now,” she said, in a swipe at board Vice-President Joaquin Rivera. 

“I’ve tried to do my best,” Rivera replied. 

Rivera’s seat is not up for election this year. School board member John Selawsky does not face re-election either.