Politics & Government

Westlake School Board Election 2011: Robert Bodi

As part of our election coverage, Westlake Patch will provide profiles of each of the candidates for school board.

Editor's Note: As part of Westlake Patch's , we will provide profiles of each of the candidates running for office. These profiles will offer biographical and issue-oriented details about each of the candidates to help you, the voters, make more-informed decisions at the ballot box. Stay tuned for more coverage of the election.

Name: Robert F. Bodi

Date of Birth: March 8, 1964

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Occupation: Intellectual property attorney as partner at Pearne & Gordon LLP in Cleveland

Education: Electrical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, Law

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Family: Wife Holly; son Andrew (8 years old, in third grade at Hilliard); and daughter Annabelle (6 years old, in first grade at Hilliard)

Years residing in Westlake: 1.5 years

Office Sought: Westlake Board of Education

Previous Public Offices Held: None

Registered: Republican

Email: cterfb@bodi.com

Campaign Web Page: votebodi.com

Candidate Statement: In these troubled economic times, Westlake needs a School Board that will embody strict fiscal discipline overseeing the taxpayer’s money, while ensuring educational excellence. Throwing money at the school district will not result in excellence, but inefficiency. With Westlake schools deteriorating for lack of maintenance, teachers’ salaries averaging over $70,000 per year and rapidly rising with annual raises of over 7.5 percent with the ever increasing costs of fringe benefits, and a serious financial deficit looming, the current dysfunctional School Board has failed to provide leadership and proper stewardship of the taxpayers’ money. 

I pledge to impose strict fiscal discipline on the district, to enforce Board decorum, and provide necessary leadership so that the Westlake School System partners with the community, including local businesses leaders and financial experts, to find economical and cost efficient means of ever greater academic improvement. Furthermore, I will ensure that all the citizens of Westlake, including all taxpayers of Westlake, are adequately represented and their voices heard. I will not cave in to special interests that are driving the current Board, but instead represent the entire community.

Typical school board candidates and the unions talk about putting the children first, but their actions show that this is not the case. Teacher layoffs and cutting bus service while paying salaries far in excess of professional market rates and allowing buildings to deteriorate shows where their loyalties lie. I believe that putting children first means spending money wisely and effectively: “Excellence within Budget” is my pledge.

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