When last seen on the campaign trail, St. Paul school board member Keith Hardy was one of three incumbents being steamrolled by a Caucus for Change movement determined to deny them an all-important DFL party endorsement for re-election this year.
The incumbents vowed that day in April to exit the race, with Hardy -- referring to the purple campaign colors worn by his supporters -- explaining that the color signified loyalty and passion.
On Friday, Hardy set aside party loyalty to announce he was reentering the race.
"My work on the school board is not finished," he said in a statement. "To me, the issues facing our students, especially students who are immigrants, who are poorer or from communities of color, are too important for me to stay out of the campaign."
Hardy, noting he is the board's lone black member, added he felt responsible to help "black and brown male students (who) continue to feel pushed out of school or feel that school is irrelevant in their lives."
First elected in 2007, Hardy was turned away at the DFL city convention by a union-powered movement that tapped parental and community concerns about school behavior problems and other issues.
The stakes were high that day and evening, with each of the 13 candidates pledging to abandon their campaigns if they failed to win an endorsement, which ultimately went to four political newcomers: Zuki Ellis, Steve Marchese, Jon Schumacher and Mary Vanderwert.
Marchese, Schumacher and Vanderwert are white, and Ellis, a PTO president and a trainer with the teachers union's parent-teacher home visit project, is black.
