Phenix City Council ousts school board’s president, vice president

The Phenix City Board of Education will have a new president and a new vice president.

In a series of four votes with one-vote margins but without public discussion during Tuesday’s meeting, the five-member Phenix City Council voted against reappointing board president Brad Baker and vice president Kelvin Redd to second five-year terms and replaced them with zoning board member John Donahue and planning commission member Will Lawrence.

Mayor Eddie Lowe and Councilmembers Jim Cannon of District 1 and Arthur Day of District 3 voted in the bloc that ousted Baker and Redd. At-large Councilmember Johnny Barfield and Councilmember Gail Head of District 2 voted in the bloc that tried to keep the leaders on the school board.

The votes went this way:

The nominations of Baker and Redd failed 2-3. Head nominated them. Barfield seconded the motions. Then they voted yes. Cannon, Day and Lowe voted no.

The nominations of Donahue and Lawrence passed 3-2. Cannon nominated Donahue, Day nominated Lawrence, and they seconded each other’s motion. Then they voted yes, along with Lowe. Barfield and Head voted no.

The five-year terms on the seven-member school board start in June. The school board members will vote among themselves to determine the new president and vice president.

In phone interviews with the Ledger-Enquirer after the meeting, Lowe and Cannon explained their votes. Day wasn’t reached for comment.

“I wanted to give other people a chance to serve,” said Lowe, who served on the school board from 2000-2012, including seven years as president.

“I just think we need a new change on the board,” Cannon said.

Lowe and Cannon didn’t say anything critical about Baker and Redd.

“They’ve done a great job,” Lowe said.

“It had nothing to do with personalities,” Cannon.

So it had everything to do with politics, supporters of Baker and Redd asserted. Without a more specific explanation, replacing the board’s leaders while the school system has been on a roll with impressive achievement leaves an opening for rampant speculation.

The conspiracy theorists contend the ouster of Baker and Redd is retribution for the board’s ouster of two high-level leaders in the school system:

▪  The board’s October 2014 payment of $587,412 to buy out the 4½ years left on former Superintendent Larry DiChiara’s contract, plus the more than $30,000 in legal fees spent on the 11-month-long dispute. The board refused to explain why it unanimously voted in a November 2013 called meeting to place DiChiara on administrative leave, abruptly ending his 9½-year tenure, which includes being named Alabama’s Superintendent of the Year in 2011. Even now, board members say the settlement of DiChiara’s breach-of-contract lawsuit prohibits them from discussing the case.

▪  The board’s May 2014 decision to not renew its contract with the mayor’s brother, College Football Hall of Famer and retired NFL linebacker Woodrow Lowe, then the Central High School football coach, who compiled a 33-13 record in four seasons but went 6-4 and missed the playoffs in 2013. Despite an outcry from the coach’s supporters, the board declined three months later to reinstate him and continued to insist it couldn’t discuss the personnel matter.

Mayor Lowe said alleging revenge was a factor in not reappointing Baker and Redd is “totally not true. How could that be true? I’m one vote. They don’t want to open that can. … The ones who are saying that, they’re vindictive. At least we follow the process.”

Cannon also denied those connections, but he did acknowledge he asked during the council’s interview with Baker “why they paid (DiChiara) all that money.” Cannon isn’t satisfied with the legal reason for the board not answering the question. “Most of the city is still upset about that,” he said.

And residents will be upset with the council’s decision, Head said.

“I was going on what I heard from the community,” Head, a retired teacher, said while explaining her vote to reappoint Baker and Redd. “The school system is moving forward now, and that board was really propelling them forward with Mr. Wilkes. I just heard to ‘leave well enough alone.’”

Barfield agreed.

“I’ve received quite a few phone calls, and every call I received was pertaining to retaining those two,” he said.

One of those calls was fromSuperintendent Randy Wilkes, who said he phoned each councilmember to “let them know what our preference was. … The message was our school system, as everyone knows, is going in the right direction. We have accomplished a lot in 21 months.”

Those accomplishments include:

▪  Increased graduation rate from 63 percent in 2012-13 to 86 percent in 2014-15.

▪  Approved plans to expand the high school with a $3,296,335 project.

▪  Constructing the $2.1 million Dyer Family STEM Center at Phenix City Intermediate School. Alabama schools Superintendent Tommy Bice said in December that the facility will be “unmatched” and that if educators want to see what innovative instruction “looks like in reality, you come to Phenix City.”

▪  Planning a STEMposium expected to host more than 300 participants from around the world June 26-28, 2017. “I’ve never seen anything like what Phenix City is trying to do, in total, anywhere else in the world,” Amy Knower said in March about the school system embracing STEM education in a dynamic way better than the hundreds of communities she has visited as partnerships director for Discovery Education.

▪  Installing an estimated $1.75 million worth of SmartLabs in the seven elementary schools by next school year.

▪  Spending $750,000 over three years to equip students and teachers in grades 6-8 with iPad Airs and $534,000 over three years to equip students and teachers in grades 9-12 with Google Chromebooks.

▪  Despite all that spending, the board has increased the reserve fund from less than one month’s worth of operations in 2013 to more than two months now, Baker said.

“I feel good about what we’ve done over my five years,” Baker said. “This is a position that doesn’t get paid, but I love Phenix City and I love this school system and I was willing to serve again.”

Redd joined Baker and Wilkes in using the word “shocked” to describe his reaction to the council’s vote.

“I’m disappointed,” Redd said. “I thought we were moving the system in the right direction.”

Baker and Redd said they heard rumblings and rumors that they might not be reappointed but nobody from the council told them.

“We live in a small town, so you hear things,” Redd said. “… But there really was no reason.”

“I would like to know why,” Baker said.

Wilkes said he has heard no complaints about Baker and Redd.

“The service that those two gentlemen have given to our board has been phenomenal,” Wilkes said. “… They’re not yes people. They’re not rubber stampers. They’re about what’s best for our students. As superintendent, on behalf of the school system, we’re very appreciative of that.”

Griff Gordy, the optometrist chairing the Friends of Phenix City Schools’ $1.1 million fundraising campaign, shared the Ledger-Enquirer’s story on his Facebook page and expressed his discontent about the news.

“Two outstanding School Board Members ousted and yet the mayor and city council refuse to explain the reasoning behind their decision,” wrote Gordy, who quarterbacked Central High School’s 1993 state championship team. “As citizens of this community we deserve to know why these decisions are made. Where is the accountability?”

This story was originally published April 5, 2016 at 11:00 AM with the headline "Phenix City Council ousts school board’s president, vice president."