What’s at stake in the 2016 Muscogee County School Board election?

Frank Myers’ name isn’t on the ballot, but his influence certainly is a factor this campaign season as four of the nine seats on the Muscogee County School Board are up for election next month.

On his Facebook page on March 28, Myers, an attorney and political consultant, endorsed four first-time challengers in each race. “It’s time to put the school system back in the hands of the people,” the board’s first-term District 8 representative wrote. “Please support the following candidates and we will fix our broken school system.”

Then he listed the following candidates: Joann Thomas-Brown for District 1, Vanessa Jackson for District 3, Pete Taylor for District 5, and Shelia Williams for District 7.

To better understand what’s at stake this election, the Ledger-Enquirer interviewed board members who aren’t running and politically involved residents who closely watch the board. They agreed that Myers, the board’s most controversial representative, personifies the key question:

What is the school board’s proper role in public education?

The answers range from staunch support of the administration on one side to watchdog suspicion on the other. And the push-pull difference between blind loyalty and micromanaging is at various points in the middle.

Change

In the 2014 election, Myers unseated first-term District 8 representative Beth Harris, a former educator, by 64 percent to 35 percent. He also helped Internal Revenue Service agent John Thomas oust property management and construction businessman John Wells, a 28-year incumbent, in the District 2 runoff by 80 percent to 20 percent. Since then, Myers and Thomas have continued calling for more accountability from superintendent David Lewis’ administration and more transparency from the board’s operations.

“We’ll either continue the change that began in the 2014 election or the status quo will continue,” Myers said. “Everyone I’m supporting understands the authority of a school board member and believes we shouldn’t be a rubber-stamp board and isn’t afraid to use the term ‘perpetually failing schools.’ They are ready to do something about it.”

Myers’ critics have described him as disrespectful and even rude while he questions administrators and debates fellow board members during meetings. He admits he should be calmer and more courteous, and observers have noticed improvement, but he contends the issue about the school board’s proper role is more substance than style.

“My tone is bad a lot of times, and my wife gets on me about it,” Myers said. “People tell me I’m saying all the right things in the wrong way. I get that. But these people don’t like the message, and it doesn’t matter how I say it. They’re almost offended a board member is actually trying to exercise his authority. It’s been that way for so long, they can’t fathom anything different.”

Concern

Board chairman Rob Varner of District 5, who isn’t running for a third term, mentions the superintendent when expressing his concern about this election.

“If the citizens of this community elect a board of education that feels like micromanaging the administration and the superintendent is the right thing to do, then this community is putting at risk the tenure of our current superintendent and the senior administrative staff,” said Varner, executive vice president of Synovus Securities, who has advised District 5 candidate Laurie McRae, a former Synovus vice president, on her campaign.

Asked to clarify that statement, Varner said, “I’ve never had one conversation with our current superintendent about that. … But if we get a board of education that wants to run the day-to-day life of the district, then, if I were the superintendent, I wouldn’t put up with that and I would resign, because that’s not the role of good boards of education.”

The Ledger-Enquirer emailed Varner’s comments to Lewis. The superintendent responded:

“One of the hallmarks of a high performing school system is an effective governance team that is mission-driven, student-centered, and team-oriented,” Lewis wrote. “I remain focused on leading the significant work being done and making decisions that are in the best interest of our students, employees and district each day. Toward this end, I look forward to working with all current and newly elected Board members who share this commitment and have the best interest of our students’ educational future as their main motivation for serving in these important roles.”

District 7 representative Shannon Smallman, who isn’t running for a second term but chairs the District 7 campaign for NeighborWorks Columbus president and CEO Cathy Williams, said two previous Muscogee superintendents told her Lewis is the best one the district has had.

“You can’t hear constant negative feedback — basically bullying on a regular basis — and want to stay in that job,” said Smallman, a real estate broker with Coldwell Banker Kennon, Parker, Duncan & Davis.

Myers countered, “Anybody who puts their friendship with one person ahead of the education of 32,000 kids, I’ve got a problem with them. As far as I know, nobody is trying to get rid of Dr. Lewis.”

The board hired Lewis in July 2013 from Polk County, Fla., where he was an assistant superintendent.

“We’re starting to see positive changes in only 2½ years,” Smallman said.

Last year, three-fourths of the district’s schools scored below average on the Georgia Milestones Assessment System, the state’s new and more rigorous standardized exams. But the district has increased its graduation rate during the past three years by 11.8 percentage points, from 72.8 to 84.6, while the state’s rate has increased by 7.0 points, from 71.8 to 78.8.

The 2015 graduating class was the first not required to pass the Georgia High School Graduation Tests since the exams were phased out. Patrick Knopf, the district’s director of research, accountability and assessment, acknowledged when the results were released that this waiver could have factored into the significant improvements locally and statewide.

Support

Most of the board’s votes that aren’t unanimous have 7-2 tallies, with Myers and Thomas the sole opposition. District 6 representative Mark Cantrell occasionally sides with them.

“Sometimes their ideas are good,” said Cantrell, CEO of Action Buildings, “and sometimes they go overboard. As long as you’re speaking your mind, I don’t have a problem with that, but I do have a problem if you’re calling people names or making somebody’s integrity look bad.”

Thomas approaches the discourse from a different angle.

“The overall tone at school board meetings is that nothing can be wrong,” he said, “Don’t point out anything wrong. If you do, you’re being a contentious board member. There’s too much forced optimism. … People say we’re always causing trouble or causing a problem, but 80 or 90 percent of the votes are unanimous.”

District 4 representative Naomi Buckner, a special-education teacher in Chattahoochee County, wants the board to find a balance between questioning and supporting the administration.

“We like cohesiveness,” she said. “We want a board where all board members can get along, but sometimes boards do need discussions. There should also be issues that come out where board members may disagree and work through it in an amicable way.”

Nathan Smith, a collections agent with one child in the school system and another preparing for next year, has been an outspoken critic of the school board’s establishment. He contends the focus on one board member’s behavior is misguided.

In fact, Smith said, when he recently walked into a local restaurant with Myers, folks at the table near the door gave him a standing ovation.

“I don’t think (this election) is about Frank Myers at all; it’s about the direction of the school board,” Smith said. “People are applauding the work that Frank and John have tried to accomplish and haven’t had the votes to accomplish. It’s about the math. We need people willing to reform instead of just going along.”

Smith asserted the divide in viewpoint is clear in the way officials describe the schools that score below state standards.

“The administration and the majority of the board still won’t acknowledge we have failing schools,” he said. “They use every other word. It’s like what they teach in AA: First you have to admit you have a problem before you can fix it.”

Ten of the 141 Georgia public schools on last year’s failing list are in Muscogee County. They are Baker Middle School and nine elementary schools: Davis, Dawson, Forrest Road, Fox, Georgetown, Lonnie Jackson, Martin Luther King Jr., Rigdon Road and South Columbus.

Those schools qualify because they scored less than 60 out of 100 points on the College and Career Readiness Performance Index the previous three years. The CCRPI is the Georgia Department of Education’s accountability system, measuring a school’s progress and comparing it to others in the state.

Gov. Nathan Deal’s proposal would create an Opportunity School District, allowing the state to take over 20 failing schools each year. The state could control no more than 100 such schools at a time. The proposal would become law if Georgia voters approve the constitutional amendment on the Nov. 8 ballot.

Lisa Jenkins, a homemaker and special-education advocate who closely monitors the school district, summed up the 2016 school board election this way: “May 24 is Frank’s last stand. Either he gets enough votes to do what he wants or not.”

In 2013, a judge granted Jenkins and her husband the right to sue the school district over allegedly not following their son’s individual education plan, but they dropped the litigation when they were pleased with his treatment under the new administration Lewis brought to the district, she said.

Jenkins supported Myers and Thomas during their 2014 campaigns but says she has buyer’s remorse.

“I supported them because I thought they were for the children,” she said. “I thought they wanted to move our district forward. … They’ll never be satisfied. It doesn’t matter what you bring to them.”

Now, she opposes the four candidates Myers endorsed.

“I’m sure they are nice people, but people aren’t going to vote against them; they’re going to vote against Frank,” said Jenkins, who ran for Muscogee County Superior Court Clerk four years ago.

Smallman said Myers gave her advice for her 2012 campaign, but their alliance collapsed after she didn’t vote with him in opposition to outsourcing custodians.

“At the beginning of my term, I realized he thought I was a puppet, and I never saw myself that way,” she said.

Power

Thomas says Lewis has too much control. “The local board has gradually ceded its power to the superintendent,” Thomas said. “… But the board should set policy and the administration should execute the policy. That’s not been the case for a long time.”

And former board member Fife Whiteside can pinpoint when that process changed. At the January 2003 meeting, the first one in Muscogee for then-superintendent John Phillips, the board unanimously approved his recommendation to replace the two nights of committee meetings with one work session in advance of the official monthly meeting.

Thirteen years later, Whiteside enjoys the irony that he made the motion for the vote — trying to show support for the new superintendent — but says he regrets his decision.

Since then, he said, many items that were on the action agenda for separate votes have been lumped into one vote on the consent agenda.

Whiteside, an attorney, said Phillips “put careful controls on the access board members would have to staff and information. At one point, I was having to make Open Records Act requests to get basic information needed to inform votes.”

Myers has resorted to such measures as well.

“I am extremely frustrated that I don’t get information when I ask for it,” he said.

Whiteside represented District 5 during the board’s first 15 years (1993-2008) as an elected governing body instead of grand-jury appointed. He concluded, “Unless the board has the power to make change and influence process and outcomes, it does not matter who is on the board or even if there is a board. No other issue really matters.”

This story was originally published April 16, 2016 at 10:06 PM with the headline "What’s at stake in the 2016 Muscogee County School Board election?."