The Frank Myers factor: What’s at stake in Muscogee County School Board runoffs

This week’s Muscogee County School Board elections brought this realization:

In the two most recent election cycles, every opposed incumbent or former board member has either lost outright or was forced into a runoff. Translation: The majority of Muscogee voters want new representatives to lead their school district.

And the force behind each rejection of the establishment in those races is Frank Myers.

The controversial District 8 representative joined the board two years ago and is on the verge of turning the nine-member board from a largely ceremonial governing body into one full of questioning oversight. So the balance of power is at stake as two of the four seats that were up for election Tuesday head toward a July 26 runoff.

In 2014, Myers went from school board critic to school board member when he ousted one-term representative Beth Harris. And he went from the political consultant who helped the board pass a Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax in 2009 to the board member who campaigned against the 2015 SPLOST, which also passed. He also became the political adviser who helped first-time candidate John Thomas topple District 2 veteran John Wells, who served for 28 years.

Since then, Myers and Thomas have been on the losing end of 7-2 votes when the issue has been awarding what they call no-bid contracts or requesting more information from the administration. District 6 representative Mark Cantrell sometimes votes with them.

In 2016, Myers has supported four political newcomers who have run for board seats:

▪ Vanessa Jackson, who ousted District 3 incumbent Athavia “A.J.” Senior in Tuesday’s vote.

▪ JoAnn Thomas-Brown, who qualified for the runoff in District 1 against incumbent Pat Hugley Green, the board’s vice chairwoman.

▪ Shelia Williams, who qualified for the runoff in District 7 against former board member Cathy Williams, whose campaign manager, Shannon Smallman, is the incumbent who chose not to run.

▪ Pete Taylor, who finished second in the four-way District 5 race that another political newcomer, Laurie McRae, won outright with 52 percent of the vote. On Jan. 1, she will succeed Rob Varner, the board’s chairman who supported McRae and didn’t seek re-election.

“That tells you Frank’s message resonates with the public and that maybe the public doesn’t want a board that universally supports its superintendent,” said Fife Whiteside, who served for 15 years (1993-2008) on the board. “The function of the board isn’t so much to support the superintendent but to support the children, and those things are not always the same.”

Whiteside then described the dynamic another way: “I think it’s a mistake to focus too much on this being Frank vs. the superintendent. I think what’s at issue here is what the public expects in its board … and what is its proper function.”

District 4 representative Naomi Buckner balked at any attempt to draw conclusions about the board from the 2014 and 2016 election results, calling the sample too small.

“I don’t see any specific meaning,” Buckner said. “There’s no trend on that. … People are always concerned about their children, so you’re always going to have issues on the school board.”

Regardless, add it all up, and Myers and Thomas already are guaranteed one additional like-minded vote, and the two runoffs could give them two more. That means they could be on the winning side of some of their proposed reforms that failed the past two years, such as conducting a forensic audit, ending no-bid contracts, decreasing the superintendent’s spending authority and increasing the information the administration gives the board.

Varner also has heard that these runoffs will determine the balance of power on the board, “but I don’t want to draw that conclusion because I would hope that all of these people, whether being supported by Mr. Myers or anyone else, would come in with a more open viewpoint, rather than saying, ‘We’re going to go in and now we control things.’ In my eight years, I never thought I controlled anything on this board of education.

“… Elections have consequences. The electorate needs to be careful about just blindly saying, ‘Throw the bums out.’”

Sometimes the first-time candidates Myers has helped elect end up opposing his agenda.

Myers gave Smallman advice for her 2012 campaign, but their alliance collapsed after she didn’t vote with him to block outsourcing custodians. Smallman wasn’t reached to comment for this article, but she told the Ledger-Enquirer last month, “At the beginning of my term, I realized he thought I was a puppet, and I never saw myself that way.”

Senior’s falling out with Myers happened between the 2012 election and when she took office the following January. She told Myers in November of that year she wouldn’t vote with him in his effort to open the school district’s contract for legal counsel to bids from other law firms.

“Frank wants to be the CEO and have everyone answer to him,” Senior said. “He wants to stack the board and have control. … He’s detrimental to our district and our children’s education.”

Failing to question the district’s administration is detrimental to the district and the children’s education and contributes to failing schools, Myers argues.

“There have been three rounds of test scores since I’ve been on the board, and we’ve gotten three Fs,” he said. “John and I have done a great job of making the public understand that we have to do better and we can do better.”

Green believes Myers contributed to Senior’s defeat.

“I’m sure she’s disappointed to have a current sitting board member to campaign against colleagues,” Green said.

Thomas-Brown said it’s unfortunate that Myers has become such a big focus in the election.

“He does provide good information and he endorsed us, and that is his right do so, and we appreciate any endorsements that we receive along the way,” she said. “But I believe we are getting the message out about the fact that we need to make a change.”

Varner contends that news stories affect the perception about the school district and its board.

“What I’m sensing, because we’re in the news a lot and because it’s largely negative, it’s tough for people to vote for us,” Varner said. “It just is. Their assumption is, when all they see is the negative media coverage, their assumption is we’re doing things poorly, and I can’t blame them for thinking that.”

Looking ahead to the runoffs, Myers said, “The stakes could not be higher,” and plainly explained the July 26 choices.

“If Pat Hugley Green and Cathy Williams go back in, it’s going to be business as usual,” Myers said. “But if Shelia Williams and JoAnn Thomas-Brown win, whatever momentum John and I began will continue.”

This story was originally published May 26, 2016 at 11:32 AM with the headline "The Frank Myers factor: What’s at stake in Muscogee County School Board runoffs."