Fiscal Recklessness in Woodland Park

Most of these board members are relatively new to town. Us that have been here a long time remember days not so long ago, when the Middle School roof was leaking. Trash cans were placed in classrooms to catch the drips. The district had no money for a new roof. I recall sitting in on a presentation by Superintendent Bowman at the time…he outlined the expenses on staff, district-wide, at a very detailed level. He convinced me the district was operating as lean as it could be…and yet…there was still no money for a new roof. In the spring of 2016, voters surprisingly stepped up to help! We passed a 1.09% sales tax coupled with a property tax reduction! This has made a huge difference to our schools, and yes, the Middle School got their new roof. 🙂

This current school board has been completely reckless with spending and an insult to taxpayers who deserve more from our elected officials. Let’s look at some examples.

The board spent around $100k of district money to bring Merit Academy into the district. The feasibility study for the middle school cost our district $51,596.53. Caplan and Ernest, lawyers brought on solely for closing the deal with Merit, cost us $32,268.50. Brad Miller incurred some uncertain amount of legal fees until he stepped away from the deal at the end (his legal fees for the first five months of 2022 were about $66k and he was very involved with this beginning in January). The board was not required to give Merit any of the sales tax revenue…they could have withheld enough of that sales tax revenue to reimburse the district for expenses incurred bringing in Merit.

Miller’s legal advice to the board led to them violating Open Meetings Law in January, leading to a preliminary injunction and subsequent legal fees incurred by defending themselves in court. The exact cost is unknown, as Miller did not invoice separately for this court case and he redacts details from the invoices we request through CORA.

In June, Illingworth called for a special board meeting, where they decided to remove Superintendent Neal from the district. Having no cause for doing so, it cost the district $275k to break his contract (plus whatever legal fees were incurred by Miller for this).

Having put in place two very competent co-superintendents, Del Garrick and Tina Cassens, the board then proceeded to hire a new temporary interim superintendent, Ken Witt. Which on the surface is not necessarily financially bad, this board found a way to really screw taxpayers over on this one. They’re paying Witt an annual rate of $155k, plus a $500 car allowance and $100 cell phone allowance. The contract makes it very difficult to remove Witt, as doing so would require 120 day notice or comparable financial compensation! To top it all off, Witt is allowed to keep working at ERBOCES, where is also being paid $155k, gets a $500 car allowance, and a cell phone provided to him. Taxpayers are paying Witt more than $310k to work two fulltime jobs. You can read Witt’s contract with Woodland Park here, or read his ERBOCES contract here (that contract has been extended). Our district alone is paying a full time salary to someone that’s barely working here part time.

Response to Jan. 4 letter to the editor by Curt Grina | Guest Column (Gazette, 1/17)

The follow letter was written by Rodney Noel Saunders (link)

It is sadly pathetic that Curt Grina believes it is acceptable to demean and discredit other U.S. citizens the way he does without evidence or proof.

Ken Witt was “pushed out” (his words) of Jeffco schools not by communists (no proof whatsoever), but by concerned parents whose students staged several walkouts because he wanted teachers to teach what was not and is not authentic American history, and Witt lost that recall vote 64.25% to 35.75%. Surely you are not suggesting all of that overwhelming percentage of good American citizens are communists! And also because he reportedly publicly tried to humiliate a student to the point it was evaluated as bullying. And the student had not engaged in racist comments as Witt claimed. Just because you don’t like what others believe and practice, Curt, doesn’t mean they are communists or that you should call them communists.

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Opinions vs. facts and the school board (Gazette, 1/18)

The following letter to the editor is written by former board director Carol Greenstreet (link)

A strong public school system is one of the things that sets our country apart. It is certainly where we invest in our future as a nation. All of us invest tax dollars, some of us invest volunteer time and others choose it as a career.

In the past year, many have spoken out against the actions and decisions of the current Woodland Park Board of Education. There have also been many letters to the editor in support of this current board. It seems impossible to miss the extreme contention that has arisen over the governance of our schools in the past year, yet I have discovered many that are happily unaware.

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New charter school coming to Woodland Park?

Mike Miles, the founder of the Third Future network of charter schools in Texas and Colorado, appears to be considering opening another charter school, this one in Woodland Park. On Saturday 1/15, Illingworth and Witt gave him tours of several district buildings – Columbine Elementary, Gateway Elementary, and the Middle School (well, what’s left of it after it was carved up for Merit Academy). Board President Rusterholtz was unaware of this and no announcement was made, and it was only through keen observation by community members that we were even made aware of it.

His two local schools are Coperni 2 and Coperni 3, both in Colorado Springs. Witt helped bring Coperni 2 to that district through his work at ERBOCES (though back then it was called Colorado Digital BOCES).

1/11/2023 Board Meeting recap

After the shitshow that was the 12/21/22 board meeting, this one proved only slightly calmer (link to agenda). Though the police were called to this one when one audience member spoke up and refused to leave. Tensions were high leading up to this…not only was it going to be Witt’s first appearance as the new interim superintended, but he was going to presenting some unknown policy changes (first reading, not a vote). Also, the board was going to take action on a “Social Studies Academic Standard Resolution” to be read by board director Sue Patterson. What resolution, you say? We didn’t know, that’s all the info we had and there had been no discussion leading up to this.

So, prior to the meeting, we reached out to Patterson and Rusterholtz, asking if they could share any information about that resolution. They didn’t reply, but the board secretary did, sending us the name of the standard and a link to it – it’s the American Birthright standard. We turned to Google to educate us further…and wow, did we find a lot! But we’ll write up something different about that. Needless to say, people kinda freaked out that this might be adopted in our district, and attendance at the meeting was high.

– Some great speeches in the public comments! Listen to this, it’s actually pretty short as the board cut the allotted time to 3 minutes per speaker.

– Some minor policy changes proposed, including one making it sound like the agenda wouldn’t have to be written by the superintendent and/or board president (we’ll need to read the exact words on this one).

– Some BIG policy changes proposed by Witt around charter school process. Not sure why they care when they didn’t follow district process with Merit Academy? But what they are proposing now would allow charter schools to apply at any time of year (previously just fall) as long as the superintendent was OK with it. I expect we’ll get a new charter school before the end of the school year.

– As expected, the board voted to adopt the American Birthright standard, which does not align with Colorado standards and was rejected by the Colorado Board of Education last fall. But more on that in the coming days!

Here’s the video:

Letters to the Editor (Gazette, 1/10 and 1/11)

I thought I’d repost a few letters to the editor here, from the Gazette.

First up is What are we trying to accomplish? by Melissa Clark

It’s a common refrain: “Radical Socialist Democrats” are ruining our country. Red-faced, angry pundits, community leaders and everyday citizens, foaming at the mouth, screech scorching rhetoric primarily designed to fire up those that agree with them. This behavior is heartily embraced by conservative leaning members of our community, particularly in regard to the WPSD.

A Jan. 4 letter to the editor by Curt Grina is an excellent example. Breathlessly wailing about the “Invasion of LGBTQ Zealots,” he calls critics of the current school board and interim superintendent a “cabal,” “socialist bullies,” questions the integrity of anyone who dare have the audacity disagree with him, then ends his letter with a demand that those who don’t agree with him shut up.

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Woodland Park Student Alliance

There’s a new student-led group formed, the Woodland Park Student Alliance (Instagram). Check them out!

Also, you can read the students’ latest update at their change.org petition.

Director Illingworth views these kids as pawns, being used as part of a phantom union-led campaign. He couldn’t be further from the truth…I know some of those kids, and this is entirely their own effort. I also think any parent of teenagers knows that the stuff these kids are doing is not something any adult could direct…these young adults are free thinkers and should be admired for the strength and courage they’re exhibiting.