The ‘Children First’ (CF) political group is attempting to take over the Capistrano School District this Fall by defeating five current Trustees who were elected on a Reform platform following the fiascos during the era of former Superintendent Fleming.
Supporters of Children First recently implemented the tactic of filing lawsuits against each of the Reform Trustees (Winsten, Maddox, Addonizio, Bryson, Christensen), claiming ballot statements were false or misleading. The strategy backfired Friday when Judge Brenner ruled in favor of the five Reformers, leaving the statements as originally written. Trustee Mike Winsten represented the incumbents.
Children First suffered another blow earlier in the week when the statement of one of its candidates, John Alpay, was found to be false or misleading. Judge Kim Dunning ordered changes in the text of Alpay’s statement.
The elephant-in-the-room is the Teachers Union. The Reform trustees allege the Union is supporting the Children First effort in order to gain administrative power and achieve compensation benefits. Children First denies the Union is a supporter. The conclusion of both judges was that neither side offered clear and convincing proof to support its position on the issue, according to the OCR. Therefore the conflicting arguments about Union involvement were allowed to remain in the respective ballot statements.
The Dispatch has been criticized by Children First for opining the Union is supporting CF. Yet the Union (CUEA) has posted ads for Children First and Capo Recall 2010 on the Union website linked to the campaign’s website soliciting campaign funds. The recall effort rose out of the Union’s fight and strike against the current Board of Trustees. The views of CF and the Union appear aligned. Furthermore, CF has refused to say it will not accept Union financial contributions.
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Well done MV Dispatch, good reporting keep it up.
Pretty close on the story. About the best I have seen so far.
One item, though, is the statement that neither judge could determine whether the union was involved or not. That is not quite how it went down when we asked the union side to strike the Yes on Measure H statement that ‘No union was involved in placing the measure on the ballot.
The Judge commented on the narrowness of the written statement as it was presented in the ballot statement and the fact that since only the board can actually place the measure on the ballot. The statement, while quite misleading, is factual. All parties agreed that the union was involved in the process, but not in the direct action to place it on the ballot.
Yes, it is splitting hairs on both sides, but the false conclusion is that there is a question about the union involvement. And that just isn’t the case, based upon what was admitted as evidence and concurrence by both parties in court. CUEA [Teachers Union] and their supporters are all over this.
As far as the union’s lawsuits (all three of them), the judge had to live by the standard of ‘clear and convincing proof’ that the sitting trustee statements were false (and the same standard for the No on Measure H).
It was up to the union folks to prove that they were not involved, and they failed to do so. The ball was in their court. So, as a result of their failure to make their case, the judge didn’t feel it necessary to remove ANY statements that clearly noted the union involvement and responsibility.
By the way, the NO on H side and the challenge to Alpay both produced sufficient clear and convincing proof that their statements were incorrect and the Judge ordered their removal (and allowed replacement in Alpay’s case).
The reality is that the union lost this skirmish in virtually every way.
Thank you Dispatch for revealing the facts/truth about Alpay’s ballot statement.
False and Misleading ballot statements seem to be the norm for some candidates now. An example is Frank Ury’s false and misleading statements about Measure D. Judge Rodriquez had to order Ury to change his proposed statements. Now we have Trish Kelley’s ballot statement that misleads the citizens on the percent of city reserves to revenue and other items.
It is important that the Dispatch and other blogs reveal these political shenanigans.
This smacks of union’s leadership supporting something that may or may not be supported by the membership. I would be curious if any teachers out there feel the same way as the Union leadership. They pay dues as they should but I feel that some unions are not really representing the voice of the members.
Union does no less or more than has been done by others before. It’s a game of position. The stakes are high. If the “ones who know best” get all the power positions, then the days of secular education in this valley are done, as well as any sort of recourse for teachers, who, lest we forget, are the friends and neighbors who actually do the work.
We stand behind the criticisms that the current trustees have exaggerated at best, misled at worst, the voters with their ballot statements.
Their anti-union rhetoric only goes so far considering that Winsten and Maddox have both recently sought the endorsement and financial support from the Teamsters’ union. Christensen and Addonizio were endorsed by the teachers’ union in 2006. Bryson is a union member. Maddox probably was, too, back in his DARE days.
Regarding Measure H, their hypocrisy continues. In August of last year Maddox moved and Winsten seconded to approve the Trustee Elections by Trustee Area on the November 2010 ballot. The motion was rescinded to allow staff time to do research. In August, Mr Winsten moved and Ms. Palazzo seconded to approve Resolution No. 0910-16 recommending that the OC Committee on School District Organization approve a transition to a by-trustee” area election process for the November 2012 General Board Election. The motion carried 5 to 2.
A month later the trustees hired an attorney for more than $50,000 to argue against their own position. In November they hired Phillip Greer at more than $32,000 to sue three public entities. (Mr. Greer was the attorney representing Ms. Bryson’s boss, Chris Street, at the time. Since then Street sued Greer for incompetence.)
It appears that voting by-trustee area is acceptable only when it is their idea and on their time schedule regardless of what the California State Education Code allows and what will save the district large sums of money that could go to keeping students safe on our campuses.
Measure H will allow greater local control of school board elections, candidacy of involved and well-known local candidates and significant cost-savings at each election. Large school districts that vote at-large are being challenged under the California Voting Rights Act. A “safe harbor” for school districts is the by-trustee area voting method which will potentially decrease our risk and save even more costly litigation for CUSD.
Mission Viejo is currently represented by three CUSD trustees. Significant improvements to school facilities have been parent driven, not trustee driven. This was true before this board took office and is true now. Only San Juan Capistrano is chopped up into more trustee areas than Mission Viejo.
Children First has endorsed five outstanding candidates who are committed to protecting public education in CUSD.
Would Fran say her post is entirely accurate?
For example, when the Trustees voted to put this on the ballot, wasn’t that in response to NOT approving a waiver that would have removed the voters from making this decision? Also, wasn’t that vote done to avoid a Special Election, which would have cost the district more?
I find Fran’s words eerily applicable with regards to exaggerating at best, misleading at worst, the voters of CUSD.
Fran needs to please at least try and be honest.
When the union advanced the statements that Winsten and Maddox asked the teamsters for help. When the claim was advanced by the teachers union… I went to Trustee Winsten and asked the telling question…
His response to me was “Absolutely Not.” (I’ve not had a chance to ask Ken, so my silence is not representative of anything other than not having a chance to talk to him yet.)
It really gets old when these folks are so shameless in their lies… and when you ask for proof… they go ‘poof’ and then will republish it somewhere else. I would LOVE to see ANY proof. Please?
We, on the other hand, keep producing actual CUEA documents to support our claims and have put them up on the web for ALL to see… (including for Fran, if she were so inclined)
Lastly… and MOST IMPORTANTLY… voting YES on Measure H will disenfranchise virtually EVERY voter in a direct way… of the 56 campuses in Capo, in the vast majority of the cases, there is a different trustee that ends up representing the child as they matriculate. Thus, you may be happy to have a trustee who represents your child in Elementary school, but you may have a different trustee for the middle school and even another trustee for the high school; and you may have never voted for any of them.
Lastly, we all know that the union candidate and the Union-Led YES on H campaign lost EVERY one of their dozens of challenges to the Trustees statements… and further, the Union-Led YES on H campaign was found to have included FALSE or MISLEADING statements in their ballot statement and a judge ordered the false or misleading statements to be removed.
It seems like Fran and her team didn’t learn anything and still have an issue with false or misleading statements.
Unanimous! That was the decision this evening by the Mission Viejo City Council to pass a resolution opposing Measure H!
Every single one of the councilmembers saw past the empty rhetoric and claims of benefit that this Measure promises, and agreed that voting for Measure H would be bad for CUSD and Mission Viejo!
Not a single proponent or advocate in favor of Measure H had the salt to show up and defend it.
Vote NO on Measure H
I agree with nearly all of the sentiment on here. However, I wish Mr. Holtzman would stick to the facts. To my knowledge, Trish’s ballot statement has not been challenged in court, and if people really thought it contained lies, the people in Mission Viejo have shown no hesitation to challenge those purported lies in Court. Ok, off my soapbox – well done Dispatch!