In this week’s edition of How the Morgan Hill Unified School Board Turns, a 3 – 3 divided board will attempt to select a new board president and vice president. It is also the first regular board meeting since The Morgan Hill Times released a series of sexist, vulgar e-mails sent by Trustee David Gerard, so we can expect that parents, teachers, staff and other community members will ask Gerard to resign his seat.
In last week’s episode, the Morgan Hill Unified School District Board of Education reached a stalemate on appointing a successor to Ms. Amy Porter-Jensen, who resigned her seat due to harassing e-mails and phone calls by parent activist Robert Guynn. After whittling down the seven candidates to two, Mary Ann Groen (Chief of Staff to San Jose Vice Mayor, Rose Herrera), who was supported by Trustees Benevento, Woolf and Ruebusch, and Adam Escoto (a former educator), who was supported by Trustees Badillo, Borgiolo, and Gerard, there were five excruciating tie-breaker rounds which could not break the stalemate. At one point the two candidates said they were ready for a coin flip to determine a winner, but the board agreed to skip the coin flip and instead will call a special election to fill the empty seat, costing the students tens of thousands of dollars that would otherwise go toward education. The Santa Clara County Registrar estimates that a stand alone Special Election will cost the District upwards of $400,000 and a special election held concurrently with the California June Primary would cost the District over $60,000.
The stalemate on the Board means that Gerard’s resignation would be all the more impactful. Without Gerard, the Board might actually be able to agree on a new president for instance. It would also mean that his empty seat could be added to the special election. Then the MHUSD school board could get back to dealing with the education of students, instead of spending their time squabbling.
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