At a forum Thursday for candidates for the Re-1 school board, several called for the current board to hold off on its hasty hiring of a new superintendent.
Eleven candidates, three of them incumbents, are running for five open seats on the board. All of the candidates were present at the forum except Barbara Mate, who is running uncontested in District B, and incumbent Leland Collins, who represents District D.
The forum was organized by the League of Women Voters of Montezuma County and all the questions were asked by the league. Most of the questions were not asked of every candidate, but of only about half of them, with the focus rotating around so that people answered in a different order every time.
Zane Kuenzler, who is in a three-way race in District E, noted that the current board is planning to hire a new superintendent with only about two weeks left before the Nov. 4 election.
“The new board will be saddled with somebody they did not hire and might not have a good ability to work with,” Kuenzler said.
He added that the new board probably wouldn’t be able to dismiss the superintendent without paying out the remainder of his contract.
“The easiest way to hamstring a new board is by hiring a new superintendent that they may not be able to work with,” Kuenzler said.
Josh Shumway, who is challenging Collins in District C, likewise asked the new board to hold off on choosing a new superintendent. He drew applause from the quiet audience of about 50 when he said, “Let the community vote.”
Erik Quiroz, who is in a three-way race in District F, also called for the vote to be pushed back. “That would be beneficial,” he said.
Current Superintendent Tom Burris announced his resignation on Sept. 16. The existing board has moved with great haste to hire a replacement and had settled on three finalists.
However, one of them withdrew from contention Oct. 13 at the end of a public interview session at which the audience peppered the finalists with questions about transgender students, critical race theory, and DEI.
The remaining finalists are Mike McFalls, who was abruptly dismissed in September after 16 months as superintendent in Grand County, Utah, and Eddie Ramirez, the current assistant superintendent for the Re-1 district.
Other themes at the forum included the need to retain good teachers, improve student proficiency in math and reading, and increase the community’s trust in the school district.
“Our test scores arenot at where we would like them to be,” said Kuenzler. “We need to retain good teachers and pay them and give them an environment where they feel they are respected.”
Incumbent Ed Rice of District E noted that Re-1, through the passage of a mill-levy override, had been able to increase base pay for teachers by about $15,000 a year.
“I don’t think we would have seen teacher salaries up by $15,000 if I had not been on the board,” he said.
Ricky Carver and Laura DeWitt, who are running against Quiroz in District F, likewise agreed that teacher retention would be one of their priorities.
“When teachers are disappearing in the middle of the school year and you have rotating substitutes, are we surprised that children aren’t learning?” DeWitt asked.
“There are tons of talented, educated people that are falling out because of adverse effects happening within the district,” Quiroz said.
Carver also said he would focus on teacher retention. He added that kids need to be able to pick their own path, whether that is toward college or a trade. “They should be able to go after their passion,” he said.
A number of the candidates stressed that new teachers need to be mentored by experienced teachers. DeWitt commented that that requires the presence of veteran teachers.
“The board needs to make sure we have experienced teachers who can mentor, and we are at risk of not having that,” DeWitt said.
Justine Bayles, who is running against Kuenzler and Rice, said student achievement would likewise be one of her priorities. She recommended focusing on early development of language for children, even before the age of 3.
When she introduced herself, Bayles said she is Native, “not to Cortez, but I am Native, so I guess I just belong everywhere,” she said, prompting smiles and friendly laughter in the audience.
She said she would prioritize services for special-needs students.
Rice said student achievement would be a top priority for him. He said three years ago, every school in the district was on watch by the state because of low test scores, but then they all went off the performance clock, although one has now returned to being on watch.
Tiffany Cheney, the incumbent in District A, said Re-1 cannot compete with areas such as Durango when it comes to the salaries it pays its teachers. But teachers don’t go into the work for the money, she said, but because they love teaching.
“Teachers need a positive working environment,” Cheney said.
But she said parents also have a responsibility for helping children to be better at reading and writing.
“There’s only so much our teachers can do,” Cheney said. “Some of the responsibility has to be taken at home. How many times are [children] picking up a book? How many times are they reading a flash card?”
Kuenzler concurred. “We need to look in the mirror a bit,” he said. “When’s the last time you saw a kid reading a book instead of a cell phone?”
Asked what goals they would want included in the district’s next strategic plan, Lara Maria Blair, who is challenging Cheney in District A, said “listening to every voice” would be such a goal.
She noted that the district and the area have a “huge variety” of cultures, languages, and behaviors, adding, “It’s not one size fits all.”
She said the district needs to increase “cultural competency” because this area has a number of students who are low-income, non-English-speaking, or students of color.
“Being here as a non-English speaker is not a fault,” Blair said.
Carver said that good teachers “try to teach every kid.”
Rice said he was frustrated with the strategic plan developed this year and that the plan, once it is adopted, should be on the agenda for every regular board meeting.
The issue of transparency and communication with the public also arose.
In response to a question about “community mistrust,” Rice said he disagreed with the use of the term, saying there is mistrust among just a few people, not the community.
He pointed out that every school-board meeting is broadcast.
“It’s not our job to turn your computer on for you at home,” he said.
But DeWitt noted that although the board’s regular meetings are broadcast, people have to attend work sessions and special sessions in person or do a special open-records request in order to see them.
She also said people who arrive at a regular meeting at 6:05 p.m. instead of 6 are told that it’s too late for them to sign up to make a public comment, even though the public-comment portion of the meetings is not until very late in the agenda.
Blair said the board needs to “listen to every single voice” that comes before it, and Shumway said people need to be heard “and know that they will not be retaliated against.”
Several candidates were critical of the district for spending money on attorneys.
“I’m not a big fan of spending money on litigation,” Shumway said. “I would cut that out quickly.”
Kuenzler, saying he was quoting from the show “Yellowstone,” said, “Lawyers are the armor of the modern age.”
“I don’t think we need to start out with lawyers in the room,” he said.
Quiroz said going to school-board meetings and seeing “somebody lawyering up” is off-putting.
The races are as follows:
District A, two-year term, incumbent Tiffany Cheney vs. Lara Maria Blair.
District B, four years, Barbara Mate.
District D, four years, incumbent Leland Collins v. Josh Shumway.
District E, four years, Justine Bayles vs. Zane Kuenzler vs. incumbent Ed Rice.
District F, four years, Ricky Carver vs. Erik Quiroz vs. Laura DeWitt.
Voters anywhere in the Re-1 School District can vote for candidates in all the districts except D, the Towaoc-area district. You need to live in D to vote in that race.
