Candidate for
Member, Board of Education; Long Beach Unified School District; District 4

As a Board member, I will open up the Board's proceedings to the public and invite the community of parents, teachers, staff, and concerned citizens to participate in shaping the policies that will determine the future of the schools and the students they serve. The Board majority's current method of doing business is to operate behind closed doors. Instead of discussing important issues in the public sessions of their meetings, the public is shut out from the decision-making process by the excessive use of closed session meetings. I will take steps to insure that issues are discussed and voted on in public unless a closed session is required or permitted by law. Greater public involvement can also be achieved by having board meetings held at schools throughout the District, so that there is a greater opportunity for the community to attend and participate.

I have an open mind about Superintendent Steinhauser. I have read statements by incumbent board members that my goal is to change superintendents. That is absolutely false! I have no such goal, and certainly would take no action to terminate him or anyone else without evidence that the employee, whether it is a superintendent, a teacher, or a custodian, has failed to perform his or her duties in a competent manner. Rather than having an objective of terminating Superintendent Steinhauser, I am looking forward to the opportunity to work with him.

Because the Board has operated in a manner that violates legal requirements for conducting its meetings in public, and because the Board majority has engaged in conduct which has led to a contentious relationship with classroom teachers, if I had to give the present school board majority a grade, it would be a C. The waste of precious school funds in the airport litigation with the City must be laid squarely at the feet of the Board members who authorized the filing of the lawsuit. With 40 years experience as a lawyer and training as a mediator, I will be able to ask the questions that need to be asked before the District engages in costly litigation where only the lawyers are winners and the taxpayers and students are the losers. I will be able to analyze the legal advice from the perspective of an experienced litigator and as an expert on education employment law. Unlike the current Board majority, I will seek to build bridges with the teachers and their representatives rather than engaging in stone throwing. In the difficult times that we are facing due to state budget cuts, it will be all the more important that the Board, the administration, teachers and support staff, are all working together to provide the best possible education to all of the children of the District. As a board member who has been a teacher and employee advocate for 40 years, I will have the credibility to resolve conflicts that may arise and to bring about a spirit of cooperation throughout the ranks that is currently lacking.