Richardson, Strawn, and Scruggs - Brought to You by the Same People That Screwed Up the Board Last Time
Because Carson-Cottingham, Hinojos Pressey, Guzman Ortiz, and Avila have worked out so well.
The ballots for the next school board election are heading out and will be in your mailboxes soon if they aren’t already. The same people that gave us the directors elected in May 2021 are trying to entice Salem-Keizer to put their faith in their chosen candidates again this time.
But who exactly is behind the candidates?
Progressive Salem
I’ve not ever addressed Progressive Salem before, but they have taken a big interest in Salem elections for a number of years.
They claim they got the four feckless progressives elected that won by the slimmest of margins in 2021. And they’ve all represented the school board and our community sooooo welllll… 🙄
Salem-Keizer board director [Osvaldo Avila] banned from games following referee confrontation - Salem Reporter, January 10, 2023. This was where Avila used his position on the board to try to intimidate a referee at his son’s football game over a call Avila didn’t like.
Salem-Keizer School Board member [Chair Ashley Carson-Cottingham] named in lawsuit against Department of Human Services - Yahoo News (Via Statesman Journal), April 27, 2023. This is a lawsuit brought by a transgendered individual that worked for Carson-Cottingham and alleges that Carson-Cottingham is rather transphobic and discriminatory.
Progressive Salem greatly mischaracterizes the margin by which these candidates won. However, the supposed monumental victory is anything but. In an election cycle that had a smidge more than 26% turnout, here’s how their lauded candidates fared:
Osvaldo Avila won by a net of 1,841 votes (90 in Polk County and 1,751 in Marion County)
Ashley Carson-Cottingham won by a net of 72 votes. That’s not a typo — the current chair of the school board won by only 72 votes! (She lost by 138 votes in Polk County and won by 210 votes in Marion County)
Karina Guzman Ortiz won by a net of 285 votes (lost by 36 votes in Polk County and won by 321 votes in Marion County)
Maria Hinojos Pressey won by a net of 1,128 votes (146 votes in Polk County and 982 votes in Marion County)
Don’t pass up an opportunity to make your vote count. Let’s not fall prey to slim margins again.
All three candidates up for election now list Progressive Salem as an endorsement, along with either unions, political parties, activist groups, or all of the above.
PCUN and Community for Salem-Keizer Schools
Both these organizations have endorsed Cynthia Richardson and Kelley Strawn, and both candidates list their endorsements proudly on their campaign websites. PCUN and Community for Salem-Keizer Schools (CSKS) have NOT endorsed Larry Scruggs, however, and no reason has been given as of this writing.
I’m not going to bother listing these two organizations separately because they are the same organization. In fact, of the six entities that CSKS says comprise their organization, Richardson and Strawn also list most of those organizations individually as separate endorsements. Why not keep creating organizations so your endorsed candidates and initiatives can have a list of endorsements a mile long?
Just like I’ve detailed for PCUN and other similar organizations in my very first article “A Tale of Corruption in Salem-Keizer Public Schools” these two organizations have a LOT of overlap. They just start newly-named organizations but it’s all tied to a small circle of the same leaders.
Both organizations (Accion Politica PCUNista PAC — PCUNs political action committee and CSKS), according to records filed with the Oregon Secretary of State, list Reyna Lopez as one of their directors.
Just in case being listed as PCUN’s PAC leader isn’t close enough to her involvement in PCUN the overall organization, she’s also listed as the President of PCUN on the Oregon Secretary of State Business Entity Data (listed as Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noreste, Inc — which is what PCUN stands for).
Remember, one of the current SKPS Board Vice-Chairs, Maria Hinojos Pressey, is also the Operations Director for PCUN.
I’ve noted before, but I’ll say it again, of Hinojos Pressey and her 3 other progressive colleagues, she can’t put her activist mindset on hold for anything. Passing up the opportunity to model good behavior, she refuses to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance that happens at the beginning of every school board meeting.
That’s the type of person PCUN wants to put on the Salem-Keizer School Board. But I digress.
Back to the link between CSKS and some of the candidates. The Secretary of State’s Business Entity Data for CSKS lists Rachel Dewey Thorsett as the authorized representative of that organization.
She’s also listed as the Treasurer for both Richardson’s and Strawn’s campaigns.
The connections between all three of these candidates and a list of deeply ideologically-driven organizations are staggering for a set of elected positions that are supposed to be nonpartisan. Do we want people who are installed at the behest of power players who are not above bullying and intimidation to get their way?
These are kids, and as we’ve seen with the four progressive board members that these groups got elected, our standards of mental health, safety, attendance, and overall academic quality have all gone down.
Make no mistake, the four openly liberal progressive board members being a majority voting bloc had nothing standing in their way to make all the changes they wanted to move things in the right direction (as they see it). Yet, with the changes they actually made, our schools have degraded even further. Do we want more of that?
In Stark Contrast
Casity Troutt, Satya Chandragiri, and Krissy Hudson all stand with parents and children and want to make education a better experience for everyone.
As a current board member and former Chair of the school board (the first time the position was held by a person of color), Satya has proven time and time again that he will ask questions that get to the heart of the matter. And as a practicing physician in psychiatry, he has the heart and knowledge to put the needs of the kids above partisan politics.
He has provided practical, relevant insight into issues put before the school board, and advocated for more transparency so that the community can see real-time results of the district’s actions. He’s a brave soul, often willing to meet, discuss, and listen to all sides when many of his counterparts are closed off and resistant to people they disagree with.
Casity and Krissy have the experience of seeing the dysfunction of the district from a community member and parent’s perspective, as well as seeing and hearing directly from their own kids what goes on in Salem-Keizer schools every day. And they both stand ready to advocate for academic excellence, safety, and accountability.
What’s clear about all three of these candidates is that they want to represent their community. Their endorsements don’t consist of a list of activist groups, unions, and political parties. All of their endorsements are actual people that the community knows: business leaders, elected representatives at the city, county, and state levels, and prominent citizens that people trust.
As your ballots arrive by mail, the choice is clear: More politics, or more community?
Choose wisely.