School board candidates to square off at forum

With Long Beach’s school board election set for May 17, Board of Education President Roy Lester and high school science teacher Perry Bodnar are slated to discuss their respective platforms at a candidates forum on May 9 at City Hall. The forum, organized by the Central Council PTA, will begin at 7 p.m.

Lester, a Long Beach High School graduate and a lifelong resident of the barrier island, has been involved with the board since 1999, and was elected its president for the third time last July. Though Bodnar, his only challenger, is retiring in June after three decades with the district, he said he is not ready to give up working with the community and children, and wants to use his experience to effect change in the district.

Lester is looking to retain his seat amid allegations of teacher abuse in the middle school’s special education department. A petition filed in state court and a federal lawsuit target the district for allegedly failing to act on complaints by staff members of the alleged abuse by Lisa Weitzman and two assistants from 2009 to 2014.

“Every one of our administrators, whether I criticize them or not, have an incredible amount of pride in the district and in what they do,” Lester said. “There’s no incentive for them to look the other way.”

He added that nothing he has uncovered indicates that administrators received any reports of the alleged abuse until the discovery in November 2014 that Weitzman was using a bathroom as a “time-out room,” which spurred her suspension and the district’s investigation. The district launched a disciplinary hearing in March to dismiss the teacher, and it is continuing.

Bodnar acknowledged that he does not know the truth in this case, but he said that if he were elected, he would ask the appropriate questions and demand answers. “I will make sure that if I’m elected, that I will ask the questions of ‘what do we know’ and wait for the legal system to give us their findings,” he said, “and after that … [I] will make sure that the school district holds accountable any potential wrongdoing that was done.”

Bodnar said he believes the school board relies extensively on the superintendent and administration to make decisions, without getting input from employees “in the trenches.” He added that the board needs to be more transparent and to better respond to the public’s concerns.

“I consider the board very transparent,” Lester said, adding that it is rare that the five members vote in unanimity. “We don’t always agree, but we get our disagreements out in public, and that’s one of the most important things about transparency.”

Lester told the Herald on Monday that the biggest challenge the board faces is staying below the state tax cap while not cutting any programs, as teacher salaries and special education costs rise. He added that he is proud of the district’s arts and athletics programs, and that keeping them is vital to students’ development.

“They teach the fundamental thing that education doesn’t quite teach, and that’s discipline,” he said. “Discipline is the number one factor in success in life … by far, over intelligence, over money and everything.”

Bodnar described the adopted $135 million budget for the 2016-17 school year as sound, and said the board did the best it could with the tax cap restraint. The proposed budget, which residents will also vote for or against on May 17, is 2.7 percent larger than the current spending plan.

“Trying to stay within the cap is probably the biggest difficulty we have,” Lester said. “…It’s like trying to fit a gallon into a quart jar.”

Both candidates agree that the lunch program, which is projected to lose $368,000 this year, and special education costs need to be examined in the future, with an eye to making them more efficient.

On the subject of the Common Core state exams, Lester said that “common tests” are a good idea in theory, but added that he would continue to advocate against coupling test scores with teacher evaluations. Bodnar said the Common Core tests were implemented with little input from classroom practitioners, and hopes the Board of Regents will make proper modifications to realign curriculum to student abilities. He added that new tests and curriculum should be developed by educators.

Both men serve on the Long Beach AWARE committee, and Bodnar said he respects Lester for his longtime service to the board. But Bodnar said there needs to be an educator on the board to pay special attention to the issues that affect children.

“That’s the voice I’m going to bring to the board, the most important voice: how we do better for children,” Bodnar said. “I think that’s missing. Mr. Lester was a lawyer. A litigator is not an educator, so having been in the schools, I think there’s a lot more to offer to the Board of Education.”