PRIEST RIVER – An upcoming recall is a partisan attempt to remove conservative politicians from office, according to a pair of West Bonner County school district trustees.
The comments are part of written rebuttals filed with the county clerk’s office by West Bonner County School Board President Keith Rutledge and Vice President Susan Brown as they prepare for the recall election on 29 august
West Bonner County residents launched the recall campaign in mid-June, after increasingly contentious board meetings after the board considered selling Priest River Middle School and Branden Durst, a former analyst of policy at the Idaho Freedom Foundation, was announced as a superintendent finalist.
Residents who petitioned to recall the couple said these decisions show that Rutledge and Brown are out of touch with the community, its values and its desires. The decision to hire the former analyst for the Idaho Freedom Foundation, a conservative political think tank, over longtime educator Susie Luckey, who was named interim superintendent after Jackie Branum left the position without notice , was the final straw.
That, they said, showed that Rutledge and Brown are putting their political agenda ahead of the needs of the district’s students, staff or schools. Repeal petitioners collected significantly more signatures than the minimum needed to put the measure on the ballot.
Rutledge and Brown said they have worked tirelessly since being elected in 2021 to fix the troubled school district, beset by low test scores and financial problems. The withdrawal is a reaction from those who are ideologically opposed to conservative principles, Brown and Rutledge said in prepared statements.
“I led the research on Susie Luckey’s recommended Wonders K-12 curriculum, which was full of [critical race theory] derived teaching methods and was 20 percent over budget,” Brown said in a prepared statement. “When we discovered that the [social and emotional learning] being pushed by retreat organizers was a backdoor through Idaho law to promote CRT and LGBTQ+/- agendas, I led the effort to send it directly to their editors.”
The two trustees called on voters to reject the recall and pledged to continue their fight for financial transparency, to keep the school district free of “woke agendas” and to uphold their demand for educational results above 60% proficiency .
“Voting my recall will return control of our district to the same people who are responsible for 60 percent reading proficiency rates and call it a success,” Rutledge said.
The board president said the retreat’s organizers want to keep the results of a pending forensic audit confidential.
“They want to prevent you and the entire country from seeing how a conservative-led school district can improve poor educational outcomes and give our children a better chance at real success,” Rutledge said in his prepared statement. “They want to continue with failed tax and spending policies.”
A vote for withdrawal maintains the status quo while a vote against withdrawal supports fiscal responsibility, a better-than-average superintendent and rejects CRT in the district’s classrooms, Rutledge said in the statement
Brown said he has fought for financial transparency, something previous administrators consistently tried to block.
“I pushed for the common sense plan to do a forensic audit before more taxes so you can know how your tax dollars are actually being spent,” he said.
Rutledge and Brown say the walkout is being led by a small group aligned with local Democrats and Idaho Mothers, which notes on its website that it is apolitical and instead advocates for libraries, schools and public lands. as well as programs that support women and children.
“We have a policy that we leave the nonsense of political parties at the door and focus on the issues that affect us,” the group wrote on the site. “We are focused on our values and the mission of Idaho Moms.”
