One of newly hired Spotsylvania County Public Schools Superintendent Clint Mitchell’s proudest achievements during his tenure in the same role in Colonial Beach was uniting a once-discordant school board.
But if Monday night’s Spotsylvania School Board meeting — the final one before Mitchell takes office on Thursday — is any indication, that accomplishment will be much tougher to achieve this time around.
School board members April Gillespie and Lisa Phelps accused other board members of racism, discrimination, muting their voices, as well as mocking them with laughter during closed session.
They also said staff members, including Interim Superintendent Kelly Guempel, mocked their concerns, while Vice Chair Nicole Cole accused Gillespie and Phelps of intentionally impeding the board’s progress and sowing seeds of chaos.
The dispute concerned an undisclosed position included in the school division’s personnel packet that Gillespie and Phelps said was reclassified, and they did not want to “rubber stamp” its approval.
Gillespie made a motion to remove the position from the rest of the packet so it could be voted on separately. She then unintentionally voted against her own motion, setting the stage for more than 45 minutes of debate as to whether to allow a revote.
“You can just vote against the [Human Resources] packet if you don’t like all of it,” Chancellor District representative Belen Rodas said. “We don’t all need to necessarily turn this into like a five-act Shakespearean tragedy every time.”
After much debate, the board voted 4-2 to override Chair Lorita Daniels’ decision to move forward without a revote, with Daniels supporting the motion. Carol Medawar and Nicole Cole voted against it.
The board then voted 5-1 to allow the revote, with Cole casting the only vote against it. The position in question was approved by a 4-0 vote, with Phelps and Gillespie abstaining. The remainder of the personnel packet was approved 5-0 with Phelps abstaining.
Livingston District representative Megan Jackson did not attend the meeting.
“My issue is that the school board, we’re supposed to be professional,” Cole said. “I know that everybody doesn’t have the same level of experience, but when it feels like it’s intentional to stymie progress of the board to be able to move forward and make decisions …. in my perception to make a mockery of the processes.”
Phelps and Gillespie said they brought the issue to open session because their voices were muted in closed session, and other board members laughed at them for questioning how the position was described.
“I shouldn’t have to come out here and do this,” Gillespie said. “I shouldn’t have to say all this. I should be able to talk about it in closed session where it’s supposed to be talked about. But just like I told [Daniels], you’re going to keep doing this to me and I’m going to come out here and sing like a songbird … That’s exactly what I’ve done.”
Gillespie initially voted against certifying the closed session because, in her opinion, she was not being heard. However, Patty Boller, the board’s clerk, informed her that is not a legal reason to refuse to certify.
“When I go to say something back there [in closed session], I’m consistently cut off by the chair and the vice chair and Medawar laughing at me because they don’t agree with me,” Gillespie said.
Gillespie added that other board members often say they’re confused by her comments. She said time limits are placed on her and Phelps, but not on other members.
“If people would just let me speak, there wouldn’t be as much confusion …. It’s complete discrimination on whatever level it may be, whether it be race, creed, economic status,” she said.
Gillespie alleged that she was called “broke, uneducated white trailer trash” during a recent closed session. No board member audibly responded to her allegation.
The personnel packet that was approved included a noteworthy coaching appointment. Former Massaponax High School basketball standout Aaron McFarland, who later became an assistant coach with the Panthers, was named the varsity program’s head coach.
McFarland replaces Darren Berkley, who stepped down after leading the Panthers to five Commonwealth District titles in eight seasons.
McFarland developed into an All-American guard at Christopher Newport University after graduating from Massaponax in 2014.
In other school business, 14 of the 16 elementary schools in Spotsylvania were accepted into the Community Eligibility Provision program for the upcoming school year. The CEP allows eligible schools participating in the USDA National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Program to provide meals at no cost to all students without meal applications.
Brock Road and Chancellor are the only elementary schools in the county not involved in the program.
Six of the seven middle schools will participate in the program, excluding Ni River. Chancellor, Massaponax, Spotsylvania and the John J. Wright Educational and Cultural Center will participate at the high school level.
