LAUSD Election 2019, District Five: Charter vs. Union vs. La Raza

The California Charter Schools Association had a 4-3 majority on the Los Angeles Unified School Board.

Ref Rodriguez unseated an incumbent in 2015. He was supposed to ensure more quality education and competition in the school district.

Then it was exposed that he had laundered money into his campaign by having everyday individuals donate money, and then Ref Rodriguez would pay them back.

All of this is illegal, violates campaign finance laws. For those who want school choice and competition, it was quite unfortunate that Ref Rodriguez was forced out.

Still, the school district is laboring under all this left-wing nonsense. Kids are learning folly about "white privilege", racism, multiculturalism--without any culture. What's worse, the district is going out of its way to turn itself into an outlaw district, in which illegal aliens are safe as are their children.

Since when did education turn into SJW indoctrination. All of this is a load of crap.

Will the replacement for Ref Rodriguez be any better?

So far, the charter association is not getting involved. At least 10 candidates are running for the school board seat, so they major endorsing firms and institutions are not putting their chips and campaign efforts behind any one candidate at this time. Very likely this will proceed into a run-off.

Who is going to improve (or impugn) Los Angeles Unified?

Major charter organization says it will sit out March primary for L.A. schoolboard seat

 

Major charter organization says it will sit out March primary for L.A. school board seat

Charter school backers endorsed Ref Rodriguez but are reticent about getting behind a successor for the school board member, who resigned in July after pleading guilty to campaign finance violations. 

Recent races for the Los Angeles Board of Education have been the most expensive school board contests in the nation’s history — and charter school supporters spent millions more than anyone else. But a key charter group announced Friday it will sit out a March special election to fill an empty and potentially pivotal seat.

All of this money into a school board race, and the education has gone from bad to worse. The enrollment is in decline, and yet the bureaucracy at 333 South Beaudry has gotten bigger. Why are all these people going to meeting with all these other people? What does any of this have to do with education?

The political arm of the California Charter Schools Assn. is not endorsing any of the 10 candidates for the seat left vacant in July, when Ref Rodriguez resigned after pleading guilty to one felony and three misdemeanors for campaign fundraising violations.

UGH!

10 candidates running. Ten candidates. Let's face it: most of the people who have thrown their hat into the ring are just looking for "the next step." They don't care about education. They don't care about making a difference. Well, they do want to make a difference: they want a difference in their paycheck and their resume.

Nothing more.

The hopefuls are vying to represent the oddly shaped District 5, which covers some neighborhoods north of downtown L.A. as well as the cities of southeast Los Angeles County. The Board of Education, currently with six members, is split on key issues, including how to interact with privately operated charter schools, which compete with district-operated schools for students.

"Oddly-shaped" is another way of saying gerrymandered. Gerrymandering should be at least transparent, if nothing else. Some of the weirdest shaped districts have emerged out of the partisan determination to make district turn out with clearly Democratic or Republican leanings. Yet even in California, when the Congressional districts were gerrymandered with utmost precision, Democrats still flipped a few seats in Congress and the state legislature.

A spokeswoman for the charter group spoke of the many strong options for the board seat.

OK, so there is some good news.

“There are a number of highly qualified, inspiring candidates in this race,” said Brittany Chord Parmley of CCSA Advocates. “Given the diversity, strength and depth of the field, we have decided not to endorse. ... This election is an opportunity for the entire community to engage in a dialogue about what it will take to provide an outstanding public education to all Los Angeles students.”

Let's be serious, though. If the Charter Association put their eggs in one basket, so to speak, and that candidate didn't make it, or if the unions spent heavily to defeat that candidate so that he or she never made it to the primary, then all would be lost.

The Charter Association still has to deal with the political realities of the region. Organized labor holds all the cards.

Close observers have described this race as especially tricky for the charter group. District 5’s boundaries were carved to elect a Latino. And in the previous election, charter backers had a strong Latino candidate in Rodriguez, the co-founder of a charter-school organization.

This is sickening. Legislative districts are getting carved up to elect people of a certain race or ethnicity. That is blatantly racist! Where is the uproar, the alarm over this over segregationism?

One obvious option, charter group executive Allison Greenwood Bajracharya, is not a Latina. Nor is Heather Repenning, a city commissioner backed by Mayor Eric Garcetti, another power player. Nor is Jackie Goldberg, the pick of the teachers union, which has been the second-biggest spender in board races and has called for halting the growth of charter schools.

Jackie Goldberg is the establishment candidate. She has been showing up to the Los Angeles Unified School District meetings for the last six months, and she spent her first few appearances targeting Ref Rodriguez as soon as he was under investigation. It was clearly grandstanding, and she was laying the groundwork for a re-election bid.  This time, she has been out of office for the last 20 some years.

Will she make the cut this time?

Backing a Latino in this district has mattered to United Teachers Los Angeles in the past, but after recent elections losses, union leaders think they have a winner in Goldberg, who has alliances within the Latino community. Goldberg previously served on the school board and the L.A. City Council as well as in the state Legislature. A wildcard for UTLA is the effect of a teachers strike planned for Jan. 10, which could work for or against the union’s endorsed candidate.

Why not support people because they have what's best in mind for the students, regardless of their skin color? Jackie Goldberg is a non-starter for me, but will her establishment credentials hurt her bid? Will the "Latino Card" make the difference?

The ideal candidate in this race would be a Latina, according to some consultants.

A Hispanic woman must win the race, according to "some consultants." These consultants are destroying the body politick in this state. They are selecting winners and losers every time, and the rest of the voting populace doesn't bother to show up!

Three Latinos in the race would be hard sells for charter supporters: School counselor Graciela Ortiz is active in UTLA. Cynthia Gonzalez works as a principal at a district-run school. Activist Rocio Rivas led protests calling for Rodriguez to resign.

Graciela Ortiz is a lawless union whore. She hates charter schools so much that in Huntington Park, CA, she led the efforts to impose moratoria on their creation. I remember the long lines of students who were protesting in the city council chambers with their parents. It was heartbreaking to see so many students asking for the best education for themselves. Instead of heeding their concerns, the "adults in the room" put the interests of the special interests, the Labor Unions, and the race-baiting Berniecrats ahead of the kids. Sickening.

The other Latino candidates are: Salvador “Chamba” Sanchez, a community college instructor; David Valdez, an L.A. County arts commissioner; Nestor Enrique Valencia, a Bell City Council member; and Ana Cubas, a community college instructor and former L.A. City Council aide who ran unsuccessfully for the council in 2013.

I met Nestor at the last Cudahy City Council meeting. He wanted to make nice, told me that he had heard about me. Then he quickly jabbed me and said "I am not your friend." Frankly, no politician in the Southeastern Los Angeles County region can count me a friend without suffering massive backlash from "La Raza".

I hope that one day, all of that will change.

For the charter group, no one stood out.

Let's just say that there are too many standing right now, so that means that none of them are outstanding at this time. The only worry, then, is that two union puppets sweep into the run-off. I fear that the final outcome won't even be determined until the end of March!

Four of the Latino candidates banded together to urge UTLA and the charter group to endorse one or more Latinos.

I don't want someone with the same skin color or surname. I wants someone who endorses my values, who cares what I care about! PEOPLE! When is everyone going to wake up

“As the ‘Charter School vs. Public School’ debate rages on and political heavyweights attempt to bully their way into installing their own,” Cubas, Sanchez, Valencia and Gonzalez said in a joint statement, “this is a familiar scenario for the Latino candidates in this race. The district has long left its Latino students behind in academic achievement and access to public education.”

Other candidates, including a couple who dropped out of the race, originally endorsed the one-and-a-half-page statement, but disagreements developed among the group.

The charter group’s neutral stance may not carry over to a likely May runoff between the top two primary finishers, regardless of their ethnicity.

Of course it won't carry over. They have to get behind someone! They can't allow a union-majority to dominate the school board and shut down school choice for the students! The indoctrination agenda in Los Angeles Unified is beyond disgusting, and now the political class on every side of the aisle wants to perpetuate it.

Is there one candidate -- ONE! -- that wants to do what is best for the students, cut the bloat, and end the tyranny of the special interest hustle?!

“It is naive to think this is a retreat or respite on their part,” said Juan Flecha, president of the union that represents school administrators. His union, which lacks big-money resources, has endorsed both Goldberg and Gonzalez.

BLECCCH!

Even in the primary, a pro-charter mega-donor could step in to fund a campaign. That could work better for charter supporters because the official charter group has the baggage of past ties to Rodriguez, said one political consultant, who requested anonymity because of connections to more than one candidate.

The consultants are total whores. They work with all kinds of candidates, not just from different parties but opposing agendas. Just as long as they get their commission, they don't care who wins. It's just terrible.

Another consultant, Mike Trujillo, who has worked mostly against UTLA-backed candidates, agreed: “It only takes some limited paperwork and a check to become a player in the primary.”

How about the voters? How about the parents? Don't their views matter?!

But it might make sense, he said, for the charter group to bide its time while teachers union president Alex Caputo-Pearl spends a lot on the teachers strike and on Goldberg in the primary.

Exactly. Big money is going to get squandered

“I suspect CCSA is gonna just get out of Alex’s way and let him spend away,” Trujillo said.

Final Reflection

I have contacted a few powerbrokers in the region. They tell me that Gonzalez and Valencia are no good. Not just because of the so-called union connections, but because of their contacts with much of the corruption in the region, particularly Art Chacon and Mario Beltran. These contractors have criminal records or have clouds of controversy surrounding them in certain ways.

The Water Replenishment districts have lots of power, too, and elected official at the city level have tried to hold two seats on these boards. All this power in the hands of a few well-connected politicos, and most of the people feel completely disenfranchises.

Residents in Cudahy and Maywood (two cities located in LAUSD District Five, by the way) have shared their frustrations with me. What can they do to combat the money? What can they do to fight the influencing peddling?

Sadly, even the most principled activists end up selling out for the power, and everyone loses.

Is there anyway to disrupt this corrupt status quo in Los Angeles Unified?