Schools Superintendent Janet Barresi, offended by remarks made by a Board of Education member, called him a “son of a bitch” after the meeting. Here’s the Tulsa World’s report:
A State Board of Education member called for the immediate resignation of State Superintendent Janet Barresi at a Thursday morning meeting.
Lee Baxter, a Lawton resident who was appointed to the board by Gov. Mary Fallin in 2011, said he feels it is in the best interest of public education in Oklahoma that Barresi resign rather than wait to leave office when her term ends in January.
“I want the venom stopped. I’m sick of the lack of collaboration and blatant disrespect for our school administrators, and I think it needs to stop soon,” Baxter said. “The way I think that needs to happen is for the state superintendent to relinquish her role now. I don’t believe that will happen.”
Baxter’s comments came at the end of Thursday’s meeting in the State Capitol. Barresi sat lock-jawed during Baxter’s remarks, which went on for about five minutes.
She quickly adjourned the meeting and turned and watched as Oklahoma City board member Bill Shdeed shook Baxter’s hand and told him, “That took a lot of courage.”
Then Barresi turned to board member Bill Price of Oklahoma City and gestured animatedly with one hand and said, “He’s a son of a b—-!”
Baxter said he was responding to calls in a Wednesday afternoon press release and in public comments at Thursday morning’s Board of Education meeting by state Rep. Jason Smalley, R-Stroud. Smalley accused Barresi of cronyism for hiring the husband of a top state education executive in a new assistant state superintendent position.
A spokesman for Fallin said the governor had no comment on the calls for Barresi’s resignation.
Baxter acknowledged that Barresi has the authority to hire anyone she wanted, but he questioned why the hiring process wasn’t transparent enough for the state board members to be informed in advance. He also called it unethical, saying: “It’s cronyism. Anywhere it is cronyism.”
Smalley told the board earlier in the meeting, “Do not set the traps for the future for whoever sits in this position down the road. … Publicly call for these resignations and stand with me to do the right thing.”
After the meeting, Barresi told reporters she would not resign.
“I understand I have failed at politics, but I am not going to fail at my obligation to the children of Oklahoma,” she said.
She also pledged to provide her successor with “robust transition” assistance even though “that opportunity was not afforded to me by my predecessor.”
Barresi, who was defeated in June’s primary election, recently created a new position — assistant state superintendent of accreditation and compliance — and hired the husband of her general counsel Kim Richey to fill it.
Richey’s husband, Larry Birney, is a career law enforcement official who made headlines statewide when he resigned as executive director for the Council of Law Enforcement Education and Training, or CLEET, in Ada in 2011 after three years there. The resignation came after a formal panel was formed to investigate his conduct.
He worked previously as an officer with the San Antonio Police Department for 35 years.
Baxter, in his remarks, said the nature of Birney’s exit from CLEET was yet another one of his reasons for questioning the hire. But he made a point of saying how much he respected Richey as an attorney and appreciated her legal counsel to the board.
In a press release sent out Wednesday afternoon, Smalley said it was “a good ol’ boy hire” and called for the immediate resignations of Barresi, Richey and Birney.
That wasn’t the sole issue Baxter cited in calling for Barresi’s resignation. He said no real progress on the development of new English and math standards for Oklahoma public schools can occur as long as Barresi is associated with the process.
“What’s now been done is to create a system for Oklahoma that stands separate from the state superintendent and separate from the state Department of Education because, sadly, today anything with education associated with the state department has become toxic,” he said. “It can’t pass in the Legislature. It can’t be supported by teachers. It can’t be supported by administrators. It can’t be supported by parents. It’s simply toxic.”
New standards are going to be developed because the Oklahoma Legislature voted to remove the Common Core standards being used in most other states earlier this year.
Barresi had initially tapped Teri Brecheen, executive director of reading and literacy at the state Education Department, to oversee a multi-tiered standards-writing process that called for several rounds of public meetings. But this summer, the state board rejected that plan as too complicated.
Baxter said Barresi had “been quick to point the finger” at the state board for delaying the process, but he said Barresi herself made that delay necessary and it could drag on as long as she remains in office.
“That’s why the move to set standards has gone slowly — we want standards for our kids that Oklahoma accepts, not rejects. If that takes an extra couple of months so be it,” he said.
“I also reject the idea the only people who know or want reform are within the state (education) department and with the superintendent. I know I want it, I know the governor wants it, I know the Legislature wants it, most of the superintendents I know want it, and I know parents want it.”
He said he hopes Oklahoma elects a state superintendent “who favors reform and at the same time is willing to collaborate with others.”
Earlier in the meeting, Barresi challenged the board to accept her nomination of Brecheen to the steering committee that will oversee the writing of academic standards.
Board member Amy Ford, who is now heading up the process, recommended a list of steering committee members to the rest of the board at Thursday’s meeting. Barresi said she had submitted Brecheen’s name previously, but it had been “rejected.”
Her motion to add Brecheen to Ford’s list of steering committee failed because no other board member seconded the motion. The board then split with Barresi 6-1 to approve the membership of the committee.
