Dozens of Franklin residents walked out of last week’s school board meeting stunned, frustrated, upset, angry.

For months they had lobbied the board to adhere to a school district decision to make masks optional for students during the upcoming school year.

Before a vote was taken by the board last week the meeting had degenerated into a complete farce.

Citizens wishing to speak were forced to wait almost two hours.

Members of the district’s medical advisory board lectured the board and audience ad nauseam.

One board member insulted the large crowd, claiming this was not a meeting for the community but a meeting for the board.

Another board member had to apologize for an ill-advised comment about a resident and her child.

And yet another board member told impatient folks to “shut up!”

When the dust settled the board voted to require masks for students K4-6^th grade. To many the move made no common sense, with parents now seriously considering removing their children from the Franklin district.

So, did anything positive come after this losing battle. I submit yes.

Public awareness has increased substantially

For decades Franklin School Board meetings have been poorly attended, if attended at all. Just the way the school district administration and their flunkies, the board members like it.

No one watching. No one paying attention. No one seeing. No one hearing. Add the fact that local news media coverage has been practically non-existent and the board has been for the longest time able to go unchecked.

One big happy family. A mutual admiration society. The club meets, pats each other on the back, votes yes yes yes, and walks to their cars arm in arm smiling.

On May 24, 2011, I blogged about a board meeting where the members performed self-evaluation. Hey, forget about student performance, test scores, dropout rates, etc. Let’s chat about how we get along.

From my blog:

The best line I heard was from member Janet Evans. As her colleagues wrestled with how to form better “relationships” as a board, Evans chimed in:

“I’m not here to have a relationship (with any of you). I’m here to do my job.”

Thud!

She said what?

“I’m not here to have a relationship (with any of you). I’m here to do my job.”

The comment made so much common sense and because it did, Evans’ statement was stunning to the rest of the clueless robots on the Board.

Which brings me to a segment on Mark Belling’s talk show Monday on Newstalk 1130 WISN.

I will paraphrase, and quite accurately, from Mark’s program.

He addressed a school board issue in Menomonee Falls (MF). By coincidence, MF has about the same population as Franklin and like Franklin is immensely conservative. In MF, the voting patterns are overwhelmingly Republican. As mark put it, the last place you’d expect victories by the teacher’s union with public officials thumbing their noses at the will of the people would be MF. I would add you could toss in Franklin, except that the Franklin School Board is beyond out of touch.

Mark mentioned that in some communities, especially smaller ones like MF (and I might add, Franklin) with 30-35,000 population, the teachers are often pals with the school board. They bump into one another and see each other in the community, at church, at youth school sports. They become buddies. 

When a school board member’s “friend,” aka teacher asks for help, the school board member, rather than upset a “friend” and stand up for the electorate, instead caves.

Another factor needs to be considered.

Folks run for office with the best intentions. They are going to strive for fiscal responsibility. They will not be beholden to special interests. They will represent the taxpayers.

Then they get elected and rub elbows with the entrenched administration. They go native, welcomed into their new family, going from “one of us” to “one of them.” Prior to the election, they were outsiders. Now they’re insiders.

Mark also said that if he was ever to serve on a governmental body, he’d be fine if the others on the body didn’t like him. Why? Because he wasn’t there to win their approval. He was there to work for the people that put him there.
—May 24, 2011

Back to the present. As of today the climate has totally changed. The public has been awakened.

No more empty board meetings

There was a time when you couldn’t pay more than a handful of taxpayers to leave their homes and show up at a meeting. Those days appear to be over.

Some residents are vowing to become regulars, attending every meeting as opposed to being just infrequent visitors.

Prior to meetings they’ve done their homework, scanning the agenda items on the school district’s website. And they’re not content to simply sit in their seats quietly. They openly express their concerns and ask questions.

Concerned taxpayers who previously practiced extensive social distancing when it came to the school district are now getting involved.

Make no mistake. District Administrator Judy Mueller and the board members absolutely hate this. They want no attention or scrutiny. To them, the less people know about what’s going on the better.

Citizens have become more active

April’s school board elections garnered the most public interest in the nearly 30 years I’ve lived here.

Higher meeting attendance has been mentioned. And communications have also increased.

Mueller and the board are consistently receiving thoughtful e-mails, even telephone calls. Despite sensing their correspondences are futile, the residents refuse to throw in the towel, and remain committed to reaching out to administrators who work for us.

Grab any 10 Franklin citizens at random and I bet they’d be hard-pressed to name one or two school board members. Truth is the board can’t hide anymore. Since the mask controversy erupted people are talking about 1) Recruiting school board candidates; 2) Running for school board; 3) Recall.

Bottom line

There’s still a great deal of apathy. Franklin excels at not getting involved.

But when it comes to the management of our public schools, interest has catapulted. That needs to remain constant.

Best of all, the major shortcomings of this inept school administration have been exposed.

Our school administration is managed by supposedly highly educated individuals.

Sorry, but I think the staggered school start this year is flat out screwy.

Let’s just totally mess up the final week of summer vacation and the week heading into the Labor Day weekend for families.

The Milwaukee Milkmen ended the home portion of their regular season schedule at Franklin Field Sunday with a 6-3 victory over Kane County. Here are the current standings in the North Division of the American Association.

WINS-LOSSES-WINNING %-LAST GAME-LAST 10 GAMES

Chicago Dogs †	58	34	0.630	–	1L	8-2
Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks †	56	37	0.602	2.5	1W	8-2
Milwaukee Milkmen	55	38	0.591	3.5	1W	4-6
Winnipeg Goldeyes	47	44	0.516	10.5	5L	4-6

After sitting in 1st place in the division for some time the Milkmen ran into tough times and are now in 3rd place. Winning the division is still numerically possible with a week left in the season.

Where the teams finish is critical.

The Board of Directors of the American Association of Professional Baseball this month approved a plan to expand the 2021 postseason schedule with a play-in game that will pit the second- and third-place clubs in each division against each other for the right to advance to the North and South Division Championship Series. 

In the new format, the second- and third-place teams in each division will face off on Sept. 8 in a one-game playoff. The winner of the two play-in games will advance to face the regular-season champion of their respective division in a best-of-five division championship series, which will begin on Sept. 10. Division series winners will then advance to the best-of-five American Association Finals, which are scheduled to begin on Sept. 17.

Previously, only the top two teams in each division qualified for the playoffs.

 2021 AMERICAN ASSOCIATION POSTSEASON SCHEDULE

Play-In Game:

Sept. 8: Play-In Game (#2 vs. #3)

Sept. 9: Travel Day

Division Championship Series:

Sept. 10: Game 1

Sept. 11: Game 2

Sept. 12: Travel Day

Sept. 13: Game 3

Sept. 14: Game 4 (if necessary)

Sept. 15: Game 5 (if necessary)

Sept. 16: Travel Day

American Association Finals:

Sept. 17: Game 1

Sept. 18: Game 2

Sept. 19: Travel  Day

Sept. 20: Game 3

Sept. 21: Game 4 (if necessary)

Sept. 22: Game 5 (if necessary)

Angered by an uncaring, rule by iron fist Franklin Public Schools administration, Franklin residents are now considering recalling some school board members.

Some important rules to understand.

Any local elected officeholder who has served a minimum of one year of the term for which he or she was most recently elected, as of the date the recall petition is offered for filing, can be recalled.

Circulation of the recall petition must be completed within 60 days after the petitioner files a campaign registration statement and intent to circulate a recall petition with the filing officer. The petition must contain the signatures of qualified electors equal to at least 25% of the vote cast for the office of Governor at the last General Election held within the same district or jurisdiction as that of the officeholder.

So, let’s do the math. In the last Governor’s race in 2018, 18,390 Franklin residents voted. Following the 25% rule a minimum of 4598 signatures would be required (even more to make up for signatures tossed because of discrepancies). In 60 days that’s 77 per day.

If a recall effort has enough dedicated volunteers, I’d say a recall is doable.