AP photo taken in NY.

“In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.”
Mark Twain

Surely Twain had a school board like Franklin’s in mind.

During 2021 Franklin joined a growing and at time intense nationwide movement to unmask our school children.

In April I did what I’ve never done since moving to Franklin nearly 30 years ago. I spoke out at a Franklin school board meeting.

May 12. Heroes and villains at the school board meeting.

Big deal. So what. Franklin announces kids don’t have to wear masks outside.

On May 26:

In an embarrassingly low point for this Franklin School Board members tonight at their meeting refused to even consider taking action on changing the current mandatory mask policy in Franklin schools.

The INACTION by the school board came despite the fact that at least three Franklin residents who testified requested a member make a motion to bring the issue to a vote and another to second that motion.

On every occasion the entire board sat stone faced and silent. Some in the audience jeered at the board, accurately heckling that not a single member had any courage to stand up for the hostage-held mask children of Franklin. Gutless and cowardly.

It is clear the entire board along with the over-compensated district administrator are full of maskaholics and cares nothing about the kids or their parents.
—May 26, 2021

My wife also testified in late May about risk. Here is more, contained in the audio of the May 26th meeting.

Throughout spring and summer dedicated parents calling for an end to masks consistently attended every meeting, vastly outnumbering mask mandate proponents.

Then in late August, just before the new school year was about to begin: Chaotic Franklin School Board meeting ends in mandatory masks for some kids, but not all.

At the August meeting, during a rather lengthy and somewhat nauseating lecture-like presentation by Franklin’s medical advisory board, school board member Angela Bier inexplicably asked a question but specifically mentioned a Franklin resident by name, the resident’s child, and the child’s medical condition.

Bier should have known better than to get that personal. The resident was very upset and during the citizen comment period called Bier out who apologized.

Another incident occurred during the comment period. A Franklin resident, an arrogant COVID hypochondriac who frequently posts his mask and vaccine obsessions on a hateful Leftist forum, was walking back to his seat following his remarks to the board. That’s when he flipped two middle fingers to mask optional supporters in the audience.

Despicable. Zero class.

Forced, coercive masking of the youngest students in the Franklin Pubic Schools system is unnecessary and abusive. Folks with far more smarts than me have come up with those assessments.

At that late-August meeting of the school board three members made incredibly reasonable arguments against mandatory masking,  the most critical being that parents, not the elected or bureaucrats, are best equipped to make health care decisions about their very own children.

Unfortunately four members stubbornly scoffed at the blatantly obvious common sense, refusing to
give the concept the slightest amount of consideration.

My school district now forces kids in grades K4-6, the least risky of all students, to mask up or else. We have turned supposedly caring staff, teachers and administrators into rigid taskmasters, imposing security guards waiting pounce and punish. Yes, punish.

Isolate.

i·so·late

Cause (a person or place) to be or remain alone or apart from others.

Suppose a defiant parent chooses to resist and sends a child, heaven forbid, to class sans mask. Cue the heavy-handed educrats.

The confused maskless child will be nabbed and ushered to what is being called an “isolation room” according to a letter (threatening I submit) all affected parents have received.

“Please note, that if you decide to instruct your child not to wear a mask at school, the District will be required to isolate in a supervised location while they wait to be picked up from you or another authorized adult. Thereafter, the District will be required to explore other options, including but not limited to prohibiting your child from in-person instruction, marking them absent, and providing them with schoolwork to complete at home.”

I wonder how many taxpayer-financed greedy attorneys were commissioned to come up with that intimidating lingo.

Speaking of that noble profession, Ilya Feoktistov is a Boston-based civil rights attorney. Though not openly recommending legal action he does make compelling arguments in support of frustrated parents in a column. Here are some highlights:As mask mandates and habits return across the United States, clear and convincing scientific data from before and after 2020 suggest masking has negative health consequences that outweigh its utility.

Earlier this year, a group of German doctors and biomedical scientists looked at the available data on the negative health effects of face masks, published both before and during the COVID-19 outbreak, as catalogued in the U.S. federal government’s biomedical database, PubMed. They found significant evidence of “relevant, undesired medical, organ and organ system-related phenomena accompanied by wearing masks,” with “clear, scientifically recorded adverse effects for the mask wearer.”

Covering the airways with masks makes breathing harder, due to the air resistance they generate and the moisture they collect inside. According to one 2020 study: “Ventilation, cardiopulmonary exercise capacity and comfort are reduced by surgical masks and highly impaired by FFP2/N95 face masks in healthy individuals.”

Masks also create “dead space” air between the mask surface and the face, which remains trapped at the end of every breath out, and gets rebreathed right back in. Dead-space air is stale, potentially containing 20 times the CO2 concentration of normal room air, along with hundreds of other substances excreted by the human body through the lungs, including toxins.

Mixed with those are traces of the chemicals, such as formaldehyde, used to make or preserve the masks. Plastic microfibers slough off the fabric, have recently been found lodged in the sinuses of patients diagnosed with irritant rhinitis, and may make it all the way into the lungs.

Because of the increased resistance to breathing and trapped dead-space air, masks make it harder for the lungs to remove CO2 from the blood, and to supply the blood with oxygen. Multiple experimental studies with N95, surgical, and other masks, some published in prestigious journals like Nature, provide evidence that all common kinds of face masks can result in statistically higher blood CO2 levels or lower blood oxygen levels in healthy individuals, or both.

The body reacts to this imbalance by increasing its resting pulse and breathing rates, which can be dangerous to those in poor health.

All of this would fall on the tone-deaf ears of Franklin’s superintendent and a slight majority of school board members. For a few months parents passionately and emotionally informed Franklin officials about the physical and psychological damage caused by masks. The cold, callous response has been total indifference. How can they possibly feel good about themselves? Their defense of trying to save all of Franklin simply doesn’t hold up.

Remember years ago all those public service announcements that proclaimed “Every child deserves a quality education”?

Try this statement from July 2020:

“Even during a crisis, every child deserves access to a quality education.”
— Christian Barnard, an education policy analyst at Reason Foundation

Those are but hollow words in my school district where a pledge to provide the best has unfortunately been replaced by punitive priorities.

Despite all of this, a question:

Did any good result from Franklin’s fight to make masks optional in school?

In November I wrote to the school board: The Case Against Masks for Children.

Another question: What is the one biggest problem with the current Franklin School Board?

Finally, December 31, 12:06 pm:

Dear Franklin Public Schools Families & Staff,

As you will see reflected on our COVID-19 Dashboard for today (here), the surge in cases in the area is impacting our students and staff within our schools.  

Since they have exceeded the 1.5% 14-day positivity rate and we are aware of new cases, Forest Park Middle School & Franklin High School will return to required masking for all students beginning Monday.  This will be in effect through the following Friday, January 14th at which point we will review our positive case rates and decide if masking can switch back to recommended. 

Due to school not being in session and students and staff not being in contact with each other, at this time, we will not be pivoting Country Dale Elementary or Pleasant View Elementary to virtual learning even though both displayed red as of late Thursday.  Based upon case rates over the last 14-days, both schools are anticipated to be yellow as of Monday.  Therefore, our current plan is to not pivot any schools to virtual learning for Monday and to evaluate our metrics as the week goes on. Families will be provided at least one day of advance notice if there is a shift to virtual learning.

In addition, the timeline for isolation and quarantine has been and continues to be set for our staff and students based on public health guidelines, and under the direction of the health department, our nursing services team and district leadership will plan to meet with our medical advisors and the Franklin Health Department early next week in order to evaluate all of our safety policies related to COVID-19. We will be in communication regarding any updated practices for staff and students in the near future.

We are asking all families to please continue to monitor your children for any symptoms of COVID-19 and act accordingly.  Thank you for your patience and understanding as we continue to navigate the circumstances around COVID-19 as we work to keep our students and staff in school safely.  

FPS Communications

Who knows what the school board will pull in 2022. They simply can’t be trusted.

THE TOP 10 FRANKLIN STORIES OF 2021

1) ?
2) FRANKLIN REFUSES TO UNMASK OUR CHILDREN
3) FRANKLIN AND THE WAUKESHA MASSACRE
4) OVER AT FPS, POOR JUDY MUELLER
5) BALLPARK COMMONS ADDS TO QUALITY OF LIFE
6) WHERE IS SANDRA ECKERT?
7) WHERE ARE THE VACCINATIONS?
8) FPS & CNN
9) HOUSING BOOM
10) FRANKLIN POLITICS

Hope you’re enjoying my TOP TEN FRANKLIN STORIES OF 2021 (Two left to go).

Lots went on in our small city, but these items didn’t make the cut.

In no particular order:

Want to speak at a Franklin School Board meeting? Bring a photo ID

Bigger than masks or CRT…or, why the Franklin Public Schools can’t be trusted, Part Three

I got a survey from Franklin Public Schools, but it wasn’t about masks

Franklin pushing SEL, which is code for CRT

After Patti Logsdon’s latest bash against the Rock, Steve Taylor responds, and how

How I love when my mayor puts my alderwoman in her place

Misconstrusion?

No one would object to this sign, would they?

“It should be in Franklin”

Franklin’s latest, greatest marketing achievement

Big changes coming at Franklin’s middle school

Busybodies are alive and well here in Franklin

Franklin: High taxes? Not a problem. Saving a chair for 7/4 parade? GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

“Who rides in a parade?”

Six people, including 8-year-old Jackson Sparks, died and dozens were injured on Sunday, November 21, 2021, after Darrell Brooks drove his red SUV through the crowd of performers and bystanders at the Waukesha Christmas parade. Graphic videos of the event show the vehicle driven by Brook running over marchers, dancers, and parade attendees. The criminal complaint alleges that “this was an intentional act to strike and hurt as many people as possible.”

Brooks has a lengthy rap sheet and had just posted bond just a few days before the parade.

Following the mass murder Franklin Mayor Steve Olson posted the following on the Franklin Community Forum Facebook page:

I have sent Mayor Shawn Reilly (Mayor, City of Waukesha) a message and offer of additional assistance with this senseless act of violence. There were several Franklin Police Officers and Firefighter/Paramedics who were off-duty and attending the parade with family who were able to immediately offer aid to victims. Franklin sent additional police officers and equipment to the scene to assist Waukesha PD. I ask that you keep the victims in your prayers and remember that there are a whole lot of kids who have seen terrible and tragic things tonight that they will remember for the rest of their lives. I hope they can get the help they’ll need.

Olson added:

It’s now up to the families and community to make sure that the kids recover both physically and perhaps more importantly, emotionally to this event. I’m told that Waukesha’s mental health system is good. I pray that they’re better. Kids shouldn’t have to have this trauma in their lives. I’m proud of my friend Mayor Riley and the message he said at the presser this evening. I’m praying for him and Waukesha tonight.

For the first time in the city’s history Franklin had scheduled its own Christmas parade and quickly announced it would not cancel. The Dancing Grannies contacted Franklin and expressed their desire to participate.

The Dancing Grannies are heroes of 2021.

THE TOP 10 FRANKLIN STORIES OF 2021
1) ?
2) ?
3) FRANKLIN AND THE WAUKESHA MASSACRE
4) OVER AT FPS, POOR JUDY MUELLER
5) BALLPARK COMMONS ADDS TO QUALITY OF LIFE
6) WHERE IS SANDRA ECKERT?
7) WHERE ARE THE VACCINATIONS?
8) FPS & CNN
9) HOUSING BOOM
10) FRANKLIN POLITICS