GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Green Bay’s seven-person school board will be getting at least two new members over the next few weeks, as two seats are up through election and one by appointment.
Leaders of minority resource centers in the city have said they want people they can trust in those positions after the resignation of Superintendent Claude Tiller on Feb. 17.
Tiller was the first African American to hold that position in the district. He resigned after about seven months on the job. Tiller was put on paid leave as the district launched an investigation into comments he made on an Atlanta radio show.
Some minority residents did not hold back moments after Green Bay’s school board accepted Tiller’s resignation.
“I’m going to run and I’m going to take your seat, I’m telling you that right now,” Steph Guzman loudly said to school board members as they walked out of the meeting after Tiller’s resignation.
While the Tiller situation happened after the deadline to run for the two school board positions that will be on ballots April 2, another seat opened up when Laura Laitinen-Warren recently resigned. The school board will pick who serves the year remaining on her term.
After Tiller’s resignation, the leaders of Hispanic, African American, and Somali resource centers formed the group United Front for Social Change. Those leaders want the school board to appoint a person of color to Laitinen-Warren’s seat.
While Green Bay’s overall population is 72% white, the students in the school district are about 61% minority.
“It’s not really that we need to beg for it or we need to ask people to do a favor for us,” said Said Hassan, a leader of the new group and the executive director of COMSA, a resource center for Somali residents. “This is actually a right that we need to demand.”
15 people signed up to be considered for the school board appointment. The United Front leaders say they know of at least four candidates who are minority.
“We are not going to wait generations for our schools to be free and we are going to create the conditions in our community so that young people can get the quality of education that they deserve,” said Stephanie Ortiz, an employee of We All Rise, an African American resource center, and a member of the United Front group.
As for the two school board seats up through election, the United Front group held a forum Thursday evening to hear from the candidates. Of the three who were in attendance, we asked them how important it would be for them to have a minority member on the board.
“I think having a good mix of people on the board that reflects the community is important,” said Andrew Becker, an incumbent board member running for re-election. “It’s also important to make sure we have quality candidates that’s going to be dedicated to board service.”
“If we don’t have any or hardly any representation then at the very least we’re not getting a very accurate picture of what the community wants,” said Alex Mineau, a school board candidate.
“It allows fresh perspectives because we all come from different backgrounds,” said Kou Lee, a school board candidate.
Paul Boucher is also running for the school board, but was not at the forum.
The school board will appoint the new board member April 15, two weeks after voters have their say on the two seats up through election.
The school board will first screen those 15 applicants during a special meeting on April 3. Interviews will then happen at that April 15 meeting when a finalist is selected.
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