Fairfield Board Candidates Take Sides on Issues

BY EMILY STEWART
OCT. 25, 2007

With Halloween creeping up on the calendar, the Fairfield community isn’t as wary of the usual haunts this year as it is of another looming presence: the upcoming Fairfield School Board election.

The Nov. 6 election is fast approaching, and with two spots open, Candidates Erik Rivera and Lee Maloney are squaring off against Candidates Diana Bailey and Jerome Kearns on the issues of school spending, funding and hiring a new school superintendent.

Rivera and Maloney are both endorsed by Citizens for Accountability and Responsible Education (CARE) and current board member (and CARE Founder) Arnold Engel. Rivera ran for school board and was defeated in 2005, and now he wants to get elected alongside Maloney to back Engel on the issues of controlling school spending.

At an Oct. 4 school board work session, Engel proposed a series of cuts he said would help save the district money. He suggested cutting 25 percent of the overall staff, all teacher aides and five assistant principals among other cuts. Rivera supports Engel’s proposal claiming the school board spending is “disgusting.”

“We don’t have a funding problem, we have a spending problem,” he said. “Our board’s hands are tied too tightly, and that’s not the kind of board we need. Mr. Engel is a tireless individual, and like him, I plan on representing all of the community, even those who oppose Mr. Engel.”

Rivera is a Cincinnati St. Xavier High School graduate who has been self-employed in Fairfield for the last 15 years. He’s concerned that surplus money the board has now is quickly running out, so his first priority if elected would be hiring a new school superintendent to help curb the spending problem.

“We need to start working more with less,” he said.

Interim Superintendent Kathy Milligan, who’s been in the Fairfield district more than 30 years, came out of retirement to fill in as a temporary superintendent when the current school board couldn’t find a suitable replacement for retiring Superintendent Robert Farrell before the academic year started. Rivera believes the district needs a permanent replacement, and Maloney agreed it should be the new board’s first priority.

If elected, Maloney would work to find a superintendent who could help Fairfield achieve an “excellent” rating on the Ohio State Report Card, which determines a portion of school funding. Fairfield missed the “excellent” mark in 2006-07 by nine students of 10,000 enrolled.

“We want our next superintendent to be someone who can get us back that ‘excellent’ rating,” he said. “We need to be willing to give the best education this community is willing to pay for.”

Maloney is a retired retail business manager who has lived in Fairfield for more than 20 years who has put his four children through Fairfield schools. Since 1999, Maloney’s been collecting data about the current state of Fairfield schools, and like Rivera, he doesn’t like what he sees in terms of spending.

“I know Fairfield is a good district, and my roots are forever in Fairfield, but I’m concerned about the senior citizens,” he said. “School levies and periodically asking for more money in taxes is driving us out of the community because of deficit spending, and that responsibility rests with the board. We need to look at what sacrifices can be made.”

While Rivera and Maloney criticize how the district spends its money, Bailey and Kearns believe state funding is the real problem with local school finances.

“I don’t think anyone that gets elected to a school board is there to mismanage money,” Bailey said. “Our funding system is broken, and therefore, no one can promise you that we can save money on taxes.”

Bailey said she and her husband have come to love the Fairfield School District in their 14 years in the community, and she accredits Fairfield for giving her daughter the opportunity to go to college. If elected, one of her priorities would be to work together with other districts to address the state funding issue.

The Ohio State Supreme Court found Ohio’s reliance on property taxes as the source for school funding unconstitutional in 2000, but ordered it be fixed at “deliberate” speed---meaning there’s no definite deadline to come up with a solution. Bailey said she would like to form a committee with other school boards in Butler County and take funding concerns to Gov. Ted Strickland in Columbus.

“No one in Ohio has a clear answer as to how we should fund the schools,” she said. “But I am willing to help form a committee so that we can address legislation about it.”

Bailey also opposes Rivera and Maloney on the issue of finding a new superintendent, and said she has been impressed with the job Milligan has done so far.

“I think the best thing to come out of the last search for a superintendent was Kathy Milligan,” she said. “She’s very committed to the schools, and she exhibits the qualities of what a good superintendent should look like. I hope she can stay.”

Kearns echoed Bailey’s sentiments about Milligan and believes Fairfield already has a superintendent who has achieved the “excellent” rating.

“We had 100 percent graduation rate in 2006-2007, seven Commended Scholars and one National Merit Finalist, so I think we already have a competent superintendent in place,” Kearns said. “To be a superintendent is a tough job because you have to be an expert in curriculum, community relations and have a commitment to a big community like this one. I think those qualities are all in Kathy Milligan.”

Kearns and his wife moved to Fairfield three years ago from a community he called “unsupportive” of its school district. He ran for Fairfield School Board in 2005, and like Rivera, was defeated by an incumbent candidate. Nevertheless, he said he attends almost all school board meetings and serves on a number of committees like the finance committee and dress code revision committee. He also has worked actively in earning grants for the new Fairfield Athletic Training Complex. As Assistant Director of Operations for Butler County Job and Family Services for 13 years, Kearns knows what it’s like to do more with less, he said.

However, he too believes the root of the district’s money problem lies with state funding.

“I don’t have an answer as to how we should fund our schools, but I’m willing to pursue that answer,” he said. “Our current system doesn’t work, and we know we need sustainable resources to live and grow for our kids.”

Kearns vowed to be first accessible, communicative and decisive, if elected, to the school board.

“School boards are not managers, they’re leaders,” he said. “It’s their job to build public support and demand quality public education for our children. On Nov. 6, we can either fall back or move forward.”

Want to find out more about the Fairfield School Board Candidates?
• For more information on Candidates Erik Rivera and Lee Maloney, visit www.care-ff.org
• For more information on Candidate Diana Bailey, visit www.4Fairfield.com or www.dianaforschoolboard.com
• For more information on Candidate Jerome Kearns, visit www.4Fairfield.com or www.myspace.com/kearnsforschoolboard