WHY WE NEED CHANGE

Denny Denholm claims experience should decide your vote on who represents District 2 families for the Mead School Board. Experience is important, but performance matters more, and his record is one of repeated failure to protect district families or reflect our values. Here are some “highlights” from his 25 years of unopposed time on the board.

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POOR FINANCIAL STEWARDSHIP

 

• Approved teacher contract the school board directors acknowledged “were not unsustainable” (4/22/19 Board Minutes, 4th bullet section III), creating a $12M budget shortfall requiring an emergency budgetary resolution (4/17/2019 Board Minutes). Rather than accept responsibility for the decision, he and the board blamed the teachers union and the state legislature.

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• Mead students and families paid the price for the financial crisis with the closure of M.E.A.D and Riverpoint Academy (5/7/2019 Board Minutes, Section F).

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WON’T STAND UP FOR OUR KIDS

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• Cast deciding vote against proposal that would have prohibited teaching Critical Race Theory (CRT) in Mead classrooms. (9/12/2022 Board Minutes, top of p 11, Recording #2 vote at ~1:51:20) 
  
  In his speech prior to vote, Denny specifically said people should “vote him out” if they didn’t like his position. (Recording #2, 1:38:17 and 1:38:30)

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• Rubber stamps bad state policy recommendations. Voted to adopt Policy 3211, Procedure - Transgender Students. The policy approved is identical to a sample policy pushed by Washington State School Directors Association (WSSDA) (7/25/2019 Board Minutes, Section V, paragraph H).
  
  The policy green lights student’s ability to choose the bathroom they want to use, paves way for the same in locker rooms, implicitly threatens staff if they inform parents about their student's behavior and essentially compels speech for staff regarding the use of pronouns. Incredibly, Denholm confirmed to a Mead voter boys are using girls’ bathroom, but said “he didn’t like it” and “doesn’t know how it happened.”​

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IGNORES MEAD FAMILIES AND STAFF

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• Doesn’t listen to his district – When Midway families filled the auditorium in 2019 to oppose changes to the middle school boundaries, he didn’t even attend to hear our concerns, and then voted to approve the plan unchanged.

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• Opposes public input – Cast deciding vote to block school nurses from making public comment about proposed staffing changes. (5/22/23 Board Minutes, Section II, Recording vote at ~8:00)

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• Too busy to visit schools or support activities – District teachers confide they never see him in schools.  Others privately report he consistently ignores invitations to join district events and activities.  This August, however, everything changed suddenly.   Faced with an election, he showed up for the first day of school and now accepts invites to events supporting to student athletes.

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OUT OF TOUCH WITH MEAD VALUES

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• Endorsed Jamie Stacy, a progressive candidate funded by Fuse WA who is “running to bring her progressive vision to the board.”  Progressive values are what District 81 and the west side embrace.  Neither is an example we want to follow.

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