Commentary: Voters can be the force that drives change, via community involvement, says a commentator.
The essays, analyses and opinions presented as Community Voices express the perspectives of their authors on topics of interest and importance to the community, and are not intended to reflect perspectives on behalf of the Salish Current.
My sister lives just outside D.C., retired from NOAA [the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] after decades of service. We take wry familial pride in her having designed a television graphic used to demonstrate a hurricane’s path. In truth, her work was meaningful; it made lives safer.
Now a different kind of hurricane has hit right where she lives. I watch as her landscape erodes. NOAA faces deep cuts, its work in jeopardy. The administration has hijacked her beloved Kennedy Center, site of Sunday afternoons watching musicals and opera with grandchildren. Her hometown paper, The Washington Post, loses credibility as lines between business and editorial content blur.
I may read the national news with outrage and sorrow, but she faces the loss of her intimate community.
All this brings me to my own community, where disruption has arrived at schools a few miles up the road. My impact on national upheaval is not nil, but it feels like the equivalent of an occasional water droplet hitting stone. Yet, in my own neighborhood, maybe I can help shape the landscape.
In the 2023 Sedro-Woolley school board election, a Moms for Liberty candidate, Lindy Mullen-Doyle, ran against the incumbent board president. Mullen-Doyle spent over $15,000 on the election, to her incumbent’s $775. Her biggest contributors in the traditionally nonpartisan race included the Republican Party and Brian Heywood. Heywood is the Kirkland multimillionaire behind Let’s Go Washington initiatives on the 2024 Washington ballot, including the repeal of the Climate Commitment Act.
Moms for Liberty formed during COVID-19, protesting school mask and vaccine mandates. Under the banner of parental rights, it presses nationally for repressive change in public schools, including book bans, the elimination of trans-students’ rights and the outlawing of curriculum mentioning race and ethnicity. The organization does not shy from obstructive or harassing tactics.
Recently it has joined what is left of the Department of Education to create a tip line so that parents can report educators who follow Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives.
After that 2023 election, school board meetings often devolved into tense, accusatory tirades from Moms for Liberty supporters, frequently directed at the superintendent. Also targeted was the reading of the Indigenous land acknowledgement, which was subsequently discontinued. Mullen-Doyle introduced an anti-trans Washington Interscholastic Activities Association resolution and amendment.
As the next year unfolded, the five-member school board lost two members to resignations. Responsible for appointing replacements, the board is paralyzed. Replacement requires a majority vote of three members. Two of the three vote along Moms for Liberty party lines. A compromise on a “neutral” candidate has proved impossible.
Finally, the school superintendent, Dr. Miriam Mickelson, departed. She left under unclear circumstances after a closed door meeting with the diminished board, who cited “a mutual separation for no cause.”
She may be hard to replace. In 2021, struggling with the educational system ravages of COVID-19, Sedro Woolley hired Mickelson, who grew up in poverty in the Philippines. Labeled by some an outsider, her competence, involvement and inclusive compassion eventually gained her a strong following among students, staff and parents.
Regionally, Sedro-Woolley is not alone in this struggle. Similar conflicts have happened in the Stanwood and Lynden school districts.
It is a sad story — the discord and damage felt nationally playing out locally. Yet, because it is a community story, the possibility of our effective engagement beckons and gives me hope for positive change.
A group of parents and community members have steadily shown up at board meetings, speaking up for inclusive education. Local papers covered the superintendent’s departure as front-page news, highlighting community response.
Procedurally, after 90 days, the decision to replace a school board member moves from the paralyzed board to Northwest Educational Service District 189. Perhaps encouraged to action by this crisis, several promising candidates are in the running.
The school board meeting after Mickelson’s departure drew close to 100 people — staff, parents and community members — packed into a room better suited for 50. I overheard one person say, “It feels like a funeral.”
Angered by her departure, they were also galvanized by what she represented: safe, welcoming schools for everyone.
When Mullen-Doyle won her election, after spending 20 times what her opponent did, it was by only six votes. At the local level, every vote clearly counts.
Those down-ballot elections — the school board, the county offices, the state legislators — can change our lives in seismic ways.
We can be the force behind that change. Well before elections, we can attend public meetings to observe how our schools, cities and counties are functioning. We can encourage and support open-minded candidates. Heck, we can run ourselves. And when the time comes, we can take voting seriously and know who and what we are voting for.
— By Beverly (Bee) Faxon
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