Celebrations & Challenges

The Friday night of Labor Day weekend my wife and I both got home very late. Bubba Egbert and the Raiders won their football game and Mrs. A. was very thankful that Jessica Tufts is her assistant cheerleading coach. Bubba and Jessica are LR grads. Lori used to coach Jessica as a cheerleader. Bubba played collegiate football and his expert, leave-it-all-on-the field, no drama style will lead to success for the Raiders. I was returning from the Spokane Tribal Powwow where I saw many local folks. I visited with Soy Redthunder (such a wonderful person) and enjoyed watching Danny Nanamkin, Jericho Desautel-Ootsey and others, dancing.

Prior to this late night, Mrs. A. and I had returned from a road trip. Roger L. is to blame for this trip because in his stories he talks about his love for our National Parks. So, my wife strong-armed me into rolling through 18 of them. She was ecstatic and I was exhausted. Roger needs to put down the pen and walk away.

Once back home someone asked me if I’d seen the series of articles in The Star from the GCDSD upper brass. I said no, but I’d hoped progressive changes were happening. Once I got caught up I was as floored as the person who confided in me. The arrogant, don’t question us, nothing to see here tone did not surprise me. What did surprise me was that their information was misleading, inaccurate and very conveniently selective. They pick and choose the narrative, avoid the real challenges and claim things are so complex and out of their control.

Over the last few years the public is aware that the GCDSD has done a poor job with important issues where volume/numbers, degree, validity and patterns have all been significant. Management couches things under the term “facts” when often times it is just their opinions. They say there is no evidence when the truth is there is tons of evidence that has always been right in front of them – get real!

They, their friends and family plastered facts in The Star before the levy requests last February and both measures failed miserably. I said they were out of touch and many “mean mugged” me, but I was correct. Things go right over heads that are buried in the sand. The disastrous levy results were not only due to fiscal reasons, but more so a lack of overall accountability. The GCDSD management doesn’t value people who’ve been Raider supporters for decades but as taxpayers we feel they’re not taking responsibility for “bobble head” decisions. For the most part, due to a lack of appropriate action and a growth mindset in the past, people are not going to say they are tired of the reactive management style. However, it is getting old.

Evidence of challenges from decisions made is all around – just open your eyes! Look again at the February 2022 poll results. Look at the exodus of staff and students from the GCDSD. I was nice when I only listed the majority of your system leaders leaving because there are twice as many staff who’ve left. We are told they were all happy and supported, which is not true and quite frankly unbelievable. Look at the line-up of cars at the top to the Wilbur hill. Students in our boundaries are going to Wilbur/Creston, ACH and other neighboring schools due to the GCDSD not progressing with current reality issues.

I want to clearly remind everyone that the GCDSD belongs to the community. Thankfully, community members talk to me. I know someone that sat on the Okanogan side of the girls’ varsity basketball game and heard our player being heckled. You did nothing about it — very sad! One person informed me that there were some violent situations happening at our schools during the State B basketball tournament and our superintendent never returned to the District to help out. What about a person who talked to me and wants our superintendent to be professional and stop sharing medical procedures stories? Once again, people won’t confide when labeled as spreading rumors, lying, etc. They don’t feel valued and feel nothing will be taken care of.

The current GCDSD education levy request for the November 2022 election is $2.00 per $1,000.00 property valuation. They say this is 52% less than the previous request. No surprise here but this is not accurate. I contacted the election offices involved and our education levy over the last few years has gone from $1.50 to $2.50 and now $2.00. Interesting…I clearly remember a few years back the GCDSD conveying the organization was broke and the superintendent saying there was nothing left to cut. However, now they are good stewards of our funds and have slashed another $500,000. They continue to lose credibility and community trust. Instead of adding more staff to do the superintendent’s job, try spending funds on a great PR firm to help portray our district we all love properly and help our superintendent keep his composure.

In closing, I predict that the current levy request will pass even though it should be at $1.50. Our students should not suffer due to the lack of quality, genuine leadership in our local school district. Once again, the worst I’ve seen in four decades.

John M. Adkins