League of Women Voters of SLO County partnered with the Paso Robles AAUW to host forum

PASO ROBLES — On Monday, Oct. 14, the League of Women Voters of San Luis Obispo County partnered with the Paso Robles American Association of University Women (AAUW) to moderate a forum for candidates running for a spot on the Paso Robles Joint Unified School District Board of Trustees. With discipline and student behavior a maintopic of concern for those attending the forum, candidates shared how they would be able to impact the district.

The Paso Robles Joint Unified School District (PRJSUD) has four seats up for grabs this November for Trustee Areas 3, 5, 6, and 7.

For Trustee Area 3, Nathan Williams and Hunter M. Breese are vying for the seats. Williams is currently on the board and is serving as board president. Breese, 19, just recently graduated from Paso Robles High School in 2022 and was a key player in students fighting to remove the masking rule on campus that same year.

For Trustee Area 5, Laurene D. McCoy, who is already on the board, is running for a second term against retired teacher and former PRJUSD Board Member Tim Gearhart. He was elected to serve on the board three times.

In Trustee Area 6, retired Army Veteran Leo Castillo is running against Bearcat mother Adelita Hiteshew. Castillo has lived in Paso Robles for 12 years and recently completed an internship at Almond Acres Charter Academy. Hiteshew graduated from PRHS in 1999 and is the current PTA president at Virginia Peterson Elementary School.

For Trustee Area 7, incumbent Kenney Enney and challenger Tracy Dauterman are vying for the seat. Dauterman is also a mother of two Winifred Pifter Elementary School students and is the PTA president there. In October 2022, Enney was appointed to the trustee seat after Chris Bausch left his seat on the board to serve on City Council. A special election was then initiated after a petition was successful in terminating provisionally appointed trustee Enney. He was then successfully elected back to his seat on the board in May 2023.

All candidates were present at the forum, answering questions from the public who attended. Candidates were givenone minute to answer questions brought forward and the audience was asked to remain neutral with any reactions and asked to not wear campaign gear.

Moderator Ed Cabrera opened the forum with the forum rules and started off by giving candidates the opportunity to provide their opening statements.

Many of the trustees agreed with Enney’s opening statement when he said that the role of the school board trustees was to provide oversight to district staff and direction. McCoy added that trustees should also consistently follow up on their direction to make sure it aligns with the district’s vision. 

However, Gearhart said, “Board members are not judges of teachers and whatnot. We have one employee, and that is the superintendent. We are not supposed to be going in and telling people what to do and how to do it … also the board should be open for communication.”

When it was his turn to answer the question itself, Enney added that it was important for trustees to have boots on the ground to verify what was happening on campuses to avoid situations like the deteriorating state of the Georgia Brown Elementary School that was inevitably closed.

Williams added, “It’s not in the weeds of trying to make specific goals or specific direction as far as exactly how the staff is going to manage it. We need to trust our staff to be able to do their job and to do it right and do it well. Things our board is not tasked with is trying to change state legislation.”

Student safety, discipline, and gaining trust between the district parents were among the top concerns for the candidates.

Towards the end of the night, Cabrera asked the candidates, “Safety and discipline have been mentioned more than once tonight; what strategies or ideas do you have with regards to this?”

“First and foremost, the kids have to be held accountable, and [if] they aren’t … I’m not necessarily a fan of suspension, but I would love to see Saturday detentions,” said Enney, who also would like to see more law enforcement involvement with students who are committing “felony equivalents” but are receiving no punishment for them. He says this would include something like diversion programs that would teach students that there are consequences for their actions.

Receiving consequences for their actions was echoed by Breese, and Williams stated he would like to see consistency across the district on what the consequences are. McCoy would like to see parents involved with certain consequences for students, but that some of the actions need someone to get to the root cause of it and have appropriate action taken to rectify it.

Gearhart had a one-size-fits-all approach to student behavior issues. However, they need to follow through.

While at Almond Acres, Castillo says he managed discipline for students and disagreed with suspension unless absolutely necessary. Instead, Castillo said he used discipline metrics that utilized community service for the students.

Hiteshew said that staff can build pride in the young students so that they want to follow the rules, providing praise when they do something right, “We need clear and concise expectations and consequences for our students. But aside from that, this is something that we will start building in the elementary school.”

Dauterman echoed Hiteshew with positive reinforcement for elementary school students starting out young, along with the utilization of the district’s multi-tier system of support for discipline.

You can watch the forum in its full at youtube.com/watch?v=bO_fYBZcXSg&t=1672s