The Shadow
LOW?MOOR? — The chairman of the Alleghany County Board of Supervisors is calling for Donnie Kern to resign from his Clifton Forge West District seat on the Alleghany County School Board.
The call for Kern’s resignation came Tuesday as the Virginia Department of Education has closed its investigation into allegations levied by Kern against school officials.
But the more than 60 allegation Kern levied against the school board and administration were overshadowed by a remark Kern allegedly made to an advocate who works with autistic children and their families.
At Monday’s meeting, School Board Chairman Randy Tucker made public an e-mail the school board received from Amy Trail, an advocate with Families of Autism Community Enrichment Services. Trail said Kern made a slur against special education students in comments to her.
“He stated to me personally, ‘I do not want my child in the retard room,’” Trail wrote in the e-mail read by Tucker.
Bennett said Kern’s comments regarding special needs students overshadowed a 140-page document he compiled in December that called for a state investigation of the school division.
“By the time the meeting was over, everybody had forgotten about the 140-page document. All the talk in the parking lot was about what he called the [special education] students,” Bennett said.
In an e-mail sent in mid-December, Kern made numerous allegations against the school divisions, including possible financial fraud and heavy criticism of the school division’s special education program.
Monday night, Superintendent Gene Kotulka spent more than an hour addressing each of Kern’s 60-plus allegations.
In essence, Kotulka said Kern’s accusations and statements against the school division “are false, misleading and untrue.”
In a Tuesday e-mail, the Department of Education said it concurred with Kotulka’s findings.
“Your findings appear consistent with our review. As we have communicated with Mr. Kern, we consider this matter closed,” Donald Fairheart, a deputy superintendent and chief of staff with the Department of Education, stated in an e-mail to Kotulka Tuesday morning.
Kern says he sent an e-mail outlining his allegations to state officials in December. The documents were dated Dec. 11.
But at Monday’s meeting, the school board said Kern never sent the e-mail to state officials. They said the e-mail was sent to a member of the Alleghany County Board of Supervisors, who contacted Kotulka.
School officials said they later forwarded the documents to the Department of Education, asking for an investigation.
After addressing the school board Monday night, Kotulka dropped numerous volumes of documents on a table. He said the documents contained Kern’s allegations and the school board’s findings.
He said the investigation into Kern’s accusations involved 225 hours in personnel time, resulting in a cost of $21,591. Kotulka said the money could have been used to hire a teacher’s assistant.
The school board has retained an attorney to staff its meetings. The proposed 2019-2020 budget includes $60,000 for attorney’s fees.
Several persons, including special education teachers from Sharon Elementary School, spoke at Monday night’s meeting. Kern was not in attendance.
Some of the strongest comments came from Melanie Mullineaux, who works as a behavior specialist in county schools.
Speaking as if she was addressing Kern directly, Mullineaux said, “Mr. Kern, I feel sorry for you … you have lost the trust of the people you claim to represent.
“Rather than making assumptions and accusations, next time, come talk to us,” she said.
Mullineaux added that Kern’s actions have been detrimental to the school division and “certainly do not keep the focus on students.”
Kotulka accused Kern of “grandstanding” at school board meetings.
In January, he voiced displeasure with the school board’s budget process before walking out, saying he had a conflict with another commitment. At the December business meeting, Kern abstained from voting on action items listed on the agenda, saying he could not make informed decisions because he was given insufficient information by school officials.
“He has belittled himself by making false accusations and misrepresenting the facts,” Kotulka said.
Kotulka said Kern is under investigation for possible violations of student privacy laws and the Virginia Freedom of Information Act. In addition, three lawsuits against Kern are pending, Kotulka said.
The Alleghany County Board of Supervisors appointed Kern to the Clifton Forge West seat in June by a 4-3 vote. Four supervisors — Bennett, Shannon Cox, Cletus Nicely and Richard Shull — attended Monday’s school board meeting.
“We just wanted be there Monday night in an unofficial capacity to see for ourselves what the school board has been putting up with,” said Bennett.
Bennett called for Kern to resign, saying his comment about special education students “crossed the line.”
“He needs to resign. This is not a school board problem. It’s the board of supervisors’ problem. We are the ones who appointed him and we need to fix it,” Bennett said.
However, there is little legal precedent in Virginia for removing appointed school board members from office.
“We have several options on how to go about this. He needs to fix it. He needs to resign,” Bennett said.
Bennett said the supervisors may soon have a special called meeting to consider calling for Kern’s resignation.
“From what I?heard Monday night, it is clear that he does not represent the people of the Alleghany Highlands — Alleghany County, Covington and Clifton Forge. None of us are like that,” Bennett said.
Bennett said the Kern controversy is overshadowing the fact that the Virginia General Assembly recently awarded $400,000 to study the possibility of merging the Alleghany County and Covington City school divisions.
“This is the first time the state of Virginia has awarded money for something like this. We have a chance to play a lead role in merging small, rural school divisions in the state of Virginia and it’s being overshadowed by something like this. We just have so many positive things going on in this area right now,” he said.
