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Kenosha Unified School District elections (2015)
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Three seats on the Kenosha Unified Board of Education were up for general election on April 7, 2015. Three at-large board incumbents were up for re-election. Incumbents Carl Bryan, Tamarra Coleman and Mary Snyder faced challengers Mike Falkofske and Tony Garcia.[1]
Bryan withdrew from the race after accepting an offer of employment from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction. However, his withdrawal came after the deadline for his name to be withdrawn from the ballot. If Bryan had won in the general election, the vacancy would have been filed by appointment.[2]
Such an appointment, however, was unnecessary. Falkofske, Snyder and Coleman were the top three vote recipients in the race, defeating Garcia and Bryan. Bryan had contributed his remaining campaign funds to Falkofske after announcing that he would not be actively seeking election. Garcia considered seeking a recount as the margin of votes separating him from the third-highest vote recipient, Coleman, was less than 100 votes as of the unofficial vote tally on election night.[3]
About the district
Kenosha Unified School District is located in Kenosha County in southeastern Wisconsin. The county seat is Kenosha. In 2013, Kenosha County was home to approximately 167,757 residents according to estimates by the United States Census Bureau.[4] During the 2011-2012 school year, Kenosha Unified School District was the third-largest school district in Wisconsin and served 22,905 students.[5]
Demographics
Kenosha County underperformed in comparison to the rest of Wisconsin in terms of higher education achievement in 2012. The United States Census Bureau found that 23.8 percent of Kenosha County residents aged 25 years and older had attained a bachelor's degree compared to 26.4 percent for Wisconsin as a whole. The median household income in Kenosha County was $55,117 between 2008-2012, compared to $52,627 for the state of Wisconsin. The poverty rate in Kenosha County was 12.2 percent between 2008-2012, compared to 12.5 percent for the entire state.[4]
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Note: Percentages for race and ethnicity may add up to more than 100 percent because respondents may report more than one race and the Hispanic/Latino ethnicity may be selected in conjunction with any race. Read more about race and ethnicity in the census here.
Voter and candidate information
The Kenosha Unified Board of Education consists of seven members elected at-large to three-year terms.[7] If more than two candidates had filed for any board position, the primary election would have been held on February 17, 2015. Because only five candidates filed for three seats, all five advanced to the general election on April 7, 2015.
To be elected to the board, candidates must reside in the boundaries of the school district for 28 days prior to the filing of a "Declaration of Candidacy" form. Furthermore, at the time of taking office, each candidate must be a resident of the apportioned area he or she is elected to represent.[8] Candidates must also be 18 years old and citizens of the United States. Unless pardoned, those who have been convicted of a felony are not eligible for election to office in Wisconsin.[9]
Candidates had between December 1, 2014, and January 6, 2015, to collect between 100 and 200 signatures for their nomination papers. The signatures had to come from residents of the district which the candidate sought election to represent, but the petition circulators were not required to reside in the district or municipality. Circulators were required to be U.S. citizens and 18 years or older.[10]
Voters could register to vote in the election at the polling place on the election day. Proof of residence was required when registering to vote.[11] In March 2015, the United States Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to Wisconsin's voter ID law allowing it to take effect. However, Wisconsin officials stated they would not enforce the law until after the election on April 7, 2015. No photo identification was required to vote in this election.[12]
Elections
2015
Candidates
At-large
| Carl Bryan | Tamarra Coleman 
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Mary Snyder
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| Mike Falkofske
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Tony Garcia | ||
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Election results
| Kenosha Unified School District, At-Large General Election, 3-year term, 2015 |
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| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan |  Mike Falkofske |
23.7% | 6,724 | |
| Nonpartisan | Mary Snyder Incumbent |
23.2% | 6,583 | |
| Nonpartisan | Tamarra Coleman Incumbent |
20.7% | 5,874 | |
| Nonpartisan | Tony Garcia | 20.4% | 5,784 | |
| Nonpartisan | Carl Bryan Incumbent | 11.2% | 3,184 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in votes* | 0.6% | 179 | |
| Total Votes | 28,328 | |||
| Source: Margaret Koenig, "Email correspondence with Stacy Busby, Executive Assistant at Kenosha Unified School District," August 7, 2015. *The write-in votes total provided here comes from the unofficial results reported by Kenosha County on election night. The official report of canvass provided by the school district did not include write-in votes. | ||||
Endorsements
Kenosha Educators Politically Active and Concerned (KEPAC) endorsed all four candidates actively running in the election.[13] Falkofske was endorsed by Wisconsin Progress.[14]
Campaign finance
Candidates received a total of $5,945.00 and spent a total of $3,898.99 in this election, according to the Kenosha Unified School District. Coleman and Garcia both filed as "Exempt from Filing Campaign Finance Records" on their campaign registration statements. Snyder filed as exempt throughout the election cycle.[15]
Candidates were only required to file campaign finance reports if they did one of the following:
- accepted contributions, made disbursements or incurred obligations in an aggregate amount of more than $1,000 in a calendar year
- accepted more than $100 from a single source in the calendar year, except contributions made by candidates to their own campaigns
| Candidate | Contributions | Expenditures | Cash on hand |
|---|---|---|---|
| Carl Bryan | $139.42 | $139.42 | $0.00 |
| Mike Falkofske | $4,780.58 | $3,209.48 | $1,571.10 |
| Mary Snyder | $1,025.00 | $550.09 | $474.91 |
| Tamarra Coleman | Exempt | ||
| Tony Garcia | Exempt | ||
Past elections
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What was at stake?
2015
Initially, three incumbents and two challengers were seeking the three seats up for election on the Kenosha Unified Board of Education in 2015. Incumbent Carl Bryan's withdrawal from the race on January 26, 2015, guaranteed at least one new face would join the board. However, Bryan's withdrawal came too late for his name to be removed from the ballot. Votes were still cast for him, and if he had won, the vacancy created by his depature would have been filled by an appointment following the election.
Bryan had been part of a minority faction in the board's voting record. The board voted unanimously on 77.97 percent of its votes between January 1, 2014, and July 1, 2014, with voting data indicating that Tamarra Coleman, Mary Snyder, Gary J. Kunich and Dan Wade were the governing majority on the board. Either Coleman or Snyder could have been replaced in the 2015 election, affecting this governing majority. Rebecca Stevens and Carl Bryan were the minority faction, and Kyle Flood's voting pattern was not consistent with either faction.[16]
In the three preceding elections, the district garnered an average 2.29 candidates per seat up for election. In 2015, each seat up for election only garnered 1.67 candidates.
Issues in the district
Teacher contracts
Three union contracts with the Kenosha Unified School District were declared to be in violation of Wisconsin's Act 10 by Kenosha County Circuit Court Judge David Bastianelli. The district abandoned the contracts in June 2014 after lawsuits were filed against it, but the Kenosha Education Association, the AFSCME Local 2383 and the SEIU Local 168 defended the provisions in the contract.[17]
At issue was the requirement that non-members pay union dues. According the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty and the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (NRTW), that requirement violated the freedom of association of their plaintiffs, a teacher and a taxpayer. Judge Bastianelli agreed, as Act 10 restricted the use of mandatory dues for government workers.[17]
Reform bills & failing schools
Assembly Bill 1, which was introduced in the State Assembly on January 7, 2015, sought to create a new board to oversee school accountability and force the conversion of public schools with poor performance scores into private charter schools, which could have affected at least six of Kenosha's schools. Bradford High School, the Edward Bain School of Language and Art’s Creative Arts program, and Brass, Frank, Grant and Wilson elementary schools would fit the definition of failing schools under the bill at that time. Additionally, the bill required all state-funded schools to administer "achievement exams." While public schools would have to take the state standardized tests, state-funded private schools would be allowed to choose the exams their students take.[18]
District Superintendent Dr. Sue Savaglio-Jarvis expressed concerns that the assembly version of the bill would remove local control. She also questioned the use of separate testing for different types of schools, saying, "Until all students in Wisconsin take the same test, there will be no true comparison." Board members Carl Bryan and Tamarra Coleman questioned the speed at which the bill was moving through the legislature. Bryan stated, "I certainly value the need for accountability; we want to hold ourselves to a higher standard, and we support the idea of bringing the voucher system and the independent charter system into the same accountability standards as the public system," while Coleman stated, "When we rush, we make mistakes, so I want to make sure that we are looking at this closely. How does this affect our students, how does it affect our staff, how does it affect our families and how does it affect our community?"[18]
Local state legislators weighed in on the measure, as well. Assemblywoman Samantha Kerkman (R-61) supported passing the bill quickly and expressed no reservations about any part of the bill. She stated that the bill was an attempt to set up a uniform system for holding schools which receive state funds accountable, and she defended the separate testing standards for private schools, citing the need to provide "individual choice." She described Bradford High School as having problems when asked directly whether or not she considered it a failing school. Her colleague Assemblyman Tod Ohnstad (D-65), however, questioned the bill and claimed that its wording as introduced could lead to a weakening of accountability, instead. He also opposed the charter school conversion provision.[18]
The vote for AB 1 was postponed in March 2015, but it was not the only bill introduced in 2015 regarding school accountability. Senate Bill 1, SB 67 and AB 78 all related to accountability reports, as well, but would not utilize the charter school conversion or varied testing requirements included under AB 1.[18][19]
Ballotpedia survey responses
One of the five candidates in this race participated in Ballotpedia's 2015 survey of school board candidates. The following sections display the responses to the survey questions from candidate Mike Falkofske.
Top priorities
When asked what his top priorities would be if elected, Falkofske stated:
| “ | My top priority is to create a new strategic plan, new mission statement, and new vision statement by using the information contained 2013 District Curriculum audit. The district will never be able to fix it’s problems if it doesn’t know how to define itself. The districts needs to have a clear vision of where it will be in the future and a roadmap for getting there. The district needs to stop being a reactive organization and instead become a proactive organization that can successfully navigate all the challenges it will face.[20] | ” |
| —Mike Falkofske (2015)[21] | ||
Ranking the issues
The candidates were asked to rank the following issues by importance in the school district, with 1 being the most important and 7 being the least important. This table displays the candidates' rankings from most to least important:
| Issue | Falkofske's ranking |
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| Balancing or maintaining the district's budget | |
| Closing the achievement gap | |
| Expanding arts education | |
| Expanding career-technical education | |
| Expanding school choice options | |
| Improving college readiness | |
| Improving education for special needs students | |
Positions on the issues
The candidates were asked to answer 10 multiple choice and short answer questions from Ballotpedia regarding significant issues in education and the school district. Links to the candidates' responses can be found below.
Key deadlines
The following were key deadlines for Kenosha Unified School District 2015 elections:[10][22]
| Deadline | Event |
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| December 1, 2014 | Candidate signature gathering period began |
| January 6, 2015 | Signature submission deadline 5 p.m. |
| February 9, 2015 | Campaign finance report due |
| February 17, 2015 | Primary election day |
| March 30, 2015 | Campaign finance report due |
| April 7, 2015 | General election day |
Additional elections on the ballot
- See also: Wisconsin elections, 2015
One seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court and four Kenosha County Circuit Court seats were up for election on April 7, 2015. Statewide, a constitutional amendment question regarding the selection of the state's supreme court chief justice was on the ballot.
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Kenosha Unified School District Wisconsin. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
| Kenosha Unified School District | Wisconsin | School Boards |
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External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Abbey Smith, "Email communication with Stacy Busby, executive assistant to the Kenosha Unified School District Board of Education," January 12, 2015
- ↑ Kenosha News, "Bryan bows out of School Board race," January 26, 2015
- ↑ Kenosha News, "Newcomer to join incumbents on Unified School Board," April 7, 2015
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 United States Census Bureau, "Kenosha County, Wisconsin," accessed August 28, 2014
- ↑ National Center for Education Statistics, "ELSI Table Generator," accessed January 27, 2014
- ↑ Kenosha County Clerk, "Previous Election Results," accessed January 31, 2014
- ↑ Kenosha Unified School District, "Policy 8640," July 10, 2001
- ↑ Wisconsin Government Accountability Board, "Wisconsin Candidate Eligibility," accessed September 22, 2014
- ↑ Wisconsin Government Accountability Board, "Candidates: Getting on the Ballot," accessed September 22, 2014
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Wisconsin State Legislature, "State Statutes: CHAPTER 8," accessed September 22, 2014
- ↑ Wisconsin Government Accountability Board, "Voter Registration," accessed September 22, 2014
- ↑ The New York Times, "Wisconsin Decides Not to Enforce Voter ID Law," March 23, 2015
- ↑ Kenosa Education Association, "KEPAC Announces School Board Endorsements," February 20, 2015
- ↑ Wisconsin Progress, "OUR ENDORSEMENTS FOR SPRING 2015," accessed February 25, 2015
- ↑ Margaret Koenig, "Email communication with Stacy Busby, executive assistant to the Kenosha Unified School District Board of Education," August 7, 2015
- ↑ Kenosha Unified School District, "Meeting Minutes," accessed June 23, 2014
- ↑ 17.0 17.1 The Washington Free Bacon, "Judge Strikes Down Coercive Dues in Wisconsin School District," March 27, 2015
- ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 18.3 Kenosha News, "Kenosha Unified administrators anxious about school reform bill," January 13, 2015
- ↑ The Capital Times, "Wisconsin Assembly committee vote on school accountability bill postponed," March 11, 2015
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Ballotpedia School Board Candidate Survey, 2015
- ↑ Wisconsin Government Accountability Board, "CAMPAIGN FINANCE REPORT DATES," accessed September 22, 2014
| 2015 Kenosha Unified School District Elections | |
| Kenosha County, Wisconsin | |
| Election date: | April 7, 2015 |
| Candidates: | At-large: • Incumbent, Carl Bryan • Incumbent, Tamarra Coleman • Incumbent, Mary Snyder • Mike Falkofske • Tony Garcia |
| Important information: | What was at stake? • Key deadlines • Additional elections on the ballot |
