Like with that beloved Wallace Stevens poem “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird,” there are several different ways to look at Josh Newman’s and Dave Min’s SB 907. To begin with, we must look at it as a fait accompli whether we like it or not – it’s happening. It passed through the Senate 30-9, and is now romping without a care through the Assembly, destination Newsom sig. So, like it or not, the OC Board of Education is going to have to come up with a 7-district map, and hold their next elections in the November ’26 general, with the new districts. (The most recently re-elected miscreants will stay on Board.) No longer will these races be at the bottom of the ballots in low-turnout March-or-June primaries.
Another way to look at it is, it’s kind of embarrassing that it’s even necessary. We can only regret that a mere 37% of registered OC voters participate in primaries, and that only 2/3 of THEM take the time (or feel informed enough) to go down-ballot to the Education races. Meaning, only ONE-FOURTH of the voters who should be voting in the OCBoE races are doing so (and a little over one-eighth choose the winners we have.) And for what it’s worth, those voters are disproportionately Republican – in last March’s primary more Republicans than Democrats voted even though there are more registered Democrats in the County. This is not something to be proud of, that Democrats are such desultory voters, and if you say, “They get what they deserve,” well… I will just nod and move on.
Also you could look at it, as Matt Cunningham and Stefan Bean do, as a “naked political power play,” which Sacramento’s Democrat super-majority is imposing on poor Orange County BECAUSE THEY CAN, and because they don’t like the results of the past decade’s OCBoE elections. You know, the constant culture wars, the dysfunction, the lawsuits, the waste, the headlines, and the dependable approval of any and all Charter Schools good or bad. No doubt the deep-pocketed Teachers’ Union is pleased as punch, while the equally deep-pocketed Charter School industry is stomping out a Rumpelstiltskin fit.
Well, there’s that, but on the other hand … Why SHOULD this important race be decided during the primary, WITHOUT an actual primary? – The only race to be “one and done” in low-turnout March or June? This state of affairs was decided in 1977, and who even remembers why? There’s room for one more race on our November ballots, if that Board is important, and apparently it is important, judging by the hue and cry coming from the Charter-School / Culture Warriors. And that brings up the BEST question:
Do these Charter School / Culture Warriors believe that they CAN’T WIN HIGH-TURNOUT RACES? Why not? Do they suck that badly?
The roadside-strangling scalp farmer and his legal counsel. [Pic from Register]
So of course, paid Charter-School cheerleader Matt Cunningham had to “wordsmith” THIS angry elegy on the topic: “Parents and Activists Hold Rally Protesting Legislation to Pack OC Board of Education.” Is that what’s happening, they’re gonna “pack” it? Matt says “dozens” of these folks showed up to this protest, and they were people who looked like this:
[Pic from Matt’s Kleptoblog]
Rails one of Matt’s “activists,” a charter school President, “Why are they singling out Orange County? San Diego County is larger and also has only five members of its county Board of Education, and LA County is way larger and only has five members!” Well, I can’t answer for what they do in other counties, but I have been told by my Sacramento pajaritos that these same reforms are being discussed and considered for the rest of the state. Still, whataboutism isn’t gonna slow down Josh & Dave “gittin’-r-done” in their own OC, posthaste.
Fast on the heels of Matt’s piece, as in YESTERDAY, came this Register screed from Charter School director and failed OC Superintendent candidate Stefan Bean. I do have this longstanding policy of not beating up a guy in a wheelchair, but this is Stefan Bean we’re talking about, the guy whose false claim that “OC school districts are teaching inappropriate sexual matters to kindergarteners” was so off the rails that the Register endorsed his opponent, the worthy (and now sadly cancer-ridden) Al Mijares. And here, holding forth in the paper that considers him a big liar, Bean sets forth a smorgasbord of specious points like so many clay pigeons at a firing range.
Quoth Bean, with what he believes is devastating wit, “[Newman] wants us to believe SB 907 will increase democratic responsiveness by adding two board members. Orange County has a population of approximately 3,200,000. I hardly think two more people will greatly improve representative democracy.” You see what he did there? Two is such a ridiculous number compared to three million, isn’t it? Let’s do this honestly, because this is the Orange Juice Blog. There are 1.8 million registered voters in OC, not 3.2 million. With 5 board members that’s one for each 360,000 voters; with 7 members it’s one for each 257,000 voters. That is the increased democracy. Still want to send your kids to Stefan’s charter school? Next?
Bean next tries to ridicule Newman’s claim that Orange County needs more members because its population has grown so much, by pointing out that OC has LOST 35,000 residents over the past two years. Does Stefan’s Irvine International Academy teach the concept of apples and oranges? This five-member Board was formed in 1977, when our population was 1.8 million and now it is nearly TWICE that much, no matter who may have buggered off in the last two years. How do you like that apple? It is not an orange. And Newman’s point holds.
And Stefan does use that favorite cry-baby word of today’s right-wingers, “WEAPONIZE.” As in Josh and Dave are “WEAPONIZING the state government against the Board.” Ah, suck it up and try winning an election in 2026 with a bigger electorate if you can convince enough people you have good ideas. Meanwhile color us NOT convinced.
I support this 7-district reform for the same reason I usually support district elections – it makes it a LITTLE easier for a person with less money to run and win, and they are a little more responsive to their particular area. And maybe good folks who care about public education, and have a record in public education, folks like David Johnson, Nancy Watkins and Bea Mendoza, will have half a chance against the Charter School Megabucks.
And here I sign off. Newman’s and Min’s SB 907. It is a light at the end of the tunnel, for the OC Board of Education.
An added benefit for increasing voter interest about these candidates and the OCBE by moving it to November, is that local school board candidates who are well known in the community are able to knock on doors and talk about both their race and the OC Board races.
Like with Community College District races, it’s tough for voters to pay attention to the campaigns when they don’t even know they have a representative on the CCD Board or the Orange County Board of Education.
Another plus… for the pro-public education side at least!
I won’t bury the lede: I looked up the LACBOE and it has seven members. Matt once again doesn’t let us down in suspecting that he’s letting us down. (They’re appointed by the Supervisors, though.)
Anyway, it’s simply more logical to group OCBOE with other school board races.
(There’s always a way around any reform, though. My bet is that if, say, I ran in my district in 2026 they would run 5 candidates named Gregg Diamond, Gregory D. Diamond, Greg Dimond, Reg Diamond, etc., all with ballot statements that mimic mine — along the lines of what used to happen to Dr. Jose Moreno — to dilute my vote. Note that I have zero plans to run.)
Good news as expected from Josh — and kudos also from Min.
Speaking of Stefan Bean, what happened to “DOCTOR” Stefan Bean? He doesn’t seem to be using that “doctorate” any more, even though he was so attached to it when he ran for Superintendent in ’22 that it was actually part of his website URL?
https://www.drbeanoc.com/
This site mentions that he got his doctorate (in SOMETHING) from Cal State Fullerton, but his bio doesn’t say anything about it. His bio is a story of tragedy piled upon tragedy, a portrait of a modern-day Job, and as far as we know it could be mostly true. He says his implacable fight against public education is inspired by the memory of his wife who died from cancer.
But why does he not use his doctorate title any more, now that he’s trying to get APPOINTED by the BOE to take the ailing Al Mijares’ spot? (And his piece against SB 907 sure seems geared to help him get that appointment.) Today the Voice of OC provides an overview of the six contenders:
https://voiceofoc.org/2024/06/who-will-be-orange-countys-next-superintendent-of-school/
And it also doesn’t mention no doctorate. Does anyone know if Bean really has a doctorate, and in what field? Or was that just another Bean tale like his discredited claim that OC schools “teach kindergarteners inappropriate sexual matters?” Apparently doctorates are important in this milieu, as Dr. Ken Williams (with a doctorate in HAIR RESTORATION) recently beat Dr. Nancy Watkins (with a doctorate in EDUCATION.)
The only other candidate that we know anything about, for this appointment, is Dennis Cole, who sounds pretty bad too. We wrote about him in 2010 when he was principal of Santa Ana’s Willard Intermediate, and ran a prayer club there named “Jaguars for Jesus,” and when he was informed that was unconstitutional, he vengefully banned ALL clubs in the school! (And now that he’s running the Fountain Valley School District, we’re hearing bad things about him there too from our FV education friends.)
https://www.orangejuiceblog.com/2010/12/the-wrath-of-cole-willards-jaguars-for-jesus-principal-bans-all-student-clubs/
Hey, this blog DOES have “institutional memory,” as Gustavo always boasted of the late lamented OC Weekly!
We fully expect the OCBoE to appoint someone awful like Bean or Cole – but on the other hand, I was sure they’d pick rightwing firebrand Ceci Iglesias to take the place of Becky Gomez and I was wrong. Maybe Ceci was just too independent for them. Maybe the fact she stands up to police unions was a disqualifier.
That is all, for now. I hope more people read this story.
So you’re saying that he’s now … Mr. Bean? I can understand a political aspirant making up a doctorate to avoid that, although I don’t condone it.
I hope that Dr. Nancy Watkins — and yes, a Doctorate in Education is a “real” doctorate and education researchers do some great work — applies and somehow gets selected.
I’m afraid it is entirely within the realm of possibility. Not the Superintendent Nancy thing, but the Mr. Bean thing.
Matt Cunningham is a festering pile of sHit, a given his track record and the attack dog for the Anaheim chamber of commerce he should be considered irrelevant as much the chamber of commerce, is irrelevant.
His wife should be doing ‘Hard Time’!.
They picked Bean. He is Dr. Bean again. The Register says his doctorate is in “educational administration” from Cal State Fullerton. He gives all glory to God, for this appointment. The piece he wrote in the Register that I responded to above, defending the Board from SB 907, probably helped a lot too. Too bad it doesn’t show much honesty or clear thinking.
https://www.ocregister.com/2024/06/18/stefan-bean-is-chosen-as-orange-countys-next-superintendent/
“Pride at the Pier” (c/o Miguel Lopez) reminds us:
At the Orange County Board of Education meeting on June 18th, the 5-Trustee board appointed Dr. Stephen Bean to the role of Education Superintendent.
This is normally an elected role. Bean replaces Al Mijares, who was most recently reelected in 2022 but is leaving the role due to health concerns. Bean ran against Mijares in that 2022 race, but lost by around 50,000 votes. Four of the Five OC BOE trustees endorsed Bean during that 2022 race.
Dr. Bean has a long, recorded history of anti-LGBTQ stances:
– He is allied with Brenda Lebsack, a prominent local figure in the anti-LGBTQ circles.
– He has made clear his belief in banning LGBTQ issues from curriculum in public schools.
– He makes frequent use of the term “transgenderism”
– He supports forced outing policies.
– During his public interview in front of the OC BOE, he suggested he would sue the state of California if AB 1955 (which bans forced outing policies) were passed.
This is going to be among the most expensive decisions in OC governance history — and given the competition that is really saying something! They are going to be in court three times as much as they plan. (Note to Lee Fink: this may be some loose hyperbole.)