Yakima School Board Election Preview
November 2, 2021, is General Election Day for all voters in Washington. Voters in Yakima County will decide the fate of several tax measures and elect officials to the county. The election that will perhaps affect our school community the most: the school board. In this upcoming election, there are two open seats on the Board of directors: One for Position 2, between Ryan Beckett and incumbent Donald Joseph Davis Jr., as well as one for Position 1, fought by Kenton Gartrell, taking on incumbent Graciela Villanueva.
In the race for position one, Graciela Villanueva is running for her fourth term on the board and is the current board vice president. She obviously has experience in her position, and it is apparent that she understands the needs of our students. However, her opponent, Kenton Gartrell, comes with a little more controversy. He ran for a spot on the board back in 2019, where he lost to Eliana Macias. During this election, a video began to circulate on social media of Gartrell, where he allegedly mocked a lady’s undocumented status while drunk at a bar and then proceeded to knock her phone out of her hands (what is seen in the video). This was not the first time that Gartrell found himself in hot water either. In 2015 he was suspended from his position as a soccer referee for making sexually suggestive comments to a female referee. More recently, in August, he released a video confronting two Nob Hill Elementary administrators, calling them “child abusers” for complying with the state-wide mask mandate that requires all people who enter campus to wear masks.
Position 2 is a race between Ryan Beckett and Donald Joseph Davis Jr. ( “Reverend Davis”). Beckett has no prior experience in elected office but he brings a strong background in business practice as a real estate broker. He also served on the Yakima Schools Foundation Board for eight years, acting as president for two. Reverend Davis has been a Yakima School Board Member since 2016. He has been in the ministry for over 38 years and is currently the Senior Pastor of Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church
On October 19th, two weeks before the election date, the Yakima School District Board of Directors' candidates held a student town hall where they answered student questions about issues they cared about. Though I think that some students did not understand the capacity of a school board's abilities or what their function was, for they asked questions in which the outcomes were out of the control of any board member. However, a majority of the students' questions were valuable and gave insight into the candidates and their views.
One of the first questions of the evening was an unexpected one. A student from A.C. Davis High School asked, “In an increasingly politicized atmosphere, what would you do to depoliticize the attitude and bring together the community in a way that is nonpartisan.” A 100 percent reasonable concern considering recent events that took place at a surrounding district’s board meetings. Starting off the answering, Gartrell remarked that what has happened is that “we have stepped away from our American values of thinking, of being inclusive, of being transparent and being able to sit and have a discussion. We have to become inclusive again to everybody, including the immigrants. We have to get back to our family values.” As the meeting moves forward, a trend that appears in Gartrell’s answers is that they all have a seemingly uneducated nature; they never quite make sense, and they lack research/ background knowledge. In a more coherent manner, the other candidates all came to a general consensus that in order to bring together the community in a nonpartisan way, you must make people feel heard. Villanueva states that through listening to parents and especially students to understand what the issues are, we should not have to worry about politics.
However, the irony of this question is that over half of the succeeding questions were Covid-19 related. While this is an important issue and needs to be addressed considering it is the world we now live in, Covid has become so politicized that even asking about it brings in partisan influence. Through the most basic question of “what is your individual position on the mask mandate?” it became very clear which position candidates took.
Beckett was the first to answer: “I understand that masking is one of those things that allows us to be inside the closer proximity, so even though personally I hate this, I absolutely go along with it … it’s a matter of respect”. Following Beckett’s response, Gartrell remarked on the “ineffectiveness” of masks, noting that he doesn't believe “that anyone has the right to create law according to the Washington state constitution without the legislatures.” However, if Gartrell had done any prior research he would have found that a mask alone is not sufficient to provide an adequate level of protection against COVID-19, it should be used as part of a comprehensive strategy of measures to suppress transmission and save lives. Next up, Reverend Davis made it clear that he was all for the mask mandate as well as for vaccination: “ I am a pastor. I believe in the power of healing, but I also have common sense to know that God uses medical science to bring along with his words. I believe in masking indoors and outdoors.” Villanueva, while effectively acknowledging the other side's perspective, sided with Davis and Beckett, saying that “wearing a mask is worth it. Vaccines and masks are really effective in preventing a disease … we have a responsibility to each other and the community of Yakima and as a local citizen to take care of each other through something as simple as wearing a mask.”
Other than the various Covid questions, which all elicited consistent responses, the questions that gave us the deepest insight into the candidates were 1.“Is there a specific issue that motivates you to serve on the board of education” and 2.” What is your number one priority in the Yakima school district right now.”
Beckett was motivated to run for school board through his pride in Yakima. As a graduate of a Yakima high school and as a resident here who has a son going here, he wants to actively help build up the positive public relations that we need to have in our community. If elected, his number one priority would be increasing academic success. Particularly focusing on literacy and embracing the research that has been done on the science of reading. He believes that “If we can increase our success with student literacy rates, we are equipping them for a successful future.”
The most important issue to Ms. Villanueva is a kid's access to a high-quality education (k-12). So her next step as a board member is to look at expanding pre-kindergarten programs.
Her priority is to focus on the after-effects of Covid and to ease students back into school life. In addition, she wants to ensure that students have the support they need to be successful today, whether that means mental health professionals, tutoring, an after-school program, or other support services.
Gartrell was most motivated to run for a board position by the issue of equal accommodation to education and the right to be accommodated for said service. He made a point in a number of his responses to reiterate the fact that Covid has stolen the youth and the experiences of many students over the past two years and that we can not keep going down this path. “We can’t afford to take your youth because you will never get it back; you’ll never get to participate with your families, with your girlfriends, with your boyfriends, with your brothers or your sisters.” When asked what his top priority was, he said: “My first and main priority is actually school choice.” He has been working with legislatures in the county to renew the charter schools bill, which lapsed during the pandemic. This is a little contradictory as to why he is running for a position on the Yakima School Board, considering charter schools could potentially take funding and students from the District; it has nothing to do with YSD school.
As a board member, Davis hopes to make sure that each and every student has equitable educational services to become productive citizens in that community. He was initially invited to participate in the school and did and was then appointed to the school board to bring change t into the system not just for students but for administrators and teachers.
The school board primarily sets the vision and goals for the district and develops and adopts policies, curriculum, and the budget. Local school boards are a critical public link to public schools. This election affects each and every student and our community as a whole. We have to take into consideration who we want to represent our district and how we want our district to represent us.
