At a recent board meeting a member of the audience stood and asked the board members a series of valid questions.

When he finished, the board began to answer some of his questions. Brent Snow then asked the parent if he had ever committed a crime.

As irrelevant and as condescending as this was, they have opened a door that I will now walk through and ask them a question of my own:

Have any of you ever been cheated on by a partner in life? Lied to so completely that all trust was gone?

If you could set aside your pride and stop looking down on us for a minute and recognize how you make a lot of  us feel, you would recognize that feeling of mistrust in us. What we read in your eyes when you don’t answer our straightforward questions. What we see on your faces when we have the nerve to want to have a say in what is going on in our children’s schools.

I want to hope that some board members are having a hard time with how they are handling this situation. I understand that some may not.

To any members that lie awake at night thinking, “these lies are really bothering me, but I cannot let down my fellow board members” — this news just out, the board is probably going down anyway and then you will have to live with your lie.

Speak what is really in your heart and on your mind. Please. The community will be put out of its misery quicker and with less expense.

Some board members and superintendent(s) may be successful at lying and have profited from it in business/politics for a long time throughout their careers. You have got to admit that greasing the skids with a lie or two can simplify and speed up things.

In lying however, there are some degrees of risk. The board has taken risks in the past that have worked out for them; the ball park development, the school lunch program, promoting our superintendent in our paper as being more qualified for his position than he actually is, just to name a few.

This time though, it appears that number has come up.

After some of the board brought in Rick Thompson and then quickly stopped supporting Gary Pflueger in his position as our FHES principal — it went too far. I have had enough. A lot of us have.

Lies for some are easy, especially when they have been successful at it for a long time.

In these cases it comes across as if the conscience has become blurred and the individual(s) believe their own lies. It is up to the individual to find his or her conscience and to develop or not to develop it.

Some of the happiest folks I know are not perfect, but aren’t hiding behind anything either.

What I am hoping for is some truth from our school board members. Not the stories and fabrications that have been spun to cover up the misuse of leadership in the name of personal agenda and incompetence, but the simple truth that got us to the stand off we are facing today.

The truth they say, will set you free.

The way that I am feeling and the words I am using do not stem from idle gossip or water-cooler conversations. They come  from first hand experiences with the board at school board meetings, reading misrepresented documents, letters to the various newspapers, and watching actual footage of meetings that have been recorded and are available on You Tube for all to see.

If what is going on in our community involving the school board and Gary Pflueger interests you, but you have not experienced any of this for yourself, I ask you to take the time to do so.  

Understand both sides before you make a stand.