2024-05-09 – Louisville, KY
A JCTA teachers union member was voted off the board on which she was elected to serve by a majority of members in 2020, after challenging the regime leader’s hand-picked candidate for President and calling into question the validity of the election results after several members reported election tampering and possible fraud. This move appears to be a continuation of retaliation against this outspoken Black female teacher leader for simply seeking a “by-hand recount,” which she is entitled to do, after several other members reported witnessing anomalies and discrepancies during the election window that could have resulted in a different election outcome. Given these leaders’ history of blatant disrespect toward members who simply want their union to advocate for ALL of its members, not just SOME, it’s no surprise union leadership found her challenge to be invalid and dismissed it out of hand.
Let’s dissect the article that was clearly one-sided in their favor, and take a look at as many as 10 allegations that were levied against her and do the research that the WFPL Education Reporter failed to do:
Claim #1:
A copy of the petition to remove Dean-Bacon from the JCTA board shows the teacher faced 10 violations of “fiduciary duty,” including the “duty of loyalty” to JCTA. Union bylaws, rules, proceeds and documentation are all closely guarded secrets; members can face consequences for sharing them.
Response:
Several members on the JCTA have shared confidential union documentation with me when they observed abuses of power, fraud or other criminal behaviors by executive leadership and they felt members and the public deserved to know. Because union leadership is notorious for restricting posts and comments within their own “members only” group, they often come to me as moderator of Dear JCPS and ask me to share information anonymously. First amendment rights, mandatory reporter obligations and whistleblower protections outweigh their cult-like “duty of loyalty” claims by a union held hostage by same regime for far too long and against many of its members wishes. Why is this member the only one experiencing retribution when she is not the only one to speak out, and as far as I am aware, there is no evidence she has even violated this rule? Especially since at least one of the documents that I am told was argued as “evidence” of her violation was actually provided to me by a different member, as shown here:
What’s even more interesting about this particular communication is that it was evidence of a manipulated survey that pushed a political agenda and it was created and sent following a unilateral decision from the top office, despite the request of several board members not to (the point of the article I wrote and shared). It appeared to have the intention of supporting the GOPs push to reopen schools while the pandemic was still raging, without masks being required, if I remember correctly. The concern of the executive officers abusing their power to further an anti-public education political agenda smacked of violations of ethics, oaths and laws, and warranted such exposure. I posted the article on Dear JCPS here. It was assumed the “proof” was shared with me by Kenyata, but it wasn’t.
The alleged violations mostly stem from Dean-Bacon’s online campaign for JCTA president and its ties to a PAC connected to local activist Gay Adelmann. Adelmann is a persistent critic of JCTA’s leadership and its longtime president Brent McKim.
Response:
First of all, simple first amendment rights allow anyone to endorse union candidates, promote their campaigns and encourage people to donate to anyone they want. It’s not a violation to do so. So to imply that this was somehow “wrongdoing” is ludicrous. It happens all the time, but it’s only a problem when WE do it.
I say “we” and not “I” because there is a democratic process that is followed by our committee, and these endorsements are not “mine.” However, they are obsessed with me, (or have been successful in making me out to be the scapegoat to take the focus off their discriminatory behavior toward their Black members and they know exactly what they are saying and doing), so again, their “centering” has prevented them from seeing the bigger picture.
But these autocrats take their allegations further and claim it was HER website. They have to use these combination of lies to prevent this criticism from dissolving in thin air. In reality, the candidate’s online campaign’s ties to the PAC had nothing to do with Kenyata. Team Kenyata was a website the coalition sanctioned to promote the entire slate of candidates we wanted to see win the teachers union elections, not just Kenyata. Why were the other three candidates we endorsed, two of whom also serve on the board, one as an Executive, not reprimanded? (One of them even contacted me on the day of the board meeting and asked to be removed. Don’t worry sister, we took you off last month when you showed us what a coward you really are.)
The screenshot below shows the TeamKenyata.com domain was acquired by my web site development entity, LBI Buzz. Therefore, it is not “her website.” The registration fee was intended to be paid for by the PAC, but we decided to over-report any PAC expenses that could be construed as attempting to influence candidates running for public office in order to avoid any appearance of impropriety. But before we even had a chance to turn in our quarterly report with the website fees, we were hit with a frivolous KREF complaint for being “too transparent,” I guess, so I ate the costs instead of using donations to cover it.
Regardless, the fees were not billed to Kenyata’s campaign, nor were they ever intended to be, because it wasn’t “her website.” They were also made aware of this fact on numerous occasions, including in our KREF response. Facts do not matter to them because this witch hunt is something they’ve intended to do for quite some time, as evidenced by the bylaws change that prevents her from running for another board seat for five years. (Just like PTA did to us when we challenged their authoritarian regime.)
DEBUNKED
Claim #3:
McKim, who has held the JCTA presidency since 2001, did not run for reelection and is retiring in July.
Response:
This statement has nothing to do with Kenyata, but it’s worth debunking anyway. His “retirement” at the end of his 23 year reign of terror is irrelevant. This statement is only intended to take the focus off of his criminal acts and make it appear that anyone critical of him is being overzealous. In fact, this is an argument he started making when members would moan and groan when he announced he intended to run again. According to some, he has used that same argument to quash members’ objections ever since he eliminated term limits decades ago. It’s also irrelevant because McKim recruited and has been grooming his successor since 2017, so his retirement means nothing to a badly needed regime change. Not to mention, according to Chris Tobe, McKim controls so much dark money that keeps candidates on BOTH sides of the aisle doing his bidding, almost competing with each other to see how horrible they can be toward JCPS.
Frankly, this article feels like it was written by his PR firm prior to receiving minor tweaks from the clearly biased education reporter. This also isn’t the first time this reporter took some of these performers at face value instead of researching their agendas, causing her to misrepresent some harmful characters and events that took place when a board meeting was shut down. When I asked her to correct and clarify who the person whose speech she included in her radio program was, she acted put out, like I was overreacting. When I brought it up again at a later date, because the harms were still ricocheting across the universe, she continued to defend her actions because they were “so long ago.” The biased story is still out there, never corrected to this day. The shady characters in question have ties to Dr. Frank Simon, a local hate group leader who McKim has given cover to in the past.
DEBUNKED
Claim #4:
Evidence compiled in a petition to recall Dean-Bacon shows that her campaign page encouraged supporters to donate to Justice for the People PAC. That PAC is chaired by Adelmann’s husband, Chris Adelmann, and is sponsored by Gay Adelmann’s nonprofit Dear JCPS. The petition says Adelmann’s PAC was started specifically to compete with the union’s PAC Better Schools Kentucky, or BSK.
Response:
Is that wrong? Is it illegal? It would be brilliant. Too bad it isn’t true.
There is no proof to this claim simply because it isn’t true. Justice for the People PAC acknowledges that Better Schools Kentucky is not making endorsements that are in the best interests and wishes of their members, but that is their doing and something within their control to correct. This fits with their executive leadership’s habit of “centering” (making something bigger than them into being about them), blaming others for their failures, and projecting their shortcomings onto those speaking the truth about them.
Anyone who has been paying attention knows that the Justice for the People PAC is a spin off of The People’s Agenda, which was spearheaded by the Kentucky Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression and dozens of organizations in 2000. The Peoples Agenda was resurrected in 2018, I believe and the Education Committee, which I was elected chair in 2020, began holding regular meetings and making endorsements under the Kentuckians for Real Options PAC. Because their own member disagreed so vehemently with their own PACs endorsements, some of them did donate to our PAC, but again, that is something that is within their control. Perhaps it is them who competes with us? Our goal is not to “compete” to make our school system better, it is to fill a void that is conspicuously left unfilled by any of the endorsing entities in the city, seeing as so many of them are compromised.
Who runs BSK? Did anyone ask? Why doesn’t anyone care that McKim’s wife runs the retired JCTA members group, his “good friends” run the PAC, and his step daughter runs another group that is endorsing candidates without a PAC. How is THAT legal?
DEBUNKED WITH COUNTER CLAIMS
Claim #5:
“Ms. Dean Bacon violated her duty of loyalty by advancing the interests of a third party over the interests of [JCTA] by using her TeamKenyata.com campaign web site to encourage JCTA members to drop their BSK membership and instead contribute to the Justice for the People PAC, a competing PAC that was established specifically to compete with BSK,” the petition reads.
Response:
“Interests of a third party” share the interests of their teachers who feel underrepresented by their own union. As stated earlier, if they wanted to advance their own interests, they could listen to their members and act accordingly.
Justice for the People PAC is the only local education focused PAC that gives rank and file teachers a seat at the table. Fact check that.
DEBUNKED
Claim #6:
The petition also alleges that using PAC funds for her union leadership campaign was not legal, citing the Kentucky Register of Election Finance guidebook.
Response:
It wasn’t” illegal” either. Anyone can file a complaint with KREF, but that simply begins an investigation. It does not prove violations took place. The charge against the PAC was for over reporting expenses out of an abundance of caution in the event they fell into grey areas, as campaigning for leaders who will ultimately be responsible for making better endorsements on behalf of their members. The PAC’s attorney, Anna Whites, filed a response and the decision is being reviewed by KREF. It is our opinion, these petty officers would have filed a complaint against the PAC had it NOT reported these expenses, just the same. Our committee chose to err on the side of caution and feels confident KREF will rule in the PACs favor when the case is finally resolved.
It’s also worth noting the litigiousness and deep pockets of the corrupt union leadership fits a pattern of making false allegations simply to be able to disingenuously throw them into a debate to derail momentum later, as they did three years ago when our committee endorsed a slate of candidates, causing them to cause all kinds of fake allegations against me, which is a key reason our committee chose to take a different tact this election cycle. They provided a USPS return receipt from a “cease and desist” letter they had the union’s high-paid attorneys send to me after I exposed some truths about them in 2021 as “proof” of whatever allegation they were making next.
DEBUNKED
Claim #7:
In addition, the recall petition cites numerous online remarks by Adelmann as evidence of Dean-Bacon’s wrongdoing. Most of those statements against current JCTA leadership were on a webpage run by Adelmann. Adelmann’s webpage could be accessed by clicking through a link on Dean-Bacon’s campaign page promising more information on the Justice for the People PAC.
RESPONSE:
What’s ironic about this one is it actually admits that they were using my remarks against Kenyata, even though she was not the one who said them. As mentioned previously, the campaign page was also NOT HERS, so how is it possible to hold her accountable for someone else’s behavior and still sleep at night?
