Shouting, secret recordings, retaliation: What's behind Thursday's chaotic MPS board meeting?

 

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Thursday's Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) board meeting was defined by a large, contentious crowd and an unplanned recess prompted by one speaker's tirade.

Behind the chaotic meeting is a possible investigation into whether one board member bugged Superintendent Keith Posley's office and claims that same board member is facing retaliation over past criticisms.

Speakers were fired up about two things during the meeting. The first was an item on the agenda that featured recommended changes the MPS Office of Board Governance had proposed. 

The suggestion that rankled speakers was a proposal to reduce how often the board's Parent and Community Engagement committee (PACE) meets. The proposal called for PACE to meet every two months instead of monthly.

"How can you think about cutting off access to parents?" speaker Jamel Harris said to the board. Harris directed his ire at board President Marva Herndon, calling her 'incapable.'

"You won't talk to the community because you're afraid of the real work that needs to happen," Harris said.

Harris said he had two kids who go to school in the district and said they were privileged because they attend two of the highest-performing schools, MacDowell Montessori and Rufus King High School.

When Herndon told Harris, 'That's fine,' Harris quickly interjected, telling Herndon, 'Don't say a word.' At that point, his mic was cut off and MPS security and Milwaukee police escorted Harris from the podium while Herdon called for a recess at the behest of board Vice President Jilly Gokalgandhi and board Director Megan O'Halloran.

Gokalgandhi said Friday board members did not agree with the recommendation, which she said was aimed at creating more time for the Legislation, Rules & Policies (LRP) committee to meet more frequently. She said it's very likely the board's final vote will be to maintain monthly PACE meetings.

"I think last night, you saw what the odds were [of keeping PACE meetings as they are]," she said. "They seemed pretty good."

Speakers also accused board members of unfairly targeting their fellow director, Aisha Carr, who has been an outspoken critic of MPS administration and openly opposed the $252 million referendum that narrowly passed earlier this month.

When the meeting resumed, former state Senator Lena Taylor, who's now a Milwaukee County Circuit Court judge, was among those who spoke in Carr's defense. Taylor praised Carr's efforts to change how the board operates, and she argued the board was harming students by sticking to the status quo.

"If they fail at your end, they come to my end," Taylor said. "And everyone is not thinking about why they come to my end."

The board went into closed session to discuss an investigation into a board member's conduct. Both Carr and Gokalgandhi would neither confirm nor deny in interviews Friday whether the closed session was to discuss allegations Carr planted a recording device in Posley's office.

Deborah Kuether, a former MPS employee who's now suing the district alleging retaliation for her own criticism of administrators, said Friday she recorded a conversation with Carr last year in which the board member said she'd bugged Posley's office.

"I bought a recording device and planted it in his office," a voice sounding like Carr's said, prompting laughs from Kuether. "I did."

Carr said she didn't actually plant a recording device but told Kuether she did as a way of testing whether Kuether could be trusted.

"That was my way of giving false bait to see if she'd bite and to see if it'd go anywhere," Carr said.

While Wisconsin is a one-party recording state, meaning it's legal for one party to a conversation to record the discussion without sharing it was being recorded, state law does not allow people to record conversations in which they're not involved.

When asked to confirm she claimed to have done something illegal, but was lying as a sort of loyalty test, Carr said that's what she did.

"I felt like I needed to test her to see if we could trust her," Carr said.

Kuether said she'd made the entire 54-minute conversation public for the sake of transparency. She didn't seem to take issue with the idea of Carr planting a recorder in Posley's officer, either on the original call or in Friday's interview.

"I almost feel like it's so out of control there, that people can't even navigate the toxicity without doing extreme measures," she said.

Gokalgandhi said any possible investigation into Carr would not be in retaliation for her past criticisms. She said despite the rancorous tone of Thursday's meeting, she was encouraged by the turnout because it was the most people she'd seen in the auditorium for a board meeting since she was elected in 2021.

"To see an auditorium full of people who had a really clear point of view on what they wanted the district to do was really reassuring," she said.