A Walk Down Memory Lane, Part II

The response to yesterday's Part I was incredible. Thanks to all of you who e-mailed your appreciation for the post.

Here's part II:

December, 2006
Snow Tries to Take a Slice of the Jump Rope for Heart Proceeds

It’s an annual fundraiser at District 158 schools that raises a great deal of money for the American Heart Association. In addition to raising funds for a very worthwhile charitable organization, the event teaches students the valuable life lesson of giving selflessly to those who need help.

“The District should consider ways to retain part of the proceeds,” said Larry Snow.

Bongo was waiting for a motion to rename the event to the Jump Rope for Larry Snow, but it didn’t happen. The annual event continues to raise tens of thousands of dollars each year for the American Heart Association.

NW Herald 12/23/06

December, 2006
Snow Sits in on a District 158 Meeting with Moore Turf Care as an Advocate for the Underperforming Vendor

In perhaps his most blatant display of loyalty to political allies over students or taxpayers, in December, Larry Snow advocated for his friends and political allies Linda and David Moore when they were in trouble for not adhering to the language of their snow removal contract with D 158. After multiple problems with the vendor, a meeting was called at the administrative offices between Moore Turf Care officials and a few District 158 administrators. Imagine the surprise on the administrators’ faces when Board Member Snow walked into the meeting and started accusing them of treating the vendor unfairly.

“This is the most unethical thing that I’ve seen in my capacity as a board member,” Shawn Green said when he heard about Snow’s involvement in the meeting. Snow simply shrugged and continued advocating for his friends.

NW Herald 12/21/06


March, 2007
Snow Takes Swipe at a Constituent Who Complains About Snow Revealing Closed Session Information

Larry Snow obviously didn’t learn his lesson in 2005 when he wrote that letter to the editor and criticized two District 158 mothers by name. In March, he was evidently not happy when a parent sent an e-mail to the board and superintendent asking that Snow be reprimanded for revealing in public the contents of a closed session meeting.

It makes sense that if a constituent is unhappy with the behavior of an elected official, that constituent should be able to express their anger or disappointment. What they should not have to expect, is to be the subject of a front page story in the newspaper the next day.

When Snow responded to the parent’s complaint, he copied his response to every newspaper in the region, thus creating his own media event meant to embarrass this parent. Evidently, the parent said Snow’s actions were illegal, when actually illegal wasn’t the right word. Inappropriate, underhanded and void of decency probably would have been better words.

The Code of Conduct that Snow swore to obey when he took office expressly prohibits revealing closed session information to the public.

NW Herald 3/20/07


April, 2007
Snow Letter Sparks Controversy Weeks Before the School Board Election

District 158 residents were treated to another of Snow’s letters in April, but this time he did not promote himself. He promoted the candidacy of Linda Moore and Aileen Seedorf, who were running for seats on the Board of Education. The letter also attacked the character and reputations of every other candidate who was running.

In the letter, he said “Do you want to add two independent, intelligent, well-informed women board members? Or do you want a political clique to keep a lopsided majority on our board?” Funny how Snow, who bankrolled the campaigns of Moore and Seedorf through his Political Action Committee Solutions Now, would talk about “political cliques.” Especially since after being elected, Seedorf voted with Snow on every single issue but one during her first year on the board.

NW Herald 4/13/07

April, 2007
Tony Q Abruptly Resigns as Treasurer of Solutions Now

On the heels of Snow’s letter promoting Moore and Seedorf and bashing the other candidates for the board, Solutions Now Treasurer Tony Q “saw the light” and abruptly resigned as treasurer of Larry’s PAC. Quagliano told reporters he was uncomfortable being a part of Snow’s PAC, and suggested that he was brought on board under false pretenses. He told reporters that Snow told him that the purpose of the PAC was to promote educational issues and to create a web site devoted to education finance. No web site ever materialized, and to this day, it does not exist. And the only promoting that has ever gone on has been the promotion of Snow and those who will vote exactly the way he tells them to. Today, Snow serves as both the president and the treasurer of Solutions Now.

NW Herald 4/19/07


April, 2007
Moore Turf Care Spills Chemical Outside Conley School and Tries to Cover it Up;
Snow Calls District’s Reaction “Politically Motivated”

District 158 had a rough winter with snow removal vendor Moore Turf Care, and had to withhold payment to them for future jobs because MTC didn’t want to pay for extensive damage they caused to curbing throughout the District. But in April, a District 158 employee discovered a chemical substance that had leaked into the ground outside of Conley Elementary School, and it was apparent that the substance had been there for at least several weeks.

Moore Turf Care eventually came clean about the spill. They were told not to remove the contaminated soil; hazardous material experts would properly clean the site. But MTC entered the sight at night and were caught on security cameras removing the contaminated soil.

Board members, all except for Snow, were livid about the blatant disregard for the safety of Conley students.

Snow’s response to the fiasco? He suggested the board and administration was overreacting and called their response “politically motivated.”

NW Herald 4/21/07


April, 2007
Potentially Libelous Ads Appear in the Sun City Herald

In the days preceding the April election for the District 158 school board, two full-page ads appeared in the Sun City Herald. Both attacked the reputations of all school board candidates other than Moore and Seedorf, and many parts of the ad included outright lies. Of course the ads ran right before the election, so there was no way the untruths could be corrected before the vote.

Interestingly, candidate Mike Skala also ran a full page ad in the same edition of the Sun City Herald. The Skala ad promoted his contributions and qualifications and did not say one negative thing about any other candidate.

May, 2007
Snow Tries His Hand at Censorship Again; This Time with a Literary Classic

Talk about a guy who can’t learn from his mistakes. You’d think that the whole censorship of “The Voice” issue had taught Snow that board members ought not dabble in censorship issues.

This time, Snow went to bat for a high school parent who objected to her child having to read Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find.”

The parent for whom he went to bat? Linda Moore. Do you see an emerging theme here?

High School Principal Dave Johnson said the book had been read by the previous year’s classes and that there had never been a complaint before. Incidentally, Flannery O’Connor is a very famous author whose work has been widely acclaimed. O’Connor is considered to be among the best of the best with regard to literary masterpieces.

NW Herald 5/14/07


May, 2007
Snow Becomes E-Mail Buddies with HEA President; Gives Her Tips on How to Influence School Board Decisions

Bongo wrote about this issue at length, so if you want the long version of the Snow-Henderson secret friendship, look back at some of Bongo’s previous posts. But in June of 2007, as the District and the HEA were preparing to enter into contract negotiations, it appeared that a budding friendship emerged between Snow and the then President of the teachers union. Here is an excerpt from a May 20, 2007 e-mail from Larry Snow to Christy Henderson that was later found through a FOIA request:

“Is HEA going to take a public position on the repayment of
cash-in-lieu-of-nothing for those administrators who received extra cash
and received full health care benefits that they were entitled to per
their marital status? You might change the final outcome of this
board's vote if HEA took a vote. There are issues such as this one that
it may be beneficial to call for a formal HEA membership vote before
school ends.

Having all non-certified not able to teach administrators be at will
employees (versus receiving one year contracts) can be another.

Having HEA take a formal vote on the tuition issue could be a third.

HEA being proactive could be a positive influence in our District.

A vote requiring your input for use of institute days could be a fourth.

It is possible HEA's input would be taken more seriously if HEA showed a
willingness to cal l for formal membership votes on issues. You now have
a larger membership and wasn't this the board's intent to have greater
participation when it put fair share into the contract?”

Another interesting line from the Snow-to-Henderson e-mail was a swipe that Snow took at board member Kevin Gentry:

“Do you think that Green or Kim or Carlin or Mrs. Gentry (oops I meant
Mr. Gentry) understands the word "compromise" for the sake of avoiding
public arguments?”