A recent Letter to the Editor (“Together for Council Rock” ironically named, Oct. 12) misled local voters about the stakes of our upcoming Council Rock School Board election. In fact, Council Rock is very much in danger of becoming the next battleground of far-right extremists who are banning books, whitewashing history and costing taxpayers millions of dollars in neighboring school districts. We cannot let this happen in Council Rock.
The fact is that two candidates for Council Rock School Board — Anne Horner and Natalya Khavulya — are members of Moms for Liberty, the leading organization driving book bans around the country. Another candidate — Stephen Nowmos — signed the Moms for Liberty pledge.
Incumbent candidates Ed Salamon and Joe Hidalgo voted to appoint Nowmos to an open seat on the board despite being informed about his bigoted and racist Facebook page. (Editor’s Note: Nowmos has denied authoring the referenced Facebook posts.)
We already have members on our board who have expressed support for book ban and censorship policies (March 2022 Policy Committee meeting). If we elect the Moms for Liberty-allied candidates, we will see the same sort of political turmoil that has engulfed our neighboring districts, Central Bucks and Pennridge.
How did such far-right extremists get elected in Central Bucks and Pennridge? Voters simply didn’t know who they really were. As candidates, they hid behind words that sounded reasonable. But once they were on the board, all hell broke loose. As one speaker at the recent Moms for Liberty conference said, when Moms for Liberty are elected to school boards, “the fox is in the hen house” — and he meant that as a good thing.
In Council Rock, we still have the chance to keep Moms for Liberty allies off our school board. We have the chance to elect reasonable, responsible, sane leaders who will focus on excellence in education, not culture wars. That’s why we are supporting “Together for Council Rock” candidates Tracey Osecki, Ed Tate, Matthew Laskowski, Linda Stone, Kimberly Winnick and Nicole Khan.
Please join us to keep Council Rock from becoming the next local school board horror story.
This opinion was signed by Jennifer Igval, of Newtown; Jennifer MacKerchar, of Churchville; Jessica Attanasio, of Ivyland; Dana Brady, of Newtown; Marie Hildebrandt, of Churchville; Michael Kauer, Suzy Lee-Kauer, Edan Kauer, all of Ivyland; Carolyn Kelly, of Richboro; Leeann Levin, of Churchville; Amy Lindsay, of Ivyland; Shara Reichwald, of Holland; Amy Scarlett, of Ivyland; and Kevin and Alisa Wiggins, of Richboro.
Join our readers whose generous donations are making it possible for you to read our news coverage. Help keep local journalism alive and our community strong. Donate today.
