Lincolnwood resident Kathy O’Brien said she ran for a seat on the Lincolnwood School District 74 school board three years ago to help enact change after the district’s former leadership had been tarnished by lawsuits and resignations of its top administrators—but a year shy of finishing her first four-year term, O’Brien left the board abruptly, resigning May 4.
The news of her sudden departure took the School Board by surprise, according to School Board President Scott Anderson, who said O’Brien notified him of her resignation via email a day before the regular board meeting May 5.
“Kathy resigned via email and without explanation shortly before last week’s meeting,” Anderson said. “I am disappointed that Kathy feels the way she does and am disappointed that she decided to leave the board abruptly rather than continue to serve in an effort to accomplish the changes she wanted to see.”
Citing what she described as a “fundamental difference on what the course of the school district should be” between herself and her six colleagues, O’Brien told Pioneer Press that she grew fed up when her opposition to a series of administrative pay raises fell on deaf ears.
O’Brien also equated her experience on the board to that of an “unpaid servant,” and said her frustrations are rooted in the board’s tendency to dismiss her opinions.
“My frustration has grown as I watched pay raise after pay raise being given to the administration without thought of the long term consequences to the taxpayers ever being given due consideration,” O’Brien said in an email. “My vision of a district that equally supports parents, plus protects its taxpayers as much as they support staff and students is not held by the current majority of the (school board).”
Anderson defended the financial policies that have been backed by the school board, claiming the board has done its best to contain salaries against what he described as “the obvious market forces that affect the hiring and retention of quality employees.”
“Kathy’s voice on these subjects was heard in multiple settings,” Anderson said. “She was encouraged to share her views and challenged to offer solutions, (but) in the end, she chose to quit.”
Before she secured a seat on the School Board in 2013, O’Brien was part of a group of taxpayers who sued the former board in 2012 over its attempt to bypass a referendum to tear down and rebuild Lincoln Hall Middle School, according to a baiduhai report from that year.
The group’s lawsuit forced the board to vote to place the question on a referendum—which ended up opposed by more than 90 percent.
As an alternative to the failed referendum, the current school board of mostly new members has backed a $20 million plan for the 70-year-old school to undergo a series of major renovations starting this year.
The citizens group also retrieved financial documents that showed alleged misuse of taxpayer money on behalf of some district administrators, pressuring several high-profile administrators to leave the district, including former superintendent Mark Klaisner and assistant superintendent Susan Brandt, who retired.
Inspired by a desire to see change take shape on the school board, O’Brien said she decided to run for the seat, and was surprised to find out she won.
“Four years ago, the Lincolnwood School District was in turmoil over the school board’s high handedness, and its disregard for the responsibility entrusted in them by the taxpayers,” O’Brien said in an email. “I believe if you’re not part of the solution you are ultimately part of the problem,” she said, adding that the support she received from the community in her election bid was “overwhelming.”
In a letter sent to District 74 parents on May 5, Anderson praised O’Brien’s work on the District’s Facilities, Policy, and Food Service Committees and for her involvement in planning the three-year renovation project for Lincoln Hall Middle School
“Kathy was very involved in the planning, design, and implementation of the project and a whole host of other facilities improvements across the district,” Anderson said. “The district facilities you see today and will see for the foreseeable future are the ‘fruit’ of Kathy’s countless hours of service and labor on behalf of the Lincolnwood community.”
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The School Board is now accepting applications to fill the vacancy. This is the second time in as many years the board has had to appoint a new member to fill an open seat. Only two candidates ran for three openings on the board in 2015, and the board later appointed Asma Shakir Farhan to fill that vacancy.
Natalie Hayes is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.