Friday, July 22 (2022) at 9:00am, approximately 12-15 members of the Stillwater community, Brice Chaffin, ROPE Board Members Nancy Blalock and Tracey Montgomery, Attorney Maria Seidler and I waited in courtroom 302 of the Payne County Courthouse for Judge Kistler to hear our response to the dismissal request by Stillwater Public Schools of our lawsuit against SPS and individual SPS Board Members.
Attorney Maria Seidler with members of the Stillwater Community inside Payne County Courthouse after court concluded
Attorney Maria Seidler won her argument against the dismissal request of SPS by pleading that the Oklahoma Religious Freedom Act does provide a mechanism by which a party can initiate a lawsuit for relief of violations of their religious freedom.
Though Judge Kistler did remove ‘The Board’ as a collective from the lawsuit, the Stillwater Public Schools District and each individual Board Member – in their role as SPS Board Member – involved in the meeting the night of April 12, 2022 when Brice Chaffin was removed from the podium by Stillwater police for reciting scripture, will remain in the suit.
This was excellent news. The public elects each individual Board Member and every member of the public should expect that each individual school board member will follow the Constitution and the laws of the State of Oklahoma in commission of their duties as they are sworn to do when taking their seat on the Board.
A rather jaw-dropping moment occurred in the courtroom after the Judge denied the dismissal and declared a pre-trial hearing would be scheduled for November. One of SPS’ attorneys (there were two) addressed the judge. He noted that the specific school board meeting addressed by the ROPE/Chaffin lawsuit had been recorded and widely disseminated. He then told the Judge that SPS did not want a jury trial.
Gosh, why could that be? The fact that if a jury had to rule on the way SPS School Board Members treated Chaffin based on the Oklahoma Religious Freedom Act during that meeting it would result in a slam dunk decision in our favor? Most likely, yes.
ROPE and Chaffin are asking for nothing more in the lawsuit than for a public apology to be made to Chaffin and fees to reimburse attorney Seidler. We are not asking for anything else.
Here are a couple things to think about:
Taxpayers paid for TWO ATTORNEYS to deal with a lawsuit that could have been resolved via a PUBLIC APOLOGY for mistreatment of a parent and community member by SPS Board Members during one of their regularly scheduled open meetings.
How much money will it cost taxpayers – and how much will the ATTORNEYS MAKE OFF TAXPAYERS – to fight a suit in which SPS is clearly in the wrong and over a simple public apology?
Government schools are out of control. Parents know this, but many don’t know what to do about it, or want to overlook the fact because they don’t want to go against teachers and administrators who might single out their child for retribution.
Hopefully – if we win the lawsuit and SPS is forced to publicly apologize – it will go a long way toward giving accountability of school board members back to their communities and the citizens who elect them.
The only way it doesn’t, is if parents and citizens don’t capitalize on the win and work to hold their own school boards just as accountable for their behavior.
While every political campaign has numerous points for failure from fundraising to voter contact, a post mortem of Jake Merrick’s re-election campaign shows that a combination of dark money and redistricting probably did more than anything to sink the re-election campaign of a fine man and public servant.
When I wrote Part 1 of the series, I reported that OCPA, through their Dark Money group Catalyst Oklahoma, had spent $50,620 FOR Merrick’s challenger, Kristen Thompson after spending over $100,000 FOR Merrick’s special election through their dark money group People for Opportunity last year.
I also reported that Senator Merrick – while voting yes in the Senate Education Committee – voted no on the Senate floor on the extremely contentious bill – SB1647 – which would provide publicly funded vouchers to private schools.
Lucia Frohling and Jill Shero both work for ECKO – Every Kid Counts – an organization run by Education Secretary Ryan Walters which supports school choice, including vouchers.
Ryan Martinez wrote a $1,000 check from his campaign account (Friends of Ryan Martinez) to Thompson’s campaign in December of 2021. Martinez is a Representative from the Edmond area who was the House Chair – along with Senator Lonnie Paxton, the Senate Chair – of the state’s legislative redistricting efforts. In March, Friends of Ryan Martinez donated another $1,700 to Thompson.
Mike Cantrell – an originator of Oklahoma Energy Resources Board (OERB) and an 11-year member of the Board of EPIC Charter Schools, who left the Board as depositions began for the criminal investigation which culminated in the arrest of EPIC’s founders, David Cheney and Ben Harris for alleged embezzlement of state tax dollars, donated $1,000.
Josh Cockroft – Governor Stitt’s Political Director.
Donelle Harder – who has worked for Governor Stitt – by way of Washington, D.C. – in several capacities and currently manages his 2022 re-election campaign.
Chris Kannady, an attorney and State Representative for Cleveland County wrote a check from his campaign account (Friends of Chris Kannady) for $1500 to Thompson’s campaign. Kannady told the New York Times that he had led an effort to purge then-elected Republicans from the State House in 2018 because they were a “cancer” to the Party. In July, the Oklahoma Ethics Commission made public that it will sue the Conservative Alliance PAC, from which dark money donated via the Prosperity Alliance was used to oust as many as 11 Conservative House members that year. His campaign pays a consultant called the James Martin Company LLC, owned by Jenna Worthen, wife of Trebor Worthen, former partner with Fount Holland of AH Strategies, an organization who, with client Joy Hofmeister, was charged in a 2016 dark money scheme to oust former State Superintendent Janet Barresi. Today, Trebor runs Sooner State Leadership, a 501C4 dark money group running adds against Governor Kevin Stitt. Kannady also apparently works with CAMP (Campaign Advocacy Management Professionals), run by Worthen’s former partner, Fount Holland. Just a quick glance Kannady’s campaign account is eye-opening. For the first filing period in 2022, Kannady had $341,154.42 and his contributions are a “who’s who” of Oklahoma and national PACs including $10,000 of donations from the OKC Fraternal Order of Police $5,000 and Marathon PAC $5,000.
Trent Smith, the CEO of Accentra, is also co-owner of Sooner Medical Staffing with House Majority Floor Leader Jon Echols and was appointed to the Oklahoma State School Board by Governor Kevin Stitt.
Republican House member Preston Stinson donated $1,000 to Thompson via his campaign fund – Stinson for House. Stinson was prominently featured in the state audit against EPIC Charter Schools management organization, Community Strategies. Ben Harris appointed Stinson to the Community Strategies Board – the governing body for Epic One-on-One Charter School and Epic Blended Charter School in 2016 – and later Community Strategies-CA, alleged to be the ‘shell’ company used by Epic Youth Services through which to receive management fees from Epic California creating profits for Harris and Chaney (#49 of Affidavit of Probable Cause). Preston Stinson received 55% of all campaign donations from EPIC founders and family for his 2020 campaign for the House of Representatives.
Former one-term State Superintendent Janet Barresi not only donated the $2,900 maximum to Kristen Thompson, she introduced her at an Oklahoma Conservative PAC meeting where Kristen shared her message with the audience AFTER OCPAC had committed to endorsing Jake Merrick again for his second campaign for Senate. Fully committed to Common Core during her tenure as State Superintendent, ROPE was nevertheless able to help repeal the bill mandating Common Core in 2014.
The Greater Oklahoma City Chamber PAC provided $1,500.
The State Chamber PAC kicked in $1,000.
Friends of Anthony Moore – who now has had an Oklahoma Bar Association complaint filed against him by OCPA President Jonathan Small for the VPO’s filed by his wife prior to the primary – donated $1,000 from his campaign fund (Friends of Anthony Moore 2022).
OKC Firefighters Association PAC Fund – $5,000.
Turnaround Team Pac donated $1,500 to Thompson. Governor Stitt has frequently called his first four years the “Oklahoma Turnaround”. In fact, his latest TV ads for his re-election campaign prominently feature this concept. The Oklahoma Ethics Commission filing for Thompson list a PO box in Jenks, Oklahoma as the PAC’s address. It is listed as an ‘unregistered’ PAC and there is no filing for the PAC with the Oklahoma Ethics Commission, but Turnaround Team PAC is registered with the FEC in Newport, Kentucky. The treasurer for the PAC is listed as Kevin Broghamer from Newport, Kentucky, who is also the registered treasurer for Governor Stitt’s Oklahoma campaign account. As of 7/14/22, the PAC has $110,000. Donors include;
Edward Hilliary and Dustin Hilliary ($5k each); The Hilliarys own Hilliary Communications, a broadband and telephone service covering southwestern OK and northwest TX. They also publish the Comanche County Chronicle in Elgin and the Southwest Ledger out of Lawton. Governor Stitt has appointed Dustin Hilliary to the Board of the Oklahoma Regents for Higher Education.
For the past year, the House and Senate worked on re-drawing House and Senate districts across the state. This is done every 10 years in conjunction with the collection and distribution of the decade’s CENSUS data. Here is a picture of Merrick’s original district with the new district transposed over the top with red.
Note the approximate location of Merrick’s house (the small red dot nearly on the new southern district line) – especially compared with before. Prior to re-districting, Merrick’s neighbors could vote for Merrick. Now, only the neighbors to the north had that opportunity. Truly very odd.
It almost seems as though the powers that be wanted to re-district Merrick right out of his district. Losing a large chunk of voters with whom Merrick lived and already had voter recognition was tough.
With 9,485 votes in the election, Merrick lost to Thompson by 833. Merrick won Canadian county by 210 votes (total voters 3,036), but was beaten soundly in Oklahoma County by 1,043 (3,746 to 2,603 – total voters 6,449). Merrick had an uphill battle when most of the voters in this election were in Thompson’s backyard.
PACS MADE ALL THE DIFFERENCE
These PACS spent money FOR Thompson (except Job Creators Action Fund).
These PACS spent money AGAINST Merrick. There was no PAC spending FOR Merrick.
{Interestingly, OCPAC’s Bob Linn, quotes Jeff Yas in the OCPAC email of July 11th 2022 where he touts the “money following the kid” (vouchers).}
A large chunk of School Freedom funds have been donated to the Protect Freedom PAC and the Club For Growth.
In Oklahoma, according to the Ethics Commission, the Chairperson for the School Freedom Fund is David McIntosh whose email url reads “clubforgrowth.org”.
Also according to Ethics Commission reports, the School Freedom Fund PAC spent $75,206 FOR Thompson and $119,546.23 AGAINST Merrick.
Then, there’s Common Sense Conservatives, LLC. Here is the address for the PAC.
Yup. A Reesor’s parking lot.
There is no email listed for the Director whose name is simply listed as “Walt Lowe”.
There are a couple Walter Lowe’s in Tulsa, but not anyone who stood out as being someone associated with a PAC – like an attorney. I have tried the number listed on the PAC and it does not work (1-918-236-6078) it’s a constant busy signal as though it’s not a working number. I have checked the Oklahoma Secretary of State website for the LLC. Guess what? Big shocker there – nothing listed. I even tried the FEC and there’s no listing there either. It’s an LLC – according to the Ethics Commission website, so I wouldn’t be able to locate it on the IRS website for non-profit filings. I can’t locate it under “Committees”, I can only find it under “Independent Expenditures”. I’m so mad about it, I filed an Ethics Complaint on the PAC 7/20/22.
Common Sense Conservative (FAKE) PAC spent $66,310 on Digital Ads through an organization in Tennessee called Counterpoint Messaging LLC AGAINST Merrick.
In fact, this PAC spent $207,592.17 against a whole slew of candidates – J.J. Stitt and Brady Butler running against Darcy Jech in SD26, Chris Toney running against Brenda Stanley in SD42, Deb Campbell and Jennifer Sengstock in HD50 against Marcus McEntire, Ron Lynch in HD60 running against Rhonda Baker and Karmin Grider running in an open seat for HD31. ALL candidates but Grider lost. Grider is in a run-off.
In total, PACS spent $158,615.17 FOR Thompson and $185,856.23 AGAINST Merrick, meaning that Thompson benefitted from a WHOPPING $344,471.40.
What in the world? Sadly, how is Kristen Thompson not a bought and paid for candidate by special interest dark money PACS whether she means to be or not? The fact that Oklahoma elections can be BOUGHT like this should concern every voter in the state, not just those in SD22.
WHY DARK MONEY PACS WORK
Most voters don’t work to be educated about issues or candidates. They don’t study candidates or even subscribe to organizations from which they could get an idea of what issues candidates stand for. Consequently, when they see an ad on Facebook calling Jake Merrick a “fake Republican who supported government overreach”, they’re likely not going to look up his voting record, emotions will kick in and Jake will get kicked to the curb. Same with the crazy mailers Fount Holland and his buddies make up.
WHY CAMPAIGN ACCOUNTS SHOULD BE BARRED FROM CONTRIBUTING TO EACH OTHER
Note the number of campaign accounts listed in Thompson’s contribution reports:
Friends of Anthony Moore
Friends of Chris Kannady
Friends of Ryan Martinez
Stinson for House 2022
Four separate campaigns donated to Thompson. Let’s say I donated to Friends of Anthony Moore. I expected that money to go to support his election/re-election campaign, I didn’t expect he would donate my funds to another candidate I might not like instead.
Truly, this is a form of money laundering. Money comes into the campaign for campaign expenses, but it’s then donated to another campaign who then donates it to another. Where is accountability in this round robin? If an elected official wants to donate to a campaign. It should be out of their own pocket, not out of funds citizens provide in good faith that it will be used for their campaigns.
HOW TO FIX THE PROBLEM
Though this month (7/22) the Ethics Commission recently shut down arguably the most influential PAC in Oklahoma – the Senate Republican PAC – due to ethics violations, over the years, the legislature has taken away more and more of the Commission’s ability to preside over dark money and other campaign issues.
If we are to take back our elections and elect candidates we want representing our community instead of people from out of state willing to throw around truckloads of cash to get candidates elected to forward their agendas in our legislature, or the school choice voucher cabal here in Oklahoma who use in-state and out-of-state donors to push their political will, we must give the Ethics Commission the tools they need to fight for campaign accountability.
Nothing beats an educated voter, but until we have a million of those, we need an Ethics Commission armed and ready to beat back unethical campaign behavior to keep good candidates like Jake Merrick from being steamrolled out of office.
Explain to your legislator that Oklahoma absolutely must give the Ethics Commission the ability to prosecute any electioneering that occurs against Ethics rules and ask them to sponsor legislation next year toward that end.
It’s our only hope.
——————–
FYI: CONTRIBUTIONS FOR THOMPSON: Catalyst Oklahoma $50,620, School Freedom Fund $75,206, American Energy Action Fund $9,862, Job Creators Action Network $22,927.17
CONTRIBUTIONS AGAINST MERRICK: School Freedom Fund $119,546.23, Common Sense Conservatives $66,310
Jake Merrick won a special election for now-Congresswoman Stephanie Bice’s open Senate seat last year. Senator Merrick is a Conservative, pro-life, pro-2nd amendment, small business owner who has served Oklahoma well since his special election. Oklahoma Council for Public Affairs (OCPA) dark money helped him in his first election. Here’s the rub: After voting YES in committee, he voted NO (on the Senate floor) on a bill to send public money to private schools (voucher – SB1647). This election cycle, OCPA is using many thousands of dollars to influence voters AGAINST HIM through a different dark money group.
What is “dark money”? Dark money is money spent on political campaigns where – since 2010 – the names of the donors to the campaign don’t have to be disclosed. The money can come through STATE or FEDERAL sources – or both. To learn more about “dark money”, click here.
In March of 2021, an Oklahoma PAC called People for Opportunity, Inc. gave over 100 thousand dollars to an organization called WPAi – a political polling, research and analytics team – run by Chris Wilson – in support of Jake Merrick.
Who is People for Opportunity?
According to the Oklahoma Secretary of State’s office, People for Opportunity was begun in 2020 by Jonathan Small – the President of OCPA and Dave Bond – the Vice President for Advocacy at OCPA.
OCPA has long been an organization in part dedicated to the idea of School Choice – which includes ‘vouchers’; providing parents with tax dollars to send their children to private schools.
OCPA is often funded by grants from the Walton Foundation (during campaign cycles apparently), the State Policy Network – an organization of which they are an affiliate – as well as private and other donors. Because they are a private, non-profit organization, however, they do not have to report the source of their donations, only their expenditures.
In 2019, OCPA did make two expenditures.
One to the American Federation for Children – a school choice organization – and one to the OCPA Impact Inc organization.
OCPA Impact Inc., also does business as OCPA Oklahoma Policy Solutions, Inc. under the same EIN (tax number).
In 2019, they reported $19,933 in revenue, but again, from where that came who knows. Where it was spent was not recorded on their tax form either.
In fact, OCPA has LOTS of organizations registered with the OK Secretary of State’s Office. Unfortunately, our state is not a fan of transparency as it costs a minimum of $5 to request ANY documents from the SOS office on any registered organization and upwards of $10 per document to actually see the paperwork the SOS’s office requires for filing.
Why so many organizations associated with OCPA?
Where did the 100K come from for the donation through People for Opportunity?
Who knows? The only way to find out any information about these dark money groups is painstaking and not something many people are going to do. This is sad, because people who SPEND MONEY TO ELECT or REMOVE elected officials have INFLUENCE over the candidates they help elect.
This election cycle, an organization listed as Catalyst Oklahoma recorded expenditures of $50,620 for Jake Merrick’s opponent Kristen Thompson.
Who is Catalyst Oklahoma, Inc. ?
Catalyst Inc., is a dark money subgroup of OCPA with the Principal listed as Charles Sublett – a member of OCPA’s Board.
There is no 990 filing for Catalyst Oklahoma for 2019 and above, though there’s little the form would tell us but to whom the organization has given money.
Why would OCPA work so heavily in dark money in Oklahoma? Why have so many organizations and sub-organizations with so many different names associated? What does OCPA have to hide?
Why spend so much money to help Senator Merrick win and then turn around and spend more money to unseat him? If OCPA is so fired up about “empowering parents” by offering “school choice”, why not put the money being spent on elected legislators into starting new schools to help kids? How does it ’empower parents’ to spend so much money on legislative activities?
Dark money always leaves unanswered questions while it influences the legislative process in ways most ‘average’ Oklahomans can’t.
In case you’ve not seen our Facebook posts with further explanations as to why ROPE has chosen to support Dr. John Cox for Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction, I’m going to paste them into the blog where you can share them with all your smart friends who are NOT on social media!
From June 7th:
A story about Dr. John Cox and why history is important: (update at bottom)
Back in 2012 (or so), the Carter County Republicans asked me (and ROPE) to do a presentation for them about why we needed to fight Common Core. They had the meeting at a hotel near I-35. After speaking, Julia Seay and I and a few others went to Two Frogs down the road to have dinner. Dr. Cox had been to another of our presentations previously and came to dinner with the group that night.
Julia and I both wondered why on earth a Democrat was so interested in fighting Common Core, so, we grilled him – beginning with abortion. He shocked us. He said he was 100% pro life. We asked him about gun ownership and he was 100% pro-second amendment.
As we got further into our discussions, Julia and I both started laughing. Julia actually told him something like, “You’re more Republican than many Republicans we know!” He explained that he’d been brought up as a Democrat and where he lived, there weren’t any Republicans to vote for anyway. If he wasn’t a Democrat he couldn’t vote except in a general election, where he traditionally voted for Republicans.
During the Common Core fight, John consistently showed up to do what he could to push back against an initiative he knew would tie his hands as an administrator and dumb down learning for his students – WHEN FEW OTHER SUPERINTENDENTS – REPUBLICANS OR DEMOCRATS – ANYWHERE IN OKLAHOMA DID.
Today we know that ROPE, Dr. Cox and all those who fought so hard against Common Core and federal intervention into state public education systems WERE 100% RIGHT about everything we said would happen with implementation of CC.
Since coming out with our endorsement of Dr. Cox yesterday, we have been lambasted and castigated by a prominent Christian once-supporter and had subscribers drop our email newsletter. This is all fine, as ROPE will fight to the death to allow people to express their opinions, but it is UNBELIEVABLY hurtful and frustrating.
To think – after all these years – that ROPE (or me) would support someone who supports policies I/we HAVE NEVER SUPPORTED is nonsensical. Why on earth would someone look at a label before taking the word of others who may know more about the person than they themselves – or even better – INTERVIEWING THE PERSON THEMSELVES?
Ronald Reagan was a Democrat. TRUMP was once a Democrat. One of the – hands down – most courageous, competent public servants we have in office – Cindy Byrd – was a Democrat and WE SUPPORT CINDY BYRD TOO!
I know that the devil has been seeding distrust since the beginning of time. I know he is the Father of Confusion and Lies. I know Conservatives have been through the ringer lately and trust is hard.
HOWEVER, allowing ourselves to tread water in a sea of emotion, where we all get spooled up in the back-stabbing, intrigue of ‘politics’ to make us feel as though we’re ‘doing’ something – we need to STOP AND THINK – and use discernment and reason to chart our course.
I’m not saying ANY man is perfect – only Jesus gets that label among humanity. All I’m saying is, the more we use emotion over reason and the more we desire to fight with one another, the faster we lose any chance of gaining the ground we’ve lost to the Communists – who are our REAL ENEMY and threat to individual liberty.
**I’m also going to add here – ROPE is not funded by anyone. We tried to be a PAC but it didn’t work. We have always supported this group on gas donations and out of our own pocketbooks. We don’t owe allegiance to anyone or any group. About what other advocacy group can you say that?
And from my personal Facebook page June 9th:
Yesterday, a person tagged me in a post that said they didn’t understand our stand for Dr. Cox because he has ‘never stood for parents’.
Here is the truth: Dr. Cox STOOD WITH PARENTS AGAINST COMMON CORE when only one or two other Superintendents did. But even that isn’t the issue here.
While Dr. Cox was labeled a Democrat, he STOOD WITH PARENTS against a FEDERAL TAKEOVER OF EDUCATION.
Here is the list of REPUBLICANS who stood AGAINST PARENTS and FOR FEDERAL EDUCATION: Former State Superintendent Janet Barresi, former governor Mary Fallin, former Senator Clark Jolley (who is running for state Treasurer and who wrote the bill to insert Common Core AND OTHER OBAMA EDUCATION INITIATIVES – into our state) and the state Chamber. Oklahoma Council For Public Affairs (OCPA) NEVER GOT INTO THE FIGHT FOR PARENTS AT ALL ON THIS ISSUE.
Who was right about Common Core? #ROPEWASRIGHT all it takes is a bit of internet search to find all the studies indicating just that.
As I’ve said before HISTORY IS IMPORTANT and if you choose to overlook it, you do so at your own peril.
In the end, who knows what Dr. Cox will do if elected – we can only go on our past experience with the man and the things he’s committed to us and the public. Obviously, Dr. Cox is human – as are we all.
We continue to remain friendly with Secretary Walters, but I did tell him, when I called to inform him of our endorsement, that one of the gravest concerns we have about his candidacy, other than his desire to see vouchers implemented statewide, is all the people with whom he associates.
In fact, his associates – all on ECKO’s Board of Directors – include former Policy Director for Mary Fallin, (Jake Yunker) – who, with former Secretary of Education Janet Baressi fought the repeal of Common Core – former Representative Lee Denney who fought against the repeal of Common Core and Jennifer Monies, who has worked extensively with the State Chamber who fought Common Core. This election cycle, Secretary Walters has had fundraisers thrown for him by both Jeb Bush – a Common Core and school choice proponent – and Betsy DeVos whose family runs the American Federation for Children 501(c)(4) and PAC; the (c)(4) of which reported 8 million dollars in revenues in 2019. Those names don’t inspire the idea of ‘parental rights’ to us, but the top-down, administrative, big government solutions of which we need to rid Oklahoma, not double-down.
“School choice is going to be very popular – it’s gonna poll very well – it has an enormous…everybody’s ‘spidey’ sense should be tingling because of how much money’s behind the school choice lobby. Like who writes your checks? Why on earth is so much money being dumped into this school choice lobby?”
James Lindsay via Unwokeable.
Ever wonder why James Lindsay was the greatest thing since sliced bread when he was going after CRT, but after he began talking about the false choice of school choice, his influence has disappeared in Oklahoma? Hint: our HUGE school choice mafia – I mean lobby – don’t want YOU to hear what he has to say, lest it hurt their plans to make all schools public schools.
If you like James Lindsay and like what he has to say about DEI, CRT and all the other nonsense feeding into our public schools and society, you had BETTER listen to this podcast. Here, Mark Ousley (Unwokeable) and James Lindsay discuss why the School Choice movement is a FALSE MOVEMENT and why. Don’t have time to listen? Put on your airpods and listen while you work. THIS IS IMPORTANT.
Though The Frontier blasts Every Kid Counts Oklahoma (EKCO) for not disclosing their donors, the real story here appears to be that an Oklahoma non-profit embroiled in controversy on several levels has no publicly-filed 990 since 2019. Though there are Republicans who might dismiss information ferreted out by The Frontier as ‘biased’ or ‘ax-grinding’, the research I’ve been doing independently for some time, supports most reports made by The Frontier.
Here’s what I have found – including as always – screen shots and URL locations where you can find this information for yourself and not take my word, or the word of an ‘independent’ newspaper supported by funds from enormous leftist Tulsa donors, including Kaiser and Schusterman.
ECKO – BEGINNINGS
{All information listed is from documents filed with the Oklahoma Secretary of State’s Office unless otherwise mentioned.}
12.6.2016 – The beginning of ECKO lies with a non-profit organization founded in December of 2016 called Upward Oklahoma, Inc. It’s purpose was to engage in “various charitable, educational, and scientific activities in the state of Oklahoma”.
Secretary of State filings show that the Registered Agent was Brett Farley (now Executive Director of the Catholic Conference) addressed from a post office box at the Post Office on Covell in Edmond.
The principle Incorporators were Brett Farley, Cordon DeKock (former Vice-President of Political Affairs for the Oklahoma State Chamber), addressed at 330 NE 10th Street (the address for the Oklahoma State Chamber) and Jason Reese (former General Counsel to Governor Stitt) addressed at 100 Park Avenue Suite 500. Upward Oklahoma’s Directors are listed as the same three men.
2.10.2017 – February 10th, 2017, An Amended and Restated Certificate of Incorporation of Upward Oklahoma Inc. was made, describing it as a 501(c)(3) entity officing from the 10th Floor of Two Leadership Square and the Registered Agent as McAfee & Taft A Professional Corporation. At that time, Jennifer Carter (former Chief of Staff to former State Superintendent Janet Barresi and Senior Advisor for American Federation for Children Oklahoma) and Kyle Beauregard (a tax manager from Oklahoma) were added to the list of incorporators.
Under the March 30 filing, the business is described as being located at 16212 Sonoma Park Drive in Edmond (a building housing Atlas Construction) and Trent Smith (Governor Stitt appointee to the Oklahoma State School Board) is listed as ‘President’. Smith’s LinkdIn account also verifies that he carried this title. AJ Griffin (former state Senator and Director of Government and Community Affairs for PayCom) is listed as the Secretary of ECKO.
12.3.2021 – Finally, in December of 2021, the address for ECKO is changed to 309 NW 13th Street, Suite 103, OKC (the site of the Oklahoma Public School Resource Center) and the President is listed as Jake Yunker (former Policy Director for Governor Mary Fallin and the President of the Board of ECKO) and the Treasurer listed as Cory Christofferson (Vice-President of Corporate Banking at Bank of Oklahoma and ECKO Board Member)
ECKO – TAX FILING
From 2016 to 2019, it appears that Brett Farley dutifully posted 990-N postcards for the non-profit Upward Oklahoma from the post office box on Covell.
But after that – filing stops. The IRS has no record of anything filed after 2019.
ECKO – TAXES AND TIMELINE
From 2016 until March of 2020 when Upward Oklahoma is re-named Every Kid Counts Oklahoma, little seems to have happened in the life of the organization. In fact, it looks like the State Chamber and friends were considering a new school choice venture at some point and secured a non-profit filing with the Secretary of State toward that end. In fact, a June 26, 2020, press release verifies that “Oklahoma Achieves Transitions To [a] New Reform Initiative” called “Every Kid Counts”.
No harm, no foul – lots of people create organizations, even changing names and personnel along the way.
There is no line item on the Oklahoma Achieves 990 filing for 2019 for a ‘Ryan Walters’ salary and the IRS has no public 2020 990 filing for Oklahoma Achieves at all. Walters worked for Achieves until he was named CEO of ECKO in the summer of 2020.
This is also the case with ECKO – there are no public IRS filings for 2020 or 2021 for an organization that – today – reports having six employees, (though according to their LinkdIn profiles, it appears 2 may be contract employees and 3 were hired in 2021 – April, August and December) and CEO – Ryan Walters – who makes over $100,000 dollars per year.
According to The Frontier, Every Kid Counts produced ‘tax forms’ (there was no specific information provided as to what kind or for what year) after a month of asking. They also report these ‘tax forms’ showed that ECKO raised just under $140,000 in 2020 – nothing is reported for 2021. Of interest on those ‘tax forms’ should be the salaries and expenses of ECKO compared to the $140,000 raised. Where’s that information?
ECKO – DONORS
I’m going to make this very clear: I don’t fault any non-profit for raising funds – that’s what a non-profit does to advance their mission statement. I do think, however, that the public should know who the largest donors of non-profits are, as that provides an idea of that organization’s political lean.
Our organization also believes that if Ryan Walters is directing education policy as the Governor Stitt-appointed Secretary of Education, his work for an education non-profit (501(c)(3)) where there is a LOT of crossover, should be 100% transparent because of the ethics concerns this type of situation generates – how easy is to push the agenda of ECKO through legislative policy when the CEO of ECKO is a legislative liaison?
The Frontier has reported that some of ECKO’s funds come from The Walton Foundation. This I cannot corroborate. The Walton Foundation has a very transparent search tool in their grant database that identifies the organizations to which they donate and no search ever returned a grant for “Every Kid Counts” or “ECKO”. The Walton Foundation filed an extension on their 2020 990’s and don’t have a publicly filed 2021 990 via the IRS, so there was no way to corroborate via that method either.
The Walton Foundation DID provide a total donation of $500,000 for Oklahoma Achieves over three years (2017, 2019, 2020), however, under the name Oklahoma Education Excellence Initiative. If the Walton grant was given to ECKO under a different name, I didn’t find that either.
It is of interest that the Oklahoma Public School Resource Center – the building in which ECKO offices, has received MILLIONS of dollars from The Walton Foundation over the years, but then OPSCR is very transparent that it is funded via “annual membership fees [and] 4 foundations that fund the OPSRC: The George Kaiser Family Foundation, The Inasmuch Foundation, The Charles & Lynn Schusterman Foundation, & The Walton Family Foundation.” According to the filed 990 for 2020, OPSCR collected 3.7 million dollars in funding. It also had a payroll of 1.3 million and gave grants to schools in excess of 2.6 million dollars.
Suffice it to say, ECKO has a long, interesting history and discovering exactly how ECKO has supported Ryan Walter’s $100,000 + salary and numerous employees on the $140,000 reported by The Frontier, has raised more questions for yet another blog.
Being a conservative is often a lonely position. Asking people to take responsibility for THEMSELVES to prevent government intervention is not an easy sell in a world where all the creature comforts of human existence are but a moment away. After being attacked personally by OCPAC for an opinion Reclaim Oklahoma Parent Empowerment corporately holds, a rebuttal is in order.
In full disclosure, several members of ROPE met with OCPAC President Bob Linn February 8th to discuss our concerns with SB1647, during which time Mr. Linn admitted he had not read the bill.
Let’s be very clear: NO, ROPE does not support the movement of tax dollars (government money – vouchers) to private or homeschools.
Here are the ways ROPE SUPPORTS PARENT EDUCATIONAL CHOICE:
Individual and family tax credits for home or private school. Oklahoma doesn’t have this option currently, but there are several bills in the legislature this year to do so – SB1471 – and several modifications to increase the EOES (below)
send their children to a public online charter school like EPIC, which provides tax dollars to parents who would like to school their children at home using EPIC’s curriculum
send their children to a brick and mortar charter school (link above)
begin saving their money in a state-sponsored 529 program when their children are born to use for either college or a private K12 school
use the EOES mentioned above to attend a private school
transfer to another public school – if allowed by the school to which the transfer would be made
The term ‘fiduciary’ comes from the word ‘trust’. A ‘fiduciary’ responsibility imposes a restriction that money given (or taken) is used in good faith and in the best interest of the owner of the money. That’s all that means.
The government has no money it doesn’t forcibly take from citizens (people who don’t pay their taxes go to jail or lose their property), so all ‘government’ dollars are tax dollars, taken from the people. Yes, government has a fiduciary responsibility for those funds, but how many times have those been overlooked and money spent wastefully and fraudulently? Who is NOT familiar with wasteful government spending? Tom Coburn was.
Bob uses Social Security as an example. This is a sad example of ‘fiduciary’ funds. Though I’ve paid into the SS system, it has been raided over and over by government overreach to the point that few of us my age will have funds to use for retirement. What happened to the government’s ‘fiduciary’ responsibility there? Clue: GOVERNMENT DOESN’T CARE ABOUT ‘FIDUCIARY’ RESPONSIBILITY or public schools wouldn’t be the problem they are now. If government cared, they would have appreciated their fiduciary responsibility and made schools responsible for not educating students all along.
TJ Schmidt, an attorney with Homeschool Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), does not agree with Bob’s assessment and says that, because all money comes from taxpayers, any government money taken from citizens but then given back – as in to home or privately school children (voucher) – comes with the need to make those funds ACCOUNTABLE to taxpayers.
When citizens are ‘incentivized’ to use government money to do something they don’t have the personal responsibility to do on their own, there will be fraud – it’s simply human nature.
In fact, my contention is that parents who want to homeschool do so to ESCAPE government entrapment and don’t want ANY government involvement. Parents who want government money to school at home use a system like EPIC where government money pays for curricula to be used at home. Data from Arizona indicates I’m correct.
parents funding private school OUT OF THEIR OWN POCKETS were the happiest of all
though polling shows 29% of Arizonans would use private school and 14% homeschool, the actual numbers are MUCH LESS – 6% and 2% of Arizonans actually use the GOVERNMENT programs respectively and Arizona was one of the earliest adopters of ‘school choice’ programs
In fact, EdChoice tells us that 23% of Arizona’s students are eligible for vouchers and tax credit programs and 100% of students are eligible for a tax credit scholarship, but ONLY 7% OF ALL ARIZONANS USE ALL PROGRAMS TOGETHER and that’s the best record in the nation!
Data for 2021 indicate that after a 31 million dollar investment over the 10 years, only 1,135 students took advantage of the program in 2021 and of those that reported their status (112), only 32% (36) were economically disadvantaged.
“We have denied an equal playing field” to children sentenced to a failing neighborhood school
How have we done that? I just cited 8 ways parents can direct the education of their children and showed that, when offered, most parents don’t take advantage of voucher programs or tax credit scholarships.
But beyond that, since when did a ‘conservative’ talking point become ‘equaling the playing field’?
I searched the term ‘equaling the playing field’ and found this slide show about how COMMON CORE equaled the playing field for all kids. Now that’s great! But, as we said it would for YEARS, Common Core – making every child have the same curricula across the US – FAILED SPECTACULARLY, never amounting to any kind of positive change on student achievement of any kind.
CONSERVATIVES DO NOT USE GOVERNMENT TO ‘EQUAL PLAYING FIELDS’, we want the government to stay in its own lane and allow PRIVATE INDIVIDUALS AND THE MARKET TO CREATE CHOICE.
“Those who oppose educational choice where money follows the child display an arrogant and callous disposition to the less fortunate”
Gosh, I guess, people like Ben Carson, whose single mother worked three jobs to allow Ben and his brother a great education and Mark Robinson (Lt. Gov. of North Carolina) whose family was dirt poor but made sure he and his siblings were well educated have it all wrong. Government should have come in and incentivized their transformation – because government ALWAYS produces programs that work.
I find it sad that a Christian Conservative, would – essentially – call those who want LESS government and more personal responsibility ‘arrogant and callous’.
In Matthew 26:11, Jesus tells us that the poor will always be with us.
Leviticus 23:22 quotes the Lord as saying, “When you harvest the crops of your land, do not harvest the grain along the edges of your fields, and do not pick up what the harvesters drop. Leave it for the poor and the foreigners living among you.”
In other words, INDIVIDUALS, left part of the harvest for the poor to harvest themselves. The Romans taxed the Jews horribly, but their religion told them it was THEIR responsibility to help the poor.
As PragerU said in a recent Instagram post, “Jesus advises us to be of “generous spirit” – to show kindness, to assist the widow and the orphan. But he clearly means this to be our responsibility.”
Conservatives are those who promote LESS GOVERNMENT, PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY, PRIVATE COMPETITION and INDIVIDUAL GIVING.
“More than that, they also fail to understand that no parent should see their educational dollars forced into the government’s failed model of education.”
Nope, we get it – we just want it done THE RIGHT WAY – via tax credit and tax credit scholarship. Both would remove money from public education, but do so BEFORE the money is taken by the government in the first place.
Here’s something Bob doesn’t apparently understand – the legislature appropriates education dollars. Why don’t we ALL advocate that, instead of giving more and more tax dollars to FAILING government education, the legislature use the grade card the State developed to get ESSA funds, to pull funding from failing schools?
Bob complains that government schools are unGodly and parents shouldn’t have to leave their children in that situation.
OF COURSE THEY ARE! THEY ARE PROPPED UP BY SECULAR GOVERNMENT MONEY! Do you honestly think that sending government money into home and private schools WON’T PRODUCE THE SAME RESULTS? It absolutely will. Right now, the only thing staving off an atheistic society are Christian home and private schools. Why do you want to compromise the two things that are working under complete parent control? That makes absolutely no sense!
Why not instead work with churches to create programs like microschools, learning pods or to provide daily tutoring, or even create a school specifically for those below the poverty line? The Biden Justice Department can’t force policy there. Again, why does GOVERNMENT have all the answers? Don’t conservatives think the private sector has those?
In closing, Bob calling me “a bit callous, heartless and cold” for wanting the private sector to do their job instead of allowing government to do that is a bit social justice warrior for me – especially in the face of Conservative principles. Government doesn’t provide choices, the private market does and the more government ‘does’ the less churches and the private market do.
Note this: in 2021, homeschooling and private schools grew and Oklahoma public schooling LOST STUDENTS thanks to parents deciding to homeschool and leave government schools ON THEIR OWN POWER.
Just recently I posted a meme to our social media about how single-parent families could homeschool and was inundated with OTHER ideas as well:
working from home and schooling when able in their schedule
church-created homeschool coops for single parents
teaming up with other families to create a coop so that each day the parents rotate so one is in charge of the children every day
teaming up to hire a tutor to teach all the children each day
homeschool families bringing in children of single parents to school with their own kids (I did this with the child of a single friend. She just became a part of the family and she graduated with my own!)
These are AWESOME ideas that parents came up with all on their own without the ‘benevolent’ hand of the government ‘helping’ them.
CONSERVATIVES, STOP TRYING TO USE GOVERNMENT TO SOLVE THE PROBLEMS WE LET GOVERNMENT CREATE IN THE FIRST PLACE. The only ways to help students out right now (other than making the legislature responsible for their funding of failing schools) is to provide individual family tax credits for home and private schooling and tax credit scholarships for the same. This would help parents and ‘punish’ failing schools without government strings while allowing the free market to work.
These are just a few representative questions from the Oklahoma Prevention Needs Survey for 6th grade which can be found here. Questions for the 8, 10 and 12th grade survey is found here. These questions are being asked of students as young as SIXTH GRADE.
But not only are 6th grade students asked to ‘RAT OUT’ their friends, this survey asks similar questions about PARENTS and NEIGHBORS!
This was forwarded through a parent in Edmond Public Schools. The school sent a letter out via email to parents to inform them of the survey and their right to opt out.
THERE WAS NO LINK IN THE LETTER TO THE DIRECT SURVEY, just descriptions of a few of the more minor questions and a notice that parents could DROP EVERYTHING AND COME TO THE SCHOOL TO VIEW THE SURVEY.
Of course I believe that every parent should do just that, but why not make it easy to access the survey questions online? Everything else – including learning – has been shuttled online, why not a link to these INVASIVE surveys?
WHAT ARE THE PARTICULAR PROBLEMS WITH THIS SURVEY?
1. The Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment protects students from being given surveys paid for with Federal funds that ask the following type questions:
Please note how many of the questions in the screenshot above VIOLATE THE PPRA!
Ahhh, but herein lies the kicker – it doesn’t protect children from invasive surveys given at the state level – including this one!
This is why ROPE worked with author, Senator Shane Jett, to create a bill (SB1448) that would force school Administrators to sign an affidavit that a survey does NOT violate the PPRA. Please ask your legislator to Co-Author this bill with Shane Jett, to protect our children from these invasive surveys.
2. If a parent got interested at all from the letter sent by the school they could internet search “Oklahoma Prevention Needs Survey” and they would find this – on the Oklahoma State Department of Education website:
Please note – you are to contact an “EPIDEMIOLOGIST” for information. According to Wikipedia: Epidemiology is the study and analysis of the distribution, patterns and determinants of health and disease conditions in defined populations. It is a cornerstone of public health, and shapes policy decisions and evidence-based practice by identifying risk factors for disease and targets for preventive healthcare.
Why in the world would we be using class time to assess student populations for reasons of ‘SHAPING POLICY DECISIONS”? Schools appear to be having a terrible time making sure a majority of their students can read at grade level.
Because results of the surveys will be used to “collect school-level data needed for grant program eligibility”! Our kids are being given invasive surveys asking them to tattle on friends and family members FOR MONEY.
3. Edmond public schools assures parents that these are ANONYMOUS surveys and that no personal data will be attached to the surveys. This is a bald-faced lie. No school can guarantee that student data will be kept anonymous – especially if surveys are to be given by a THIRD PARTY. The Oklahoma Prevention Needs Survey is being given through the OSDE by Oklahoma State University researchers. How many people will handle that data? How can the school prevent a name or id from being attached to the survey?
ROPE has written a great deal about the dangers of student data collection that came with the Common Core. All one needs to do is use the search engine to search the word “data” on our blogspot and find numerous well-researched articles that explain the nature of data collection and why data can never really be anonymous. Or, if you don’t trust us – internet search the terms “student privacy”. That should provide plenty of information indicating the LACK of privacy for students when data is collected through government schools.
FYI: If a parent found the page on the OSDE website and tried to “click for more information” they would find that the page goes NOWHERE.
The survey also includes risk and protective factors, which are attitudes, behaviors, and opinions that research has shown to be highly correlated with these health risk behaviors.
Exactly the things that schools should not be giving to children according to the PPRA.
These are not the only surveys being given to students in our public schools. This blog talks a bit about the Youth Risk Behavior surveys which ask – not only questions about drug use – but ask very personal questions about sexual behavior – another taboo topic according to the PPRA.
HERE’S THE BOTTOM LINE: PARENTS! DO NOT ALLOW YOUR CHILDREN TO TAKE ANY SURVEYS OR FILL OUT ANY QUESTIONNAIRES AT SCHOOL – and help us pass SB1448 this 2022 session!
Over the last several years, it has become abundantly clear that many K12 public school boards do not have the best interest of parents at heart. For the last several years, parents across the country have expressed frustration over issues such as mask policies, Critical Race Theory and inappropriate reading material, only to have their microphones turned off, be completely ignored by Board members, or forced out of meetings by police.
At the end of last September, the contentious issue of parents and school boards came to a head when the National School Boards Association (NSBA) penned a letter to the Biden administration asking them to review whether angry parent outbursts can be acted upon as violations of the Patriot Act – indicating their wish to have dissenting parents treated as terrorists.
The news only gets worse. Thanks to an FOI request submitted by grassroots parents group, Parents Defending Education, it became clear that Biden Secretary of Education, Miguel Cardona, actually ASKED NASBA to write the letter to the Biden administration and later, Cardona added the head of NASBA to the board which governs the National Association of Educational Progress (The Nation’s Report Card) ostensibly as a “thank you” for his service.
Why would the OSSBA ignore the request of state legislators to withdraw from NASBA – especially after the controversy continued?
Because the OSSBA is not for parents, they are for the education bureaucracy.
In fact, the OSSBA is no stranger to controversy. The OSSBA fought every effort to stop Common Core, frequently siding with the Superintendents union (CCOSA) and the OEA among others. They have been for every teacher pay raise offered – especially the enormous Step Up plan in 2018.
Though HB1775 was passed last year to stop the teaching of CRT tenets in public schools, the OSSBA seems very preoccupied with race. There’s a section of their blog entitled, “Voices” which has several essays on race and a post outlining “The Problem With HB1775”.
Then there are some very problematic trainings based on race and equity:
Then there is their affiliation with the NASBA Equity Symposium:
Then, there’s all the lobbying they do. Last year they wanted to stop school board elections from being held in November:
According to Title 70 5-110, school board members are to receive 15 hours of training over a five year term.
Elected legislators are not required to receive training prior to taking their seat – nor are they to take continuing education courses.
City Council members and Mayors are required to take a one day course given by the Oklahoma Municipal League (OML).
Why should school board members be forced to receive so much more training than any other elected official?
Why is the OSSBA listed in law as a training provider? Isn’t that protectionism?
Why would the law say that ELECTED school board members can be removed if they do not take training? How can an official elected by the PEOPLE be removed by the government for not taking mandatory subjective training?
School Board members should NOT be forced to take statutory training, nor should they be able to be ‘fired’ if they refuse mandatory training, nor should a non-profit PRIVATE organization be listed in law as a training provider.
SB1447 by Shane Jett repeals statutory training and, instead provide optional training for school board members at their local vo-tech, where the money would stay in their town instead of going to a non-profit organization that doesn’t need more state money. It also removes the OSSBA as a training provider and repeals the section that allows school board members to be fired for not attending training.
Title 70 5-107a describes the length of school board terms. Elementary District members serve 3 year terms. Independent districts with five-member boards serve 5 and 7-member boards serve 4.
Most district terms are 4 years. If a school board member begins their term fighting parents at every turn, like a school board member from Deer Creek Schools, Lorrie Bamford, no change can be made to the seat for FOUR YEARS, leaving parents with little ability to have a voice in their child’s school throughout their entire high school career!
State Representatives are elected EVERY TWO YEARS. Why should a school board member have a term longer than a State Representative?
A two-year term could make it easier for busy community members to serve at least one term on their local school board, increasing the pool of possible candidates – plus, prevent authoritarian Board Members from becoming entrenched in their position and hard to remove in favor of more parent friendly candidates.
Please support these two bills by asking your Senator and Representative to sign on as Co-Authors! OSSBA will do everything it can to make sure neither of these bills pass the legislature and we’ll need YOU to see that they do!
