Anoint: to choose by, or as if by, divine election; anoint him.
In all the strange and inappropriate weirdness of the eight-page rant excoriating a sitting board member and mailed last week to taxpayers across Proviso Township by the superintendent and school board president of the local public high schools, we were stopped by the paragraph that read:
“KEEP TALKING [Claudia] Medina — GOD has the last word! YOU don’t understand whose we are — We [Rodney Alexander, board president, and Supt. James Henderson] are not only highly qualified for this work but are anointed for a time such as this to lead this work.”
Excuse us. Anointed by whom?
The Review, also heavily criticized in this leaflet/screed, has filed FOIA requests to find out just how much it cost the taxpayers of Proviso to design, print and mail this full-color testament to these school officials’ qualifications. We have to file Freedom of Information Act requests because, as we reported last week, in a highly-efficient and low-cost harangue emailed to us, the district said it would no longer speak to the local paper. Let’s hear it for email. All the burn for just pennies.
Two District 209 board members reached by the Review had the common sense to distance themselves from the district leaders’ decision to so thoroughly take down an elected school board member. We’ve seen a lot of things over our years in community journalism. This we’ve never seen.
Amanda Grant said in an email to the Review, “I had absolutely no involvement in this.” We asked who paid for it, hoping Dr. Henderson had dipped into his retirement savings to foot the bill for his attack on one of his employers. But no. “Unfortunately, the district paid for this,” said Grant.
Ned Wagner, a board member, said, “I had no idea it was being developed. I would not have authorized it.”
Well, who needs authorization when you’ve been anointed?
In other Proviso news
Who knew the only qualified consultants to advise Proviso Township High Schools on any topic come from Mississippi or Texas? We’ve already reported on the no-bid hiring of Ernest Clark, a former employee at Dr. Henderson’s past school district in Holmes County, Mississippi, and of Samac Technology, also of Holmes County, to audit technology in District 209.
This week comes the RFP-less hiring of Walker Quality Services of the great state of Texas. This firm will advise the district on how to bring its food service back in-house from a less than delectable outside vendor. Two other bids were solicited — one 48 hours before the deadline, and both were substantially less expensive than the Texas outfit.
If James Henderson had earned any credibility, maybe we’d accept that all the good consultants come from the Deep South.
He hasn’t and we don’t.
