The Monroe City School Board is facing open conflict between two of its members, with Board President Betty Ward-Cooper and Board Member Jennifer Haneline trading sharp words over accountability and oversight in the district.
Haneline, in a detailed statement this week, said her “legitimate questions” about budget practices and curriculum decisions have been met with “defensiveness, anger, and personal attacks.”
She said she was stunned when one of her requested agenda items was “intentionally omitted” by Ward-Cooper.
According to Haneline, she is simply echoing the concerns of parents, teachers, and administrators. Her questions focus on issues such as delayed curriculum materials, the elimination of the Accelerated Reader program without committee input, and the management of student funds. She said she has only sent “two emails with one attachment” to Superintendent Sam Moore, but her inquiries have been twisted into accusations.
“Even if I had ulterior motives, that doesn’t make the questions any less valid,” Haneline said, adding that she has been treated with “vitriol” and accused of motives that distract from the issues. “No one is above scrutiny… We deserve transparency and accountability.”
Ward-Cooper, however, fired back with her own choice words in two emails to Haneline and other board members. She accused Haneline of forcing the administration to waste time “chasing rabbits” instead of focusing on “the real work of the district.”
She described Haneline’s questioning as “overbearing demands” that were “never placed on Superintendent Moore’s predecessor,” Dr. Brent Vidrine and said the barrage of inquiries amounted to “excessive, time-consuming questioning.”
“I am tolerant of a whole lot,” Ward-Cooper wrote. “But I am NOT tolerant of deceitful, insolent behavior by longstanding board members that know better and that put in jeopardy the mission of our school district.”
The back-and-forth underscores a deeper struggle over how the district should handle questions of accountability.
Haneline maintains she is upholding her duty to the public, while Ward-Cooper portrays her actions as harassment of the superintendent’s new team.
The two sharply different characterizations — “defensiveness, anger, personal attacks, vitriol” from Haneline’s perspective, and “chasing rabbits, overbearing demands, deceitful, insolent behavior” from Ward-Cooper’s side — reveal a board divided not only on policy, but on how its members should treat each other.
