(Geronimo) — School Board President Dr. Greg Gilcrease came under attack during Wednesday night’s meeting of the Navarro ISD Board of Trustees.
During the public comments portion of the agenda, several members of the community not only spoke on the lack of transparency used by Gilcrease and the rest of the board in filling a pair of board vacancies, but they also accused him of not living where he says he lives.
The comments came minutes before the school board moved forward with administering the oath of office to its newly appointed trustees Tracy Large and Melissa Sartain. The board was forced to fill the positions after the top vote getter in the Nov. 3 school board election, Katherine Ewald, officially declined the position. The second vacancy was that of Rick Martin, who died in October. Instead of appointing the candidate who appeared next in line in the election, the board opted to fill the third available spot by choosing from a pool of resumes.
Sharing his thoughts on this route was Weldon Dietze, the Nov. 3 candidate who came in fourth and who drew 300 plus more votes than Large who was an incumbent at the time and who again, was welcomed back as one of the newly appointed trustees. Dietze says public perception of how the board chose to fill the seat was “not good.” He says the people clearly spoke during the election and would have hoped that the district would have listened. Dietze says his words are not about being a sore loser but more about the lack of transparency throughout the whole process.
“If they were sincerely looking for the best candidates for the position, they would as they said they were going to, they would take the resumes, they would conduct their interviews and they would appoint the best people. The fact that they forewent the interview process and just selected the two people they chose, is an indication that they are not sincere in their choices and if you look further and you look at the two people that they did select, it is even more evident,” said Dietze.
Dietze says allowing for an interview process was among the information that was publicly shared and provided to Seguin Radio KWED by Navarro ISD Communications Officer Whitney Magness.
However, according to Gilcrease, that information supplied by Magness was wrong.
“Unfortunately, that was not what we spoke. The communications director put that in there. We had always intended to receive resumes and select from there,” said Gilcrease.
Now all the district has, according to Dietze, is a candidate who was essentially “voted out” by the public and another trustee who is reportedly “a friend” of those on the board.
Demanding Gilcrease’s immediate removal from the school board was Chris Gosch. Gosch says questions on transparency and his handling of the school board appointments led him to further investigate rumors of Gilcrease’s residency within the district.
“From Guadalupe County that he had his voter registration card as 605 Thormeyer Road, Seguin, Texas. It was that way through at least through August 25, 2020. As an elected person for the school district, he has to maintain residence inside the school district. That 605 Thormeyer Road sold May 2, 2018 prior to his reappointment then. That is a felony as far as we know. I started hearing rumors that he did not live in the district. School Board member Clint Scheib had told me that previously. They did not live in the school district. They, in fact, lived in San Marcos. His dentist office is in San Marcos. He owns a property, according to tax records in Comal County and I believe his mom has a property in Hays County or vice versa. Both of those are public knowledge as well. When I followed up with Clint, he had told me that ‘no, I’m pretty sure he lives in San Marcos.’ That’s illegal and nothing was done about it. It was after August 25, that Dr. Gilcrease changed his voter registration. That’s public information that we found. He changed it to 9292 Highway 123. It’s the campground there just north of town. It’s spot #4, second one on the left. He maintains that with the school also and he has not resided there,” said Gosch.
Gosch says he has obtained firsthand knowledge that Gilcrease has not been living in the RV park as stated.
“I have followed him for at least for 20 days, evenings — as late as 2 (or) 3 o’clock in the morning to see if anyone is there and he’s not been there one single time.
Anyone else in our school district, if they were to abide by the same rules and principles, Mr. (Luke) Morales (deputy superintendent) would kindly ask them to leave the school district. I think the same standard needs to be applied to our school board trustee, the president,” said Gosch.
Gosch says he has zero confidence in the board right now and can no longer ignore the lack of leadership he believes Gilcrease is demonstrating.
“I had put it to rest and then with these appointments, obviously, you can see the results of the election. They want to put Mr. Large. I don’t have anything against Tracy. In fact, I think if they put him in the second spot, that might be okay but to come out of the blue and just appoint Mrs. Melissa Sartain who no one really knows much about versus Weldon or whoever took that fourth-place spot. We are not here to bash the board and we are not trying to get one particular person in. We just want what the community wanted, and 1,700 votes cast, fell for that fourth-place spot. Katherine Ewald took the first-place spot. She is not here this evening. She moved her kids out of the district in light of some of the things that are going here and when she moved them, she obviously still has a house here. She lives on a lake, but she lives full-time at least four days a week so that she can put her kids in Alamo Heights. If she wanted to do the same thing, she would probably have more legal grounds to do so than Dr. Gilcrease. She could come out, stay three days at the lake, take her kids back to school at Alamo Heights but she chose to do the upstanding thing. We have a person in there right now that is not doing the upstanding thing,” said Gosch.
Following the meeting, Gilcrease defended his current living situation as well as the board’s process in filling the two available seats. He says as for his home, he currently resides at the Geronimo RV Park on State Highway 123 North just south of the Grain Bin.
“I do have an RV and I do stay there. It’s not my only place that I stay. I am a single guy who sometimes I have to stay with mom. Sometimes, I stay out at our family’s lake house, but I do stay there. That’s the only residence I actually own. I don’t have a house other than that,” said Gilcrease.
Gilcrease says questions about his residency may have begun when he got divorced in May 2018 and when his former home on Thormeyer Road was sold later that month. He says it was soon after that, that he purchased his RV and has called it home ever since.
As for never being home as Gosch pointed out, Gilcrease stated “them and I were just not there at the same night.”
As for the appointments to the school board, Gilcrease says the district simply did what it thought was best.
“A lot of it is the cost of an election, cost of having a special election. This district is constantly, we are battling our finances and we thought it was in the best interest in the district to appoint. That’s how we have done it in the past. We’ve done that a couple of other times since I’ve been on the board,” said Gilcrease.
Despite some of the public’s criticisms of the board’s handling of the board appointments, and its suggestions to hold off on the swearing in ceremony, the school board still followed through with administering the oath of office to its new trustees Wednesday night.
Gosch says he’s not surprised.
“It’s what we expected with this board. The absolute lack of transparency. The lack of what the community truly wants. They are keep talking about a large bond issue that they are going to have to pass for Navarro based on the growth. I think they are just trying to get people in to push that bond forward and whatever their agenda is – not what the community truly wants,” said Gosch.
Among those also speaking was Eric McCaig. McCaig stated that he too was disappointed in the school board’s leadership. He said its transparency is shady and secret and believes it is the board’s disregard for the public that has caused the community to be concerned and divided.