January 12, 2005
Ms. Connie Kitchens
Ms. LaToya Walker
Clayton County Board of Education
1058 Fifth Avenue
Jonesboro, Georgia 30236
Dear Ms. Kitchens and Ms. Walker:
Words cannot express the profound amazement that I have for your most
recent antics on the school board. For all the hope, proclamations, ballyhoo, and prayers for unity, as soon as the amens
were uttered, you two commenced to attack your fellow school board members, Allen Johnson and Eddie White in particular. Mr.
White had not even warmed his seat well before you questioned his experience. Experience? Mr. White served as an educator
in the Clayton County Schools for nearly 40 years, the last twenty or so as an administrator. (I might add that when I arrived
in Clayton County in 1982, Mr. White was the only African-American administrator in the county.) I’ve known Mr. White
for over twenty years, and he is a man of impeccable character and sterling credentials as an educator. To attack him in his
first meeting as a school board member is unconscionable. The same holds true for Allen Johnson. Mr. Johnson was a career
educator in this county, spending the last twenty-plus years as principal of Lake City Elementary School. To question his
capabilities in a public meeting is not only an abject cruelty but also politically stupid. I’ve known Mr. Johnson for
nearly twenty years, and I know him to be a gentleman and a scholar. He wouldn’t hurt a flea. He showed his mettle by
refusing to respond in kind to your galling attacks.
The real losers (besides the children and teachers) in your crass
attacks are you two. You obviously don’t see the dearth of your political judgment. Your former colleagues, Nedra Ware
and Carol Kellum, suffered ignoble defeats in this last election season, garnering 25.5% and 26.5% of the voters respectively.
Their humiliating rejection by the Clayton County voters hasn’t seemed to register on your myopic political minds. I
haven’t engaged in a conversation with either of you in nearly two years. Like others, I stand on the sidelines and
never cease to be flabbergasted at your imbecilic actions. You could do yourselves a favor and you would definitely do the
Clayton County citizens a favor if you would simply resign from the Clayton County Board of Education. I publicly called for
your resignations in early Spring of 2003. Now, in this Winter of your continued discontent, I ask you again to simply resign.
We, the citizens of Clayton County, have already resigned in our minds that your intemperate ways will never cease. There
is no merit in "acting the fool" per se. Some say that I can "act the fool" better than anyone Georgia. I don’t disagree.
But, I "act the fool" toward what I believe in my heart is injustice, not to simply embarrass two distinguished gentlemen
in a foolhardy, selfish, and hopeless attempt to browbeat colleagues into voting for me to be chairman or vice chairman of
a school board.
Your most recent antics would be laughable if they weren’t so
sad.
Sincerely,
John R. A. Trotter, Ed.D.,J.D.
