Brett J. Vickers                       
Jan-21-93 12:08PM
News update: Creation/Evolution controversy

From LA Times 1/21/93:

BIBLES AND THE BOARD -- A SKIRMISH BREWING
By Micahel Granberry

   VISTA, Calif. -- At Allen's Alley Cafe, the noontime conversation
these days often turns to a hot topic: The city's school board,
whose new members make up what many call a right-wing, Bible-beating
majority bent on change.

   Skeptical parents envision a new era in which sex education classes
serve as pulpits for preaching against abortion, and science courses
teach that God created Earth in seven days.

   They fear that the new board will censor books, cancel programs for
immigrant children, try to impose school prayer, oppose racial
integration and abolish school-breakfast, self-esteen and drug-abuse
programs, which conservatives view as government's encroachment on
"family values."

   In this inland community of 76,000 in north San Diego County, where
the biggest civic boast is having "the best weather in America," the
controversy is nastier than anything that may have ever happened
here.

   Susie Lange, spokeswoman for the state Department on Education,
said California officials are "keeping a close eye" on events in
Vista, where a right-wing coalition campaigned aggressively last fall
and seized a school board majority -- three of five seats.

   Other school districts in California have seen conservatives running
strong campaigns in recent years, but not going so far as to actually
take control of a school board.  "In that respect," Lange said, "Vista
is unique.  They actually achieved the majority."

   After a campaign aimed at getting out the vote at the city's
churches, Joyce Lee and John Tyndall [an ICR member -bv] easily
ousted moderate incumbents Lance Vollmer and Marcia Moore, joining
fellow fundamentalist Deidre Holliday to form the majority whose
newfound power is alarming to many.

   The first skirmish is expected tonight, when the board will consider
two agenda items, both so controversial that the meeting has been
moved from the offices of the Vigsta Unified School District to one
of the city's larger auditoriums.

   At the request of a marine biologist concerned about the new members'
ideology, the board will air its views on creationism -- but only as
a discussion item.  [I wonder if this marine biologist is Steve
Linke, a past participant in t.o who works at Scripps in San Diego. -bv.]
It plans to vote, however, on the hiring of four new attorneys, which
has plenty of people worried and a few enraged.

   Poppy Dennis, head of The Community Coalition Network, a liberal
group formed to counter the growing fundamentalist education movement,
said the lawyers -- all of whom champion such conservative causes as
the anti-abortion effort led by Operation Rescue -- are being sought
for a reason.

   "Why would you put on the district payroll attorneys whose role
has been to sue schools on behalf of various right-wing causes?"
she asked.

   She predicted that the agenda of the new members will result in
lawsuits, whether they are in response to the reinstitution of school
prayer, the dismantling of bilingual and sex-education programs or
the teaching of creationism.  "And when such suits result," Dennis
said, "the new members will want to make sure they have the right
lawyers arguing for them."

   The conservatives, for their part, said they are not trying to push
creationism in the classroom but indicate they will seek sweeping
changes on other fronts.

   To many in the community, though, such change is long overdue.

   "Lately, we've been indoctrinating our kids more than teaching
them," said satellite television dealer Morris Saracino.  "The
reason Johnny can't read is that we're so concerned with doing things
the politically correct way that we've forgotten to teach him how
to read and write, and to think for himself."

   "In my opinion, the older members on the board are overreacting
to the newer members," retired businessman Donald Graham, 68, said
over chicken-fried steak and cream gravy at Allen's Alley Cafe.
"The new members haven't caused any trouble -- yet."

   The Vista Teachers Assn. bitterly opposed the election of the
new members.  Tom Conry, its president, cites litigation as a chief
concern, in an economy and a school district where money is hard to
come by.

   That has the state worred as well.

   "If nothing else, the hiring of those attorneys should bother that
community greatly," said Lange, the education official.  "When citizens
see the board hiring four attorneys, and kids are going without books
and roofs are leaking, somebody has questions to answer."

   New member Lee, who often carries her Bible with her and quotes
from it freely, accuses the teachers association and some parents of
"whipping up hysteria."

   Lee said teachers and parents are "overreacting," and that she and
her colleagues have no intention of ordering the teaching of
creationism.

   "They should all feel pretty secure with the precedent set in at
least three court cases, saying you can't put creationism in a
science classroom on equal footing with evolution," said board
President Holliday, a member of the Christian majority.  "Do I
support this idea?  I abide by the law and court decisions."

   Asked about sex education and immigration issues, however, Holliday
declined to comment.  Lee has publicly stated that she prefers a
return to prayer in the schools and an end to the breakfast program
for underprivileged students.

   As for teaching children of illegal immigrants, Lee recently told
a Vista newspaper: "If you're going to cut the school budget, cut those
who aren't American."

   Regardless of the board's intentions, the debate has stirred furor
and plenty of fear.

   "All we hear about is that they want to make us pray in school
and that they want to ban books," said Louie Archuleta, 17, a senior
at Rancho Buena Vista High School.

   "They've already started banning books," said Mat Price, a 15-year
old sophomore at the same school, claiming that Maya Angelou's
autobiography, "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" and the Harper Lee
novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" have been removed from school shelves
because of sexually explicit scenes.

   School officials deny the assertion, but parents such as Poppy
Dennis fear a kind of "self-censorship" will result as teachers
adjust to the new political climate.

   Max Friedlander, owner of the Book Deli, a popular bookstore,
has heard of the threat to ban books and calls it stupid, a word he
also applies to the ongoing debate.  He blames fear and mounting
problems of gangs and drugs in a community "that's growing too
fast" for igniting support for the so-called religious majority.

   "Regardless of where you sit politically," he said, "people
around here are just scared, and that's at the root of the problem."

   At the cafe, retiree Graham blames the school battle on "a
radical transformation.  This little, rural, farming village
suddenly feels overpopulated -- and scared.  A lot of people don't
understand why Vista, of all places, has such big, urban problems."

   "As a result, you have a battle over the school system, and
it won't end soon."