Iowa City school board appoints former member

IOWA CITY - Iowa City school board members Monday night picked a former board member to serve alongside them for a partial term.

The board voted 6-0 to appoint Orville Townsend Sr., of Iowa City, to a recently vacated seat that will be up for election in September 2015. He was among nine applicants for the position and will be sworn in at Tuesday's meeting.

'I'm a firm believer in family, so I feel like I've been adopted,” he said.

Townsend was on the school board from 1986 to 1989 and currently is a member of Iowa City's Human Rights Commission, which has been especially active on racial, immigrant and housing issues.

Townsend will take the spot of Sally Hoelscher, who was president of the school board when she resigned last month for undisclosed personal reasons. The board chose to appoint someone rather than hold a special election.

In selecting Townsend, board members said his past experience on the board was important because he could quickly get up to speed.

A few board members also said they wanted someone not affiliated with factions in the community that advocate strongly for their interests. Divisions have been evident in recent years during school boundary and diversity debates, among other issues, in a school district that covers five towns.

'Unfortunately, given the state of the district, I think we need to find someone coming in with a state of neutrality,” said board member Jeff McGinness, adding that Townsend was the only applicant he would support.

Townsend becomes the second person of color on the school board, joining Tuyet Dorau, and is the first black board member since Michael Shaw in 2011.

Townsend mentioned his race in an interview with reporters but said he will represent everyone in the district.

He said he will listen to the public but also will be honest with them. The district has confronted many contentious issues of late, including the current discussion over redrawing school boundaries.

'Change is very difficult, and we just react to it automatically,” Townsend said.

He also repeatedly mentioned the importance of considering students, teachers and staff when making board decisions. Townsend also said he will not run in the 2015 school election, another key factor for some of the school board members who said they did not want to give a candidate an advantage.

The other applicants where Thomas Simmons, Phil Hemingway, Karla Cook, Brian Richman and Jason Lewis, all of Iowa City; Angela Pitkin and John Weihe of Coralville; and Ron Conner of North Liberty.