The Kenosha School Board often times gets called upon to discipline students, but last night board members addressed one of their own.
It started out sounding like a routine meeting, but it was anything but for the board’s youngest member, 19-year-old Kyle Flood.
Members of the audience chided Flood: “those events are incompatible with serving as a school board member, and I think you should step down.”
Stay informed on the latest news
Sign up for WPR’s email newsletter.
The “events” include Flood getting cited for having marijuana pipes in his UW-Parkside dorm room, and a more recent disclosure of involvement in a New Year’s Eve dorm room vandalism. Doors were damaged and walls were drawn on. In a police report, Flood minimizes his role, but some of his drunken antics are now memorialized in an embarrassing cell phone video that’s out in public.
When it was his turn to speak, Flood rebuffed calls for his resignation. “I just, first, want to say that I sincerely apologize for everything that has occurred recently,” he said. “I have taken responsibility for my actions and will continue to do so.”
Most of his fellow board members, like board president Rebecca Stevens, were sympathetic.
“None of us here are perfect. We all make mistakes,” Stevens said. “I don’t know all the details yet with Kyle’s situation, but I know that he’s going to handle it and we’re going to move forward in a positive direction.”
The board eventually voted to censure Flood, a symbolic move, then went on to tend to the rest of the night’s business.
Wisconsin Public Radio, © Copyright 2024, Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System and Wisconsin Educational Communications Board.
