A Catchall Place for Publications About Cindy Byrd vs Epic Schools

[claireokc]

Date - approximately the spring, 2022 before the Primary Election June 28th.

There were a lot of hooplas this spring - right before the Primary (June 28) about Governor Stitt ordering a financial investigation into Epic Schools. Cindy Byrd, the state auditor, can be ordered by two authorities in the state to start an audit: the Governor and the State AG. So she was completing a task ordered by the Governor - all legit.

The upshot was that through the audit, Byrd discovered in her findings that her opponent was being financed by funds from Epic Schools - and weren't schools supposed to be teaching rather than contributing to who's running for state auditor? Well, the plot gets thicker, and through a variety of online posts and letters, this tracks what happened.

First, Bob Linn with OCPAC had a speaker who through innuendo and indirect assumptions asserted a connection between some illegal maneuverings with the health department. To be honest, I wasn't there at OCPAC that day so I'm only privy to the report that came from the OCPAC meeting. As time grew on, several folks, including Cathy Costello, widow of former Oklahoma Labor Commissioner, Mark Costello, voiced her objections to Bob Linn's attack on Cindy Byrd.

That started a whole back and forth involving OCPAC emails to members and Ignite Liberty with "the other side". Then an outright fairly even-handed report on Byrd and Linn and what was the disagreement between the two. Cindy Byrd was finally asked to speak at OCPAC which I thought was very good of Bob Linn, and as time wore on, turned out to be particularly epic (no pun - really!), in light of the results of the report that she released.

The Result: Byrd's opponent withdrew from the race three days before the primary on June 28th. So Byrd won as there was no opponent, but then she also won by a landslide (anything over 60% is considered a landslide with Byrd getting 70% of the vote), as certain folks hadn't gotten the message and absentee ballots had already been sent in. As there is no opponent for the General on November 8, Byrd is effectively re-elected.

[claireokc]

Epic Charter Schools are the gift that keeps on giving...or probably more like it keeps getting worse than we thought. After the debate, in which Stitt's opponent made the point that schools and education in Oklahoma are the worst in the country - I guess thinking that this was Stitt's problem and not the head of public education in the state. The thought may not have occurred to her who was the last Superintendent of Public Instruction - it was HER!

So I pick up this blurb from Stitt's campaign site that has some other interesting factoids that also explain Stitt's opponent that's worth the read.

Enjoy the read!