When voters head to the polls in Hamilton County, the school board candidates won’t be listed as Republican or Democrat. But politics have once again played a role in these elections.
Some conservative candidates are identifying themselves as Republicans, and whole slates of candidates are backed by political PACs or the countywide Republican Party.
School board elections are officially nonpartisan across Indiana, but since the COVID-19 pandemic, Hamilton County’s school board elections have become a battleground for partisan politics. This year those same battles are playing out in school board races for both Carmel and Hamilton Southeastern schools.
In Carmel, the countywide Republican party and a conservative PAC have endorsed Dina Ferchmin and Robin Clark. Kristina Wheeler and Jon Shapiro are running on an opposing slate.
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In the race for three open seats on the Hamilton Southeastern Schools Board, Greg Lannan, John Stewart and Terry Tolle are endorsed by the conservative group Fishers One. They face three candidates, who are not running as a slate, in Latrica Schooley, Sarah Parks-Reese and Suzanne Thomas.
Laura Merrifield Wilson, an associate professor of political science at the University of Indianapolis, said she is not surprised by how party politics are impacting Hamilton County’s school board races.
“It's the conservative candidates that are banding together and proudly adopting and utilizing the conservative label,” she said. “I do feel like in Indiana that makes sense due to the statewide dominance of the Republican Party.”
When did politics enter the school board room in Hamilton County?
Terry Spradlin, executive director of the Indiana School Boards Association, remembers the heated debates at school board meetings that began over COVID-19 policies but turned to arguments over social issues.
“It was not favorable,” he said. “Individuals and groups came to board meetings with the intent to disrupt in a variety of ways, with chanting, threatening behavior and even chasing school board members out to their cars.”
Then in 2022, Attorney General Todd Rokita and U.S. Sens. Mike Braun and Todd Young endorsed school board candidates, including in Carmel, a practice that had been unheard of. So did the Hamilton County Republican party.
At the Statehouse the following year, lawmakers pushed legislation, which ultimately did not pass, that would have turned school board elections into partisan races, requiring candidates to indicate their political party on the ballot.
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Spradlin and the nonpartisan Indiana School Board Association heavily advocated against this legislation. He is pleased that similar bills were not filed in the most recent legislative session.
Now, Spradlin is satisfied with how things stand, even as politics still play a role in some school board elections.
“We have found a sweet spot,” he said. “In certain school communities where party affiliations are important, candidates can self-declare without being forced to do so on the ballot, and elected officials can endorse if they want to. It’s more of the exception than the rule.”
How do the local political parties handle school board races in Hamilton County?
Mario Massillamany, chairman of the Hamilton County Republican Party, said his party only weighs in on school board races where he feels there are conservative and liberal candidates competing against each other.
The party started to get more involved in school board races three years ago when Massillamany became chair because he believed Democrats were holding school board positions in a partisan way in the county.
“Out of fairness, I wanted to try and give an opportunity for Republican and conservative candidates to learn what the process is for running, understand a little bit more about the school board and then teach them how to run races and how to effectively message those races,” he said.
Jocelyn Vare, the chair of the Hamilton County Democratic Party, pushed backed against the assertion that Democrats in the county had brought politics into the school board room.
“You are going to have a very hard time convincing me that there were school board members in the past who were acting out of political agendas or motivations,” Vare said. “That did not happen.”
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The local Democratic and Republican parties differ in their official approaches when it comes to donating to and officially endorsing candidates in school board races.
“We honor the nonpartisan nature of these races, so we are committed to be sure these races are nonpartisan, and that means the Hamilton County Democratic Party does not provide funding to school board candidates, nor do we make endorsements for school board candidates,” said Vare.
The Democratic party does assist school board candidates in reaching Democratic voters if the candidates reach out and feel their values might resonate with Democrats in the county, Vare said.
Her party also assists school board candidates if they have technical questions about the election, such as which campaign materials need disclaimers for who paid for it, Vare said. She is frustrated with the politicization of school board races in the county, pointing specifically to the statewide Republican party funding a mailer sent to voters in Fishers.
“This is not how school board elections are supposed to be approached at all," she said, "and it certainly does not give voters confidence that candidates are going to serve in a nonpolitical way if they're elected."
PACs get involved in Carmel race
In addition to the parties getting involved, various groups have created PACs to throw their weight behind candidates across Hamilton County.
In Carmel, Ferchmin and Clark are endorsed by Carmel Excellence, which supports “common-sense conservative school board leaders.” The other two candidates, Wheeler and Shapiro, are endorsed by Support CCS, which is a “nonpartisan” group, according to its website.
Support CCS has raised about $65,000 since Jan. 1, while Carmel Excellence has raised about $24,000. That group is supported by current conservative-leaning board member Greg Brown, who was elected in 2022.
The candidates supported by Carmel Excellence are outraising their opponents, with Ferchmin leading the way at about $35,000 in contributions since the start of the year, followed by Clark with about $22,500. Shapiro has raised about $16,500, while Wheeler has raised close to $12,000.
Elected officials and other candidates have gotten involved in the Carmel school board election as well, campaign finance reports filed with the county elections administrator show.
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Longtime Republican state Rep. Jerry Torr, Republican Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita and Republican U.S. Rep. Victoria Spartz each made separate $500 contributions to support the Clark and Ferchmin campaigns.
Spartz sponsored a meet and greet event for Clark and Ferchmin earlier this month at a Carmel neighborhood clubhouse, and the event was advertised on the Hamilton County Republican Party's website.
Republican Carmel city councilors Rich Taylor and Matt Snyder donated about $150 and $500 each to Clark’s campaign, while Hamilton County Commissioner Steve Dillinger contributed $500 to Ferchmin.
Support for the other two candidates are more of a mixed bag, perhaps a testament to their attempts to paint themselves as apolitical.
Miles Nelson, who unsuccessfully ran for mayor of Carmel as a Democrat last year, and Anita Joshi, the only Democrat currently on the Carmel City Council, donated $100 and $250 each to Shapiro’s campaign. But Shapiro and Wheeler are also endorsed by former Carmel Republican Mayor Jim Brainard.
Some candidates embrace party identity during school board election debates
The candidates themselves have tried to use the debate stage to signal to voters where they stand on politics — and where they think their opponents stand.
During a debate hosted by Current in Carmel at the end of September, Wheeler accused Ferchmin and Clark of not being moderates, the type of candidate that Carmel typically elects, while Ferchmin accused Wheeler and Shapiro of being Democrats.
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Wheeler answered back that she and Shapiro have been supported by moderate Republicans in the community, while Ferchmin said she has been transparent about her conservative beliefs.
“Thankfully, there's no political party or interest group that has any control over me," Ferchmin said. "And I have no political aspirations other than being on the school board."
Shapiro answered Ferchmin's accusations that he is a Democrat by stating that he wouldn’t try to hide who he has supported in the past, but that he looks at candidates as individuals and doesn’t always vote along party lines.
“School board is nonpartisan,” Shapiro said. “It means we come to the table, and we put that stuff to the side.”
Conservative candidates for HSE board lean into party politics
Candidates for the Hamilton Southeastern Schools Board got into similar spats on the debate stage when questions about politics in the school board room were asked of them.
Lannan, Stewart and Tolle, are endorsed by the conservative group Fishers One. The group emphasizes a desire to get back to “traditional education standards” and says it wants to minimize distractions attributed to non-core curriculum programs, according to its website.
All four candidates endorsed by the group in 2022 went on to win their elections and are currently serving four-year terms on the board.
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Campaign finance records filed with Hamilton County show the candidates backed by Fishers One are outraising their opponents by thousands of dollars this year. Lannan has raised about $35,000 in contributions this year, while Stewart is at about $27,000 and Tolle is at about $10,000.
Records from the county show Thomas, a realtor who has served on the board since 2020 and is running once again for the Fall Creek Township seat, has raised about $4,000 in contributions this year. Parks-Reese has raised about $8,400, while Schooley recieved about $8,000.
The conservatives running for HSE school board have leaned into their conservative stances.
“I’m not going to hide the fact that I’m a Republican,” said lannan, who is running for the district’s Delaware Township seat, during a debate hosted by Current in Fishers and WFYI earlier this month.
“This is a nonpartisan race, but we are all political animals by nature,” Lannan said. “We all vote a certain way. It doesn’t mean that has to enter into the school board decision making.”
John Stewart, who is running for the school board’s Wayne Township seat as a conservative tried to label his opponent a Democrat, noting Sarah Parks-Reese campaigned at an event at Britton Falls, a 55-and-older neighborhood in Fishers, that Jennifer McCormick spoke at earlier this year.
“First of all, we all aren’t political animals,” Parks-Reese said. “We cannot allow partisan agendas to influence board decisions. Board members must keep students at the center of all decisions and we have to base those decisions on data and research.”
Parks-Reese pushed back against Stewart trying to label her with a party affiliation and said that all the HSE school board candidates were invited to the event which McCormick attended.
Latrica Schooley, who is running against Lannan for the Delaware Township seat, emphasized during the debate that the school board room needs to be nonpartisan.
“To be nonpartisan that means that you have to be willing to listen to other people, that you have to be willing to collaborate with other people,” she said. “Having been on professional boards, I have had to collaborate with people who thought differently than me."
For Merrifield Wilson, the associate professor of political science at the University of Indianapolis, the conversation around the role of politics in school board races is expected to continue beyond the Nov. 5 election.
"There are people that believe these races should be partisan, and recognize it may benefit the voter by easing the decision making in these races," she said. "There's also pushback. It'll be a topic of continued conversation.”
IndyStar reporter John Tuohy contributed to this article.
Contact Jake Allen at jake.allen@indystar.com. Follow him on Twitter @Jake_Allen19.