By Ben Velderman
EAGnews.org

MEDINA, Ohio – Here’s a story worthy of the “man bites dog” file.

Ohio’s Medina City School District is beset with deep financial problems, and for once, the local teachers union – not the local school board – is emerging as the community’s voice of reason.

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Earlier this year, taxpayers were stunned to learn that the school board had given Superintendent Randy Stepp an $83,000 bonus when he agreed to a new five-year contract in January. The bonus was seen as excessive for the cash-strapped district, which has made significant budget cuts in recent years.

The Medina community became even more upset when it learned a short time later that Stepp’s earlier contracts helped pay off his student loans, which totaled more than a quarter-million dollars, reports The Medina County Gazette.

The controversy forced two board members to leave office, and another has announced he won’t seek re-election in November.

However, the two remaining board members aren’t up for election until 2015, and they don’t appear inclined to leave early.

That means this controversy is still brewing, and it’s threatening the district’s upcoming levy request, in which Medina taxpayers will be asked to approve $6.6 million in new school taxes.

School leaders say those additional funds are crucial for the district’s operations. Without the levy, they say they’ll have to cut school athletic programs, close an elementary school and make other drastic changes to how the district operates.

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Leaders of the Medina City Teachers Association, the local teachers union, want the levy to pass. That’s why they want all school board members who gave Stepp his ticket aboard the taxpayer-gravy train to resign, so taxpayers can focus on the merits of the levy, instead of the board’s mishandling of school money.

MCTA members approved a resolution of “no confidence” in the board and Stepp in March, and refused to rescind that vote during a meeting earlier this week.

“If those board members staying on increases the chances of us losing neighborhood schools, that’s where the teachers are concerned,” MCTA President John Leatherman told Gazette.

The district’s levy faced long odds even before the pay controversy came to light. Medina taxpayers rejected a levy request last November, marking the fifth consecutive time a request for additional K-12 funding had failed, reports Cleveland.com.

If the new  levy is needed to preserve the integrity of school operations – as nearly everyone claims – then the MCTA is wise to pressure the two remaining school board members to put the children’s academic needs ahead of their personal interests.

Like we said earlier, it’s a strange situation over in Medina, Ohio.