Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Sam.
[00:00:27] Speaker B: Well, welcome everybody, to another edition of Unbolted. I'm MJ Bolt. I am your host. And with us today we have Brandon Arthur, who is a candidate for the Central Valley School Board Director, position two. Brandon, thanks for being with us today.
[00:00:44] Speaker A: Yeah, thanks for having me. This is great. I appreciate it.
[00:00:47] Speaker B: You bet. Yeah, I like to. I've kind of been doing this for about a year now where we highlight the candidates that are recommended candidates by the Spokane county gop, which you are. Congratulations. And this way, too, you kind of get out there and we get more people that gets to know you and understand, you know, why you're running and what your positions are. So I really like doing this for our citizens so that they can, you know, can become a better informed voter. So, yeah, thanks for doing this. Let's, let's hop into it. So, Brandon, tell us about yourself, your background, how did you get to here and why you're running. What motivated you to run for the school board?
[00:01:33] Speaker A: Yeah, no, thanks for having me. And so I've been out just doorbelling, knocking on doors, trying to get to meet the community and introduce myself and let them know who I am and why I'm running. But this obviously is going to hit a wide variety of people, so I really appreciate the opportunity.
I got involved. I'm a parent. That's up front. That's foremost. I'm a parent. I've got a daughter who's in elementary school, and that's why I got involved. I started going to board meetings initially last year around some of the title 9 Issues to Talk about how I disagree with allowing boys to play in girls sports. Sports, not. I don't want to allow boys to be in girls bathrooms and locker rooms. That's, that's really kind of the tip of the iceberg, how I got involved from the very beginning.
From there, it just, it grew, right? I, I learned that this position number two was going to be open and I could run for it. And I live in District 2 and I thought if I'm going to go and speak about Title 9 and parents rights, I probably should run so I can be kind of the, the tip of the spear for all of this.
You know, obviously there's a lot of hot button topics. We talk about Title 9. That's what first got me involved in all this. But really it's about parents rights as well. You know, we talk about House Bill 1296, which peeled back, or seems to have peeled back a lot of the parental rights that, that we had.
I want, I Want to combat that? I want to, I want this to be a topic that is on the forefront because the parents are really the backbone of raising kids and, and getting kids where they need to be, not only academically, but like being, when they, when they finish school in our school district, they're going to be volunteer, viable members of society.
So parents are everything. And I say parents, but I also mean family. I know there's children out there who, you know, maybe they don't have. Their parents are being raised by their family members. So it's really parents and family.
[00:03:45] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, for sure. Those are such important topics. And I think, you know, when I ran for school board, the school board races were not as visible or not as contentious, you know, or competitive as they are now. And so I think it's what you just outlined there and we'll have more time to talk, get into those a little bit. Are so important to people right now. So appreciate you running because it is a sacrifice. You're not getting paid big bucks, you know, by any means.
So you are, you know, going to help not just your student, but also the rest of the students in the school district and also be a representative of the citizen and the parent voice on that board, you know, as you make decisions. So again, I really appreciate that you stepped up and did this because I'm sure there's other things that you can be busy with. You're a businessman too, right, Brandon?
[00:04:40] Speaker A: Yeah, so my day to day job, I'm a pharmacist, but I'm also a local business owner. So I own a real estate company, actually two of them.
One that primarily focuses on rental properties and rental management and the other that focuses on wholesales as well as home renovations and resales.
[00:05:00] Speaker B: Nice, nice. And so. And you really haven't been political before, right? Is this kind of your first getting.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: Not at all.
This is the first. And I, you know, going into running for the school board, I didn't realize just how politically charged it can be and how much work has to go into just getting elected to be on the school board. I thought it would be a lot less rigorous process, let's just put it that way.
[00:05:32] Speaker B: Yeah, like I said, it's changed a lot since I ran. I think it was 2011. It has changed a lot since then. And so, yes, much more rigorous, much more involved. It is not for the faint of heart.
So again, thank you for doing this. What is your vision for the school district?
[00:05:51] Speaker A: Yeah, that's a good question.
When I.
So I graduated high school 20 years ago, I was in District 81. I graduated from North Central.
And when I thought about school districts like Central Valley and when I thought about school districts like Mead, I always thought, man, those, those are the good school districts. Those are the great ones.
I think that, that, that recognition is still there, but to a lesser extent. So what I envision, like my vision for Central Valley School District would honestly be that they're recognized as the best school district in eastern Washington, if not the entire state. They talk about like, okay, well, he recognizes the best. What does that really mean?
It probably means, and it definitely means strong academics, which means good test scores. So we need to look test scores both on the state and national level. How do we improve those strong athletics, which I believe Central Valley has, but we need to continue and a commitment to involve parents every step of the way. Because those two things, athletics and academics, do not come without parents being involved. Because not everything is going to happen, you know, from 8am to 3pm during the school day. It happens in the morning before school and it certainly happens in the evening after school. And it needs the parents to be involved, parents and family to be involved in everything that their kids are doing.
[00:07:27] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Strong parent involvement is critical to every child's success and also to a stronger school district, quite honestly. So, Brandon, why do you believe people should vote for you over your opponent in this race?
[00:07:43] Speaker A: Yeah, no, that's a good question. So I am running against one other person and I believe you should vote for me for many reasons. The most important is that I am a father with a daughter in the district. My opponent does not have that.
He doesn't have any children in the school district. Currently I do. So I think that's very important. I've got, you know, just more skin in the game. My daughter is going to be in this district for the next probably 12 to 13 years. She's in kindergarten. Right. So this is. I'm in it for the long haul.
I will fight for what is right and what makes sense. You know, as you, you know, as you mentioned before, this is, you know, I'm not in this for the money. This is a voluntary position. I, I want to do what's right, and if I think something's not right, I'm going to fight for it. I don't know if my opponent will do that. From my research, I can't really tell where he lands on a lot of the very important issues that are facing our district today, including the title nine issues, including parental rights. I can't tell if you Go to his website.
There's nothing there that's going to say one way or another. And, and that, that scares me, quite frankly.
If someone can't take a stand on what they believe in, I don't know that I'd want to vote for them. So that's why I think I'm the person you should vote for.
I'm a problem solver. I understand there is almost never a silver bullet to answer any given issue or question.
And so I always seek to understand and just make the most common sense recommendation or vote as things come up.
[00:09:31] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, that's really good. And it is important. We can't, you know, what you itemize there is ultra important right now because you do have to have courage to make a stand. And we see school districts making a stand against some of the policies, you know, that are trying to be pushed down from the state.
And Central Valley has been one of those. They've signed on to resolutions.
Are you, how do you feel about some of that? I mean, is that something that you hope to continue to do or are you more. Oh, let's just let the state make the decisions for our school board?
[00:10:07] Speaker A: No, I think the school. So if we just think about what am I doing? I'm running for the school board for Central Valley.
So if I'm, if I'm running and we're going to put this on the ballot and we're going to have folks vote for me or someone else, that means that we are essentially governing ourselves. Right? We, we have a board to govern Central Valley School District.
Why in the world would we just rubber stamp everything that comes from the state? If that's the case, then we don't need a school board anymore. We would just take everything that came from Olympia and go from there, which is not the way I want things to go. So. Absolutely, this is the board that the, the Central Valley folks are going to vote on and it's hopefully the board, the board that is going to make the right decisions for the kids in this community.
[00:11:01] Speaker B: Yeah, very important.
So, and you've, you've already touched on a couple of these, Brandon, but maybe you can elaborate a little more. What are your top priorities for the school district?
[00:11:15] Speaker A: Number well, number one, we got to get parents more involved. You know, I think that, and I know parents are, they're very busy. Most parents, you know, if there's a two parent household, they're both working full time.
If the parents aren't around, there's a family member trying to raise the children. But we've got to get family and parents more involved.
I just think back to when I was in school. My parents were heavily involved.
If my parents weren't, my friend's parents were, you know, we didn't get away with anything. They knew everything that was going on. And that's, that's pretty darn important when we're talking about academics and making sure that our kids are going to graduate from high school, like being viable members of society can move on to do whatever it is that they're going to do to contribute.
I want to see our district improve both national and state test scores.
I think that helps with just recognition that we stand out. We are a good school district and we are one that's going to strive for excellence.
[00:12:23] Speaker B: Yeah. And you had mentioned earlier too, about Title nine. Why don't you elaborate on that? Because I don't know your opponent.
What, what he's, where he is on this, but it sounds to me like this might be one of the key differences to what, you know, your, your priorities are.
Talk about that a little bit more about what you plan to do as if you, once you are elected, if, you know, God willing, you get elected, what you plan to do as a school board member around the Title IX issues.
[00:12:58] Speaker A: Yeah. So just, I guess just to summarize, you know, we've, we're, we're in a environment where, you know, school districts are being advised that they must allow for boys who identify as girls to play in girl sports.
And I just simply don't agree with that. You know, I just look at it from a scientific, a biologic standpoint.
You know, if you're, if you're born a boy, you've got some biologic sort of advantages that if you're playing in girls sports, it puts them at risk of being injured.
You know, and it goes beyond that. It goes into, you know, they just have distinct advantages and they're going to be able to, you know, potentially take away from scholarship opportunities, award opportunities that these girls have really worked hard for. So I, I am not in favor of that. If I were elected and on the board, you know, we talk about, well, what do you, how are you going to combat the fact that they might pull funding if you go against them?
You know, sometimes you just have to do what's right and there's going to be a fine line. Obviously, we don't want to lose funding, so we're, we're gonna, we're gonna do things in a constructive manner, a manner that's not just destructive, but we, we do have to push back and really think about what is, what is right for our, our community, what makes sense and what's right for our girls.
[00:14:36] Speaker B: Yeah. And it's also, you know, not just a sports issue, but it's also like the bathrooms and the locker rooms. You know, I can't imagine. I mean, you know, Brandon, you were in high school a lot more recently than I was, but I can't imagine going through my school years and having to worry about a boy being in my bath in the girls bathroom or the locker room. Like, I just, it just, you know, that floors me. And I've heard if you listen at all to the testimony when they were doing the, you know, the 1296, the House Bill 1296, you know, a bunch of those legislators talked about situations that they heard from citizens where girls were holding, you know, like holding it so that until they got home to go to the bathroom, they were more, you know, they didn't want to, they didn't want to shower after practice because, you know, of that situation. We love every kid. We love every kid, but this is an unsafe situation for our girls. You want to expand on that?
[00:15:43] Speaker A: Yeah, no, it's an extremely unsafe situation. I think about my daughter and, and this is just making maybe a little bit light of it, but, you know, she's afraid of the automatic flushers in the, in the bathrooms. Now she's covering her ears like this when she goes potty because it's going to flush and she's got some, you know, some sensory issues with that. But to throw on top of that, now there's a boy running around in your bathroom that, that's really going to startle her. It. And really all of our girls, they're not going to be comfortable with this. And it go, it goes well beyond just, you know, trying to be inclusive and sensitive to, you know, what these, what these boys who are, you know, sort of identifying as girls are going through. It goes beyond that because is a ticking time bomb when, when an incident occurs where one of our girls gets hurt in whatever way that might be, that that's going to come back down in the school district for allowing those things to happen.
And ultimately that adds up financially, right. When we're talking about lawsuits because a girl got hurt in one of our locker rooms, a girl got hurt in one of our bathrooms, a girl got hurt on one of our, know, playing in one of her sports.
That will ultimately end up in a lawsuit and that will ultimately end up in our school district paying out money they shouldn't be.
[00:17:13] Speaker B: Yeah, and, and, and I just want to make sure and clarify for people. And you, you stated this too. There's only, there's some things that you can't control as a school board member. You know, if the state is dictating things and they're holding your funding, but what, you know, so you're not, you know, you may not have the jurisdiction, if you will, to be able to change all this with a vote on the school board, but you are definitely going to push for whatever means possible to help right this situation. And that's what's so important is we need people that aren't afraid to stand up, that aren't just going to be, you know, rubber stampers and going to push against this agenda that's been pushed down on us. And like you said, this is our community, you know what's right for us. So I greatly appreciate that, Brandon. And it takes, you know, some wisdom and strategic, you know, thought and effort on how to do that. Right. But it takes most of all courage and boldness. And that's what I believe you have. So what. How about, how would you handle a situation where parents, teachers and administrators disagree on a major policy issue?
[00:18:29] Speaker A: Okay. Yeah. So this is a, this is, I've been asked this question. This is one of my favorite questions because this is essentially my bread and butter. This is what I do on a daily basis.
So many who have researched me know that I'm a pharmacist, I'm a business owner. But what a lot of people may not know about what I do on a daily basis is I'm not only a pharmacist, but I'm also an information technology and I'm an analyst.
And being an analyst on that side of things, I, I often have to put together policy. I and look at policy and also bring together a wide variety of healthcare providers from pharmacists, nurses, providers. And when I say providers, I'm talking about Doctors, Nurse Practitioners, PAs.
And so when, when I'm doing this, when I'm helping to create policy for our health care system and bring it into our electronic medical record, because that's what I do oftentimes, almost never does everybody agree on something. So it's, it's, it's always about finding the common thread, establishing what is best practice and making sure that we're checking all the boxes not only from like, you know, a best practice standpoint and making everybody happy standpoint, but does it also, like check all the boxes for what we need to do? That's most appropriate to serve our community.
What do we need to do to make sure that we're also, like, in line with all the regulatory bodies?
So I guess what I mean to say is I'm very good at taking a problem that no one wants to agree on and bringing it through all the sort of governance processes to get it to something that at least meets the needs of our community and everybody can be satisfied with.
[00:20:36] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And having that parent voice is so critical to making sure that it's right for the community. Right.
[00:20:44] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. And without being a parent or having a child in the district, I feel like that would be extremely challenging and would probably just lead to, like you mentioned before, just some rubber stamping of things.
[00:20:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
What role do you believe a school board director should play in overseeing the superintendent?
[00:21:06] Speaker A: So, you know, I kind of look at it as, you know, the board of. And there are some nuances, of course, but I, I look at it as like the board of any other company. Right. This board has been appointed. In this case, the board has been elected by the folks who live in the community to go and represent and help make good decisions. The CEO is an employee. Right. They.
He or she has been hired to help out based on their expertise. And I think leaning on their expertise is certainly warranted.
You know, that's what they're there for. They're there to help guide, help lend their expertise.
But again, the board really has the final say, and that's the way it should be. They're the ones who have been voted in by the community to have the final say.
[00:21:56] Speaker B: Yep, absolutely. That's exactly right. As a school board member, you have one employee, and that is the superintendent. And like you said, I love that. You know, thinking of a business, it is your. Your employee is the CEO and that is the superintendent. So very, very important to understand that. And, and I appreciate that you recognize they are an expert in their field. I mean, that's how they got to these positions. Right. So you want to work with them.
But ultimately, yes, the buck stops with you as the elected board representing the citizens of the community.
So that's so important.
Brandon, once elected, how do you plan to continue to connect with your community, the people that elected you? What's your plan moving forward? Right now you have a great opportunity because you're out doorbelling, you're out, you know, doing events, and you get to talk to a lot of people.
What's your plan once you get elected?
[00:22:57] Speaker A: No, yeah, I think that's great. And it kind of just, it Aligns with the last question as well. Like, you know, we're, we're leaning on, you know, we mentioned the seat, the superintendent kind of being like the CEO. They're the superintendent. They've got expertise. They've been hired because of their expertise. So we should lean on that expertise.
The same goes for our community. Right. Our community, as a collaborative, are the experts. Right. If we look at them across the board, they're the ones who are seeing all the issues because they've got, you know, they've got a daughter or son in the district or their grandparents, so they're hearing all these things. So we, we do need a platform for hearing from the community. Right. As we're moving forward. And I'm not certain of the how the platform is set up right now, but whatever that platform looks like, whether it's open houses and things like that, we need to continue that. Right. And, and take that input and make sure that we're taking it into account. Because, you know, the board is five people.
And in general, those five people have a wide variety of backgrounds. And so those five people, if I were elected, I'd be one of those five. We have to tap into the expertise of everyone around us. The community, the superintendent, our teachers, our paras. Everybody, right? Everyone has a say. Everyone has like a different perspective on, you know, the way things should be done in the classroom or in the school district. So without taking into account their sort of their expertise, we would be lost and we'd just be again, rubber stamping things.
[00:24:47] Speaker B: Right, Right. Absolutely. Brandon, final comments. Is there anything else that you would like voters to know about you?
[00:24:56] Speaker A: I think just overall, I'm a parent.
My daughter's in the school district.
I'm going to fight for what I believe is right. You can, you can look at my website and my Facebook and get a pretty good understanding of what I'm all about.
My, my website should be posted here. Everybody can see it. It's Arthur for WA.com. go on there. I've got my contact info. You can email or call me anytime.
And I hope to have your vote this fall.
[00:25:27] Speaker B: Right. And, and on that, Arthur, for what?
You also kind of go into your issues, right. And talk a little bit about that. So you also have your social media sites, which is really important. And, and please reach out to Brandon, let him know, you know, your thoughts that you have, your questions that you may have. We want you to engage. These are such important races. And you know, last year was the big presidential race and a lot of people kind of Take a backseat during these off year elections. But let me tell you, these school board races, these city council races, I mean, these are right here in your community. They affect you even more than those, than the other larger, you know, more national races. So please get engaged. I meant to look, I can't remember. I know ballots drop like the middle of October, correct?
[00:26:22] Speaker A: October 16th, I believe.
[00:26:24] Speaker B: Okay, so we only have a few weeks before, you know, I mean, that's going to come up quickly. And so please, you know, engage with Brandon. Help us campaign out. You know, with everything that's happened in the last couple weeks with Charlie Kirk and everything, like, what are you doing to make a difference? And this is something that you can do. You can get involved. You can, you know, put up a yard sign. You can, you know, get involved with the campaign, donate.
I'm sure you'd love to take people's support through their volunteer hours or their donations, right, Brandon?
[00:26:59] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. Whatever you can do. Donations, volunteer hours with just getting out and doorbelling or handing out a few of my palm cards or just putting up a sign in your yard, that would be great.
[00:27:12] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. So get involved. And then also, like I said at the beginning, Brandon is one of the Spokane county gop, the official Republican Party.
Make no mistake, the official Republican Party, that's very important because the official Republican Party is, is a membership organization that is made up of members from your community, Precinct committee officers, and I'm one of those as well. And so the pcos, the precinct committee officers, are the ones, ones that vet these candidates and come up with the recommended candidates, which again, Brandon is one of them. So if you're curious about more about other candidates that the Spokane GOP has recommended, please go to spokanegop.com and you can find that list and you'll see Brandon's name on there. So again, Brandon, thank you so much for coming on here, letting people know about you and what you stand for and why you're running and then also how to get in touch with you. And we just appreciate what you're doing and we just, you know, bless you and your family for stepping up and, and doing this and being bold and taking action.
[00:28:27] Speaker A: I appreciate it. Yeah. And just on that note, I am, I am the only person running for position two who has been endorsed by the official Spokane Republican Party.
[00:28:36] Speaker B: That's. That's right. Brandon, you've got a couple events coming up here, too. Do you want to talk about that? If people.
[00:28:44] Speaker A: I've got a couple of. Well, I'm going to be at Valley Fest all weekend, so Saturday and Sunday, so you can find me at the GOP booth there.
Also got a couple of meet and greets coming up. One is Tuesday the 23rd, and then the following Tuesday on the 29th. So I. I will be posting some information on my website and Facebook about those. Those two events, if you'd like to attend.
[00:29:12] Speaker B: And what's your Facebook account? What's. How do people find you on there?
[00:29:17] Speaker A: I have a link. If you go to my webpage, click the link to my Facebook. It'll bring you right there.
[00:29:22] Speaker B: Okay. Awesome. Well, Brandon, blessings again.
You know, good luck with this.
Everybody get involved. Make sure that you vote. Vote early. Don't set it on the counter. You know, vote as soon as you get that. And if you need more information, reach out to Brandon. I'm sure he'd be happy to talk to you. And go to the Spokane GOP website to find out the rest of the recommended candidates. We'll be having them on here, too, as I interviewing as many of them as I can. So, Brandon, thank you again. Blessings to you and your family. Take care.
[00:29:54] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:29:55] Speaker B: Thanks.
[00:29:56] Speaker A: Bye.
Sa.
