Shasta County Board of Education Won’t Censure Board Member Authur Gorman

The seven members of the SCOE Board sit beside SCOE Superintendent Judy Flores and other SCOE staff on August 9, 2023. Photo by Annelise Pierce.

A crowd of about fifty people filled the Shasta County Office of Education (SCOE) Board chambers on Wednesday, August 9, in response to the Board’s planned discussion on the possible censure of Board member Authur Gorman.

Gorman, a registered nurse, and local parent who helped coordinate a county-wide student walk-out in response to COVID-19 mandates in 2021, was elected to the Board of Education late last year. 

This May, his behavior during a Board meeting and via a social media post prompted local community member and parent Jessica French to request the County Office of Education Board to censure or officially reprimand him.

The incident in question occurred when Gorman approached Bobbie Simpson, a local parent of two school-age children, after she spoke up at a SCOE Board meeting in May, sharing her personal story of being bullied over her gender identity. Speaking to her from the floor of the SCOE Board chambers that day, Gorman repeatedly used male pronouns instead of the female pronouns Simpson uses. 

Gorman also shared a post about Simpson from a public Facebook account which he uses to discuss SCOE board decisions as well as his personal political and ideological perspectives. The meme compared a photo of Simpson to an image of Gateway Unified School District Board members Elias and Lindsi Haynes, whose recalls Simpson has publically supported. Text on the meme asked the viewer which of the two images represented “your voice for Gateway” before encouraging the viewer to “say no to the Liberal Recall.” 

In a press release put out before the meeting on the 9th, Simpson said she hoped the Board’s discussion about whether to censure Gorman would help engage the community in “a constructive conversation about the responsibility and ethical standards expected from our public officials, especially those in positions of educational governance.”

In an emailed response to a request for comment, Gorman posed the issue as a potential violation of his free speech rights. His supporters who flooded the meeting on Wednesday, August 9, spoke similarly. Several referenced First Amendment rights, and specifically what they referred to as “compelled speech,” throughout their public comments.

In March 2022, the Supreme Court ruled that censure by a school board does not violate free speech rights. Writing for the court in that ruling, Justice Neil Gorsuch emphasized that “a reprimand, no matter how strongly worded, does not materially impair free speech,” especially because, he continued, “the censure at issue . . .was a form of speech” by other elected representatives on the board. 

During comments to other board members during Wednesday’s meeting, Gorman initially seemed to deny having used male pronouns for Simpson in conversation with her, then later admitted to it. He also indicated that the social media post that had concerned French had been “doctored,” although he did not clarify exactly what part of it had been doctored or why. 

Each of the six other SCOE Board members also spoke up during the discussion, showing unified support for both the right to diversity of expression and the right to free speech. 

Board Vice President Robert Brown accused Gorman of purposefully setting up the situation to play to his political base. 

“This is supposed to be a meeting . . . to set policy . . . not about your personal political agenda,” Brown told Gorman. “We have given you a lot of leeway, we really have,” Brown continued before stating that he did not personally support a censure. 

“How about a recall? Do you want a recall?” Gorman interrupted him. 

“If the people of this county want to recall you, that’s up to them,” Brown responded, “I’m not going to speak to that.”

After a fairly brief discussion, no one on the Board motioned to move the item toward a possible future vote on censure.

Some did encourage Gorman to remember that his actions when in SCOE’s board room reflect his role as a public official, not a private citizen, a statement that Gorman pushed back against. 

During his public comments during the Board meeting Wednesday, Gorman chose to again repeatedly misgender Simpson as he discussed his behavior towards her publicly, something no one on the Board addressed when it occurred.

In response to questions from Shasta Scout after the meeting, Board President Kathy Barry said it was a “fair criticism to wonder why we didn’t respond to Mr. Gorman’s continued misgendering” from his Board seat during the censure discussion.

“My honest answer,” Barry explained, “is that this is new territory for me and for this Board, as we are not experienced in policing a fellow Board member.  I also believed that he should have the opportunity to respond with his side of the story, without interruption.”

But, she continued, “His intentional misgendering was a statement in itself, and important for the public to witness. Mr. Gorman’s statements and behavior do not reflect the Board as a whole, and as one member he does not have the standing to represent the Board.  This Board has consistently voted to support policies of non-harassment and non-bullying, and expected Board behavior is covered by our Board Bylaw 9005: Governance Standards.”

The tone of the more than four-hour meeting was tense throughout. One speaker, who identified herself only as Lilian, referenced California education law about the use of pronouns, saying, “This is modern segregation and its preparation for civil war.”

Another speaker, who said she had worked in Shasta County’s mental health program for years, referred to trans people as having a “delusional disorder.” 

“If someone has a delusional disorder, you tell them the truth,”  “You don’t play into their delusions . . . it’s only the right thing, the kind thing to tell the truth. We don’t wish any harm on anyone. They obviously need help. Don’t play into the delusions. That only makes it worse.” 

Some public commenters who supported Gorman also spoke about what they perceived as a governmental plan to “take away our rights to raising our children.” Others mentioned concerns about local libraries offering drag queen story hours and distributing “pornographic materials,” although none offered evidence that these occur locally. 

Community member Clayton Seabourn speaks to the SCOE Board on August 9, 2023. Photo by Annelise Pierce.

Local community member Clayton Seabourn also spoke to the Board, using a walker to come to the front slowly, before telling the public that he wanted to share his story of growing up gay in Shasta County many decades ago.

“I knew who I was when I was five years old,” he said. “I just didn’t know the name for what I was. I had no examples to tell me that there were other people like me. . . I tried to conform to what my family, what my church, and what society was telling me I should be.” 

“The result of that,” Seabourn explained, “was extreme loneliness and despair. It drove me to try to kill myself five times.”

“One thing I was taught in the church I grew up in,” Seabourn continued, “was that we love each other, we support each other, and that Jesus cared for outcasts in the community. Went out of his way, actually, to care for people. And I think that’s been a lesson that’s been lost on many.”

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