The PAC

Key takeaways: In our community, “The PAC” has come to reference the heavy involvement in school board elections by those who were behind the RDP PAC. My view is that each candidate should run independently and demonstrate that they will represent the community. Pushing a slate of candidates in every school board election has caused strong divisions in our community.

The PAC was formed in 2016 to elect a slate of candidates: Brad Marley, Tom Schott, Brian Bittner, and Doug Masson. Their goal was to keep Melissa Prochnau from winning a seat on the school board as she was the only non-incumbent candidate in that election and the first non-incumbent to run for a WL school board seat since 2004. The PAC paid for the yard signs for the slate of candidates. The $5,000 in funding came from I-PACE, a state teachers union organization where JSHS teacher, Randy Studt, is a leader. In addition to the yard signs, the PAC bought advertisements in the Journal & Courier and sent out direct mail political adverts. They were unsuccessful in keeping Prochnau from being elected in 2016, though the vote was very close. Doug Masson lost his seat on the school board.

The only school board candidates in the 2018 election were the slate of: Alan Karpick, Karen Springer, and Rachel Witt. Because they were running unopposed, there was very little PAC activity.

In 2020, there was widespread dissatisfaction with several recent school board decisions and 15 candidates ran for the 4 school board seats. The PAC supported Amy Austin, Brad Marley, Tom Schott, and Doug Masson. They claimed that this slate of candidates had been “chosen by the teachers.” This was false; the teachers had no role in choosing which candidates the PAC would support. West Lafayette Mayor John Dennis agreed to serve as chair of the PAC. One of the first things it did was send out an “apocalyptic” letter which inflamed the community and was widely denounced, including by Mayor John Dennis who resigned as PAC chair. None of the slate of candidates distanced themselves from the PAC and no one came forward to accept responsibility for writing the letter. A former school board member, Dianne Sautter, replaced Mayor Dennis as the PAC chair. Prior to the election, the PAC raised $40,000 from companies that worked on the recent school construction projects, several other school contractors, I-PACE, board member Alan Karpick, a community member who was appointed to a school board position on the West Lafayette library board, and small contributions from a few other individuals. The PAC spent $24,000 during the 2020 election on direct mail political adverts, robo calls, and mass texts. They were successful in getting three of their slate of four candidates (Marley, Schott, and Austin) elected. Masson lost for a second time. Yue Yin essentially replaced Prochnau as the lone non-PAC member of the school board.

There was a high level of community frustration with the PAC after the 2020 election. So, before the 2022 election, those behind the PAC changed its name from “RDP PAC” to “Citizens for Quality School Leadership” in an attempt to hide their involvement in the election. They did this by transferring the money from the old PAC to the new one and disbanding the old one. This time, the slate of PAC-supported candidates were George Lyle, Karen Springer, and Rachel Witt. The PAC sent out text and email messages that were signed by Alan Karpick and Rocky Killion, the former superintendent. This time, the PAC was less successful, getting only one of their slate of three candidates elected. The result was a board with four members who had been backed by the PAC (Amy Austin, Brad Marley, Tom Schott, Rachel Witt) and three members who had not been supported by the PAC (Yue Yin, Dacia Mumford, Laurence Wang). After the election, the PAC had $8,471 remaining in their account.

With so much community frustration about the PAC, it was disbanded in 2023 and donated $4,971 to the West Lafayette Schools Education Foundation. It’s not clear what happened to the rest of the money. The election board filing shows that as of December 31, 2022, the PAC had $8,471 but then on January 1, 2023 the PAC claimed to only have $4,971 remaining in their account. There has been no explanation for the discrepancy. I filed a complaint with the election board and they said they would not look into it until after the 2024 election is over.

As shown in the 2024 mid-election filings, Austin’s PAC is financing the current support for the slate of four candidates (Amy Austin, Maria Koliantz, George Lyle, David Purpura). This PAC has paid for direct mail political adverts and social media ads promoting the slate of candidates. All four candidates have accepted and approved of this support. 

We need to keep PAC influence out of our community school board elections.

You can follow the history of PAC through its financial filings (see links below) with information summarized in the following table:

Campaign Year	PAC Name	PAC Leadership	Spending	Funding Source	PAC Candidates	Non-PAC Candidates
2016	RDP PAC	Chair: Brian Bittner Treasurer: Brad Marley	$4,125	IPACE – State Teachers Union Political Arm (Randy Studt)	Brad Marley, Tom Schott, Doug Masson, Brian Bittner	Melissa Prochnau
2020	RDP PAC	Chair: Dianne Sautter (originally Mayor John Dennis) Treasurer: Monica Shaeffer (recruited by Rachel Witt)	$24,159	IPACE – State Teachers Union Political Arm (Randy Studt) School Construction Architect (KJG) School Board Appointee (Atlschaeffl) School Board Members (Springer & Karpick) School Board Lawyer (Reiling) School Board Interim CFO (Sloat) School Board Consultant (Troyer) Others: Gregg Theobald, R Sutton, Mark Castell, Paul Brown, and Kelley & Pat Carr	Brad Marley, Tom Schott, Doug Masson, Amy Austin	Yue Yin, Dacia Mumford, David Purpura, Melissa Prochnau, Angie Janes, Sara Poer, William Watson, Brady Kalb, Jeff Kayser, Brian Ruh
2022	Citizens for Quality School Leadership	Chair: James Garland Treasurer: Joseph Krause	Either $7,500 or $4,000 (it isn’t clear)	$12,471.12 Transfer from RDP PAC	Rachel Witt, Karen Springer, George Lyle	Dacia Mumford, Laurence Wang, Angie Janes