Richmond School Board: Sex, Drugs, Rock-n-Roll!

Back in December, the chairman of the Richmond School Board stepped down (as chairman, but stayed on the Board) due to the controversy over his bare-chested photo being posted on an explicit dating website. My comment at that time was;

I have nothing against Mr. Johnson, and it certainly does not bother me if he is gay, but his decision to post this type of singles ad was so ill-advised as to be worrisome. Would you want someone this foolish holding such power over the schooling of your children? What are those children to make of the example he is setting here? This is a member of their School Board!

Unfortunately, Mr. Johnson was back in the news this week. From the Richmond Times-Dispatch:

Richmond School Board member Stephen B. Johnson says he will resign from the board after being caught with marijuana at Richmond International Airport.

He had three joints hidden in a pack of cigarettes. He was trying to take them on a flight to California, where he would attend a conference on home schooling. That's right, a business trip.

Johnson claims the marijuana was for medicinal purposes. I once again wonder how he would feel if a teacher were in a similar situation. The news article tells us:

Richmond Public Schools describes itself as a "drug and alcohol-free workplace."
The School Board policy says employees outside the workplace who are charged with possession or use of illegal drugs are subject to disciplinary action up to termination.

Mysteriously, he wasn't charged. Which I guess means that a teacher in the same situation would be just fine... right?

For the record, I have zero moral objections to the web posting he did in December, or towards the possession and use of marijuana, whether for purposes medicinal or recreational. I've never smoked pot, but I think it should be legal. To me, the issue is not the objective value of what Mr. Johnson does. The issue is that a member of the School Board should be livng to a higher standard than this. He or she should be a model to students, and should not engage in any behavior that cannot be encouraged in teachers. As Times-Dispatch staff writer Michael Paul Williams wrote today;

even his most ardent supporters must ask how such a capable School Board member could exhibit such an inexplicable lapse in judgment while under the microscope. And he now has a problem overseeing a school system that describes itself as a "drug and alcohol-free workplace."

We wish him good health and appreciate his service to the board. But he has a credibility problem. Johnson's decision to step down is the correct one.

The Board should have asked Johnson to step down in December in light of his poor judgement regarding the pornographic web site. It might have saved them the embarassment of this current situation.