Misguided long shot recall effort has some new and old faces

HOWELL -- Move over Vicky Fyke, there’s a new sheriff in town trying to push you out of the spotlight for her 15 minutes of local fame.

District parent Deborah McCormick is leading an effort to recall three of the four Howell Public School Board members who voted to fire Superintendent Theodore Gardella after just a year on the job. She held a meeting at a Howell Township motel Thursday attended by 15-20 people, depending on what media source you read. Basically, she is leading a recall of board members for making a vote she disagreed with, and she’s letting one off the hook. This is a clear abuse of the intent of the recall process, in my opinion.

The recall group is pushing to get the issue on the November ballot, which means organizers need to collect about 5,000 signatures before July 31. They can’t get started until at least July 14 when the clarity hearing is held before the county Elections Commission and the language is approved as clear.

This simply will not get done, and I hope it doesn’t. Basically, if all 20 people collect signatures, they have to collect about 48 signatures a day.

You knew Fyke had to be at the meeting, and she had to be quoted. The article in the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus never said if Fyke’s partner, board member Wendy Day, was at the meeting.

Fyke apparently told the paper, "We have to send a message (to the school board) that we're not going to tolerate this. I'm excited because I think we can do it." That would be the first time Fyke and Day managed to get something on their rightwing agenda.

Fyke is the co-founder with Day of the now the defunct anti-gay hate group known as the “LOVE PAC” - (Livingston Organization for Values in Education).The group was first heard from in the spring of 2006 in response to a diversity flag they mistakenly claimed was a gay pride flag that they claimed promotes and endorses homosexuality. In the fall on 2006, Day, Fyke and her group began a book banning crusade that ended with an embarrassing FBI investigation and national embarrassment.