'Appalled': Columbus school board member shares why she leaked memo at heart of scandal

A Columbus City school board member said Thursday that she was responsible for sharing the document with the Columbus Education Association that is now the center of controversy as the board looks to close district schools.

In a Thursday statement where she stressed she was speaking in her personal capacity, Board Member Sarah Ingles said that she was the one who had shared the document with the Columbus Education Association.

The document in question is a draft of a strategy for handling opposition to school closures and was first published Tuesday by the Columbus Education Association, the union representing the district's more than 4,500 teachers and other educational professionals. In its release, the CEA said the document was racially divisive, and called for a pause to the closure process and for Board Member Brandon Simmons to resign.

More: Read the leak: What to know about the document at the center of a Columbus schools scandal

Neither Simmons nor other school board members returned calls from The Dispatch seeking comment. On Tuesday, Simmons said in two hastily called news conferences that the document was the product of collaboration with other board members and stakeholders.

Simmons on Thursday released a statement via social media, doubling down on his assertion that the document was part of a collaboration, but he also apologized for it's existence.

"I have let our District down," he wrote. "The words on that document should not exist."

Ingles said in a prepared release that she was not present at any meeting where the document was shared, and that she didn't know of its existence until it was shared with her. She did not say who shared it with her.

"After serious consideration of what was best for the district and our students," Ingles said she decided to share the document.

"I was appalled and offended when I read it," Ingles stated in the release. "Our work in the district is too important for these kinds of divisive and absurd tactics."

CEA President John Coneglio told The Dispatch that he commended Ingles for doing the right thing. He said he made the document public because he didn't want the issue swept under the rug.

"Politicians that do the right thing need support," Coneglio said. "I'm sure the district would have loved to have handled this internally, but then we would still have these bad actors doing this type of stuff in the future, because nobody knows about it."

Who is Sarah Ingles?

Ingles is a first-term board member elected in November, with a term expiring in 2027.

A Near East Side resident, Ingles is currently Democratic legal counsel for the Ohio House of Representatives, and previously worked as a union lawyer. Ingles campaigned on rebuilding trust and relationships with the CEA, The Dispatch previously reported.

CEA: District enacted elements of leaked strategy document

In a Thursday release, the CEA said union legal counsel sent a letter to Columbus City Schools detailing what it said was evidence that the Board of Education had already enacted parts of the controversial leaked plan.

The letter to the district chiefly points to what it says are irregularities in the seating and agenda, and a changed location of the Tuesday board meeting.

The release also points to the widely covered media tour of poor conditions at Columbus Alternative High School and better conditions at Downtown High School, held on May 14. The leaked document details plans for a news conference "at our oldest and worst most crumbling (sic) building" on that same day.

Coneglio said he didn't believe Simmons acted alone.

"I never think that anybody acts alone," Coneglio said. "Brandon (Simmons) definitely was part of this process — but I don't think Brandon was alone."

More: Who is Brandon Simmons? What to know about CCS board member at center of leak scandal

In her only statement since the release, Board President Christina Vera said during Tuesday's board meeeting that Simmons "was not asked to provide any recommendations and did so independently."

She also said the strategies outlined in the document "do not represent the perspectives of the Columbus City Schools or the entire Board of Education," and that "no action has been or will be taken … to implement the board member’s suggestions."

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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus City Schools board member Sarah Ingles talks document leak