Community members from local churches fill BCSD's chambers to speak out against LGBTQ resource library

Aug. 26—A large group of community members, many associated with local Christian churches, attended Bakersfield City School District's Tuesday night meeting, mostly to speak against the content of the district's resource library for LGBTQ students.

For the first time since the pandemic began, the crowd in attendance was so large that there wasn't enough room to fit everyone inside the main meeting room, and the crowd outside cheered as they listened in to the speakers.

"There is a steady push to adjust the thinking of children to accept new lifestyles, new LGBT vocabulary, who a boy is, who a girl is," Judith Olson told the board.

She read from one book in the library about children who identify as nonbinary, which means they may not identify as a boy or a girl.

The district's Pride library is aimed at addressing bullying issues targeted at the LGBTQ community. On the district's agenda Tuesday was an update of its bullying policy, which mentioned the LGBTQ community. However, the topic of the library had come up during the previous meeting.

Superintendent Mark Luque said he met with church leaders before the board meeting when he heard there were fliers going around about the BCSD meeting. He said that the district failed to communicate appropriately about the resources. He said he hopes to build understanding, if not forgiveness, with the community.

"What we are trying to accomplish in our district is to ensure that we have safe spaces for every single child and family member," Luque said.

The resource library now has a note appended to it that states that it is offered to teachers as an option to "foster a safe and inclusive learning environment in the event discrimination, harassment, intimidation, and/or bullying occurs related to LGBTQ+ students and families."

The note states that teachers are not required to teach from the library. In fact, a teacher must ask permission from Instructional Support Services to teach lessons from this resource guide. There is an opt-out form for parents.

The note also states that the library is part of the district's compliance with the state's Safe Place to Learn Act. The law has a Kern connection: It is also known as Seth's Law, for Seth Walsh, a Tehachapi teen who killed himself at age 13 after being bullied at school for being gay in 2010.

David Goh, senior pastor of The Garden, thanked the board for clarifying how parents can opt out, so that religious communities can withdraw when they find that the curriculum being taught conflicts with their own deeply held values, which include teachings on marriage and sexuality.

"Of course, we are adamantly opposed to the bullying of any child, and we would certainly want to partner with you in creating a safe and respectful environment for all students," he said. "We also just ask that the same respect be granted to us as parents and that we could partner together for the education of our children."

Lillian Lopez asked the district to also send a letter home to parents at the beginning of the year to allow parents to opt out. She said she felt that the issues of bullying and suicide were being used as reasons to push ideology on students that should be discussed at home.

Board member Chris Cruz-Boone vowed to preserve the Pride library in her board comments.

"That Pride library that people are afraid (that) being on our website will somehow corrupt our youth: that needs to be here. That needs to be there, because queer people exist," she said. "They exist in our classrooms and they exist in our district, and they need a place to go to learn about why they are different."

The district's new opt-out form states: "In the event bullying and discrimination towards an LGBTQ students occurs within my student's classroom...," and the parent can answer that they either do or do not give permission for their child to "participate in the LGBTQ Antibullying/Nondiscrimination Inclusive lessons."

Most of the speakers at Tuesday's meeting spoke on LGBTQ issues and the board voted to give them extra time to speak. Many also spoke against the state's masks mandate and critical race theory.

Angelo Frazier, a pastor of RiverLakes Community Church and volunteer chaplain of the Bakersfield Police Department, was one of those speakers who touched on many of these issues in his comments. He told the board that the district needed to return to reading, writing and arithmetic.

"Families are mad, they are really mad with what is going on," he told the board.

Frazier told the board that no man or woman can fully transition into the opposite sex. He said critical race theory will institute "a new era of racial segregation."

Some attendees brought signs advocating for recalling Gov. Gavin Newsom. One man threatened to recall the board members in his comments. Another woman spoke of her work collecting signatures on the recall campaign.