You remember Carmen Lopez.

Last year, the ex-judge filed what was ultimately determined to be a spurious lawsuit alleging that the Bridgeport Board of Education was wrong to extend Paul Vallas’ contract, the State Board of Education and education commissioner were wrong to allow that extension and that a UConn professor had somehow lied. Lopez’s lawsuit against Vallas cost the city and state a significant amount of taxpayer dollars to defend as it dragged on for the better part of the year.

Less than one month after the State Supreme Court tossed Lopez’s lawsuit into the round file, where it belonged from the start, she signed off on a letter as “counsel” for the district’s Parent Advisory Council.

Several questions come to mind: Who decided to hire her? Was there a vote? How much is she being paid?

Wait … why does the District Parent Advisory Council need a lawyer in the first place?

The letter Lopez signed was sent to Vallas and the principal of Cesar Batalla Elementary School, in an attempt to strong-arm an election process that would guarantee a win for a Working Families Party-aligned candidate.

Principal Hector Sanchez had wisely worked to postpone an election designed to replace the president of the school’s parent advisory council. The Working Families Party-aligned district council president had rushed the election along, in what appeared to be an attempt to rig the election.

The council’s response was to send a threat-laden letter to Vallas and Sanchez, warning that “any and all appropriate action will be taken,” and signed by Lopez, among others.

It’s clear that the district is being controlled by a cadre, willing to use “any and all” tactics they deem necessary to get their way. Lopez, whose tactics have already taken their toll on the City of Bridgeport, should have no place representing parents.

Rather than use the Parent Advisory Council as the tool to build community engagement it was intended to be, the council is being perverted into a whip, a way to dominate the district and exert the will of whoever’s in charge.

District PAC Letter to Batalla Principal

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