BillHobbs.com is a frequently updated blog of original reporting and commentary by Bill Hobbs, a longtime Nashville journalist and media relations adviser. I am currently serving as communications director for the Tennessee Republican Party, a job I began on Oct. 29, 2007.
The Tennessee Republican Party issued a press release yesterday in the wake of a series of news reports about the failure of Tennessee to track teachers accused of sexual misconduct toward children. The Tennessee General Assembly's Democratic-controlled House Education Committee rejected legislation earlier this year that would have improved the system and made it impossible for a teacher facing a sexual misconduct allegation to simply leave one Tennessee school system and get a job in another Tennessee school system with the new school (and the new students and parents) being unaware of the possible danger. It's not a hypothetical situation - it has happened in Tennessee, with tragic results.
Here's the TN GOP's press release:
Time To Track Sexual Predators In a recent nationwide investigation by the Associated Press, Tennessee's system of tracking sexual misconduct committed by our children's teachers is shown to need improvement. This improvement, however, has been blocked by Democrats in the Tennessee House. The investigative report reveals that only one person at the state level handles all conduct complaints with no system available to view profiles of teachers with pending cases who move from one school district to another within the state.
In April of 2007, Representative Stacey Campfield (R- Knoxville) and Senator Dewayne Bunch (R- Cleveland) sponsored legislation that would create a record of "all disciplinary actions, criminal violations, and civil actions pertaining to the official capacity of teachers and administrators" for the purpose of keeping criminals out of the classroom. This bill was defeated in the House Education Committee, which is led by Democrats.
Currently, a teacher investigated for sexual misconduct or criminal activity can leave a school system to be hired by another within the state with no record of the ongoing investigation. This puts our children at risk and is unacceptable. Democrats only allowed passage of legislation addressing criminal background checks, which fails to identify those who move prior to the filing of charges.
"Putting the safety of our children behind the power plays of the committee structure in the state legislature is inexcusable. Continuing an environment for predators to have access to Tennessee's students is negligent in light of good legislation that died in committee," stated Robin Smith, Tennessee Republican Party Chairman. "Great teachers invest their lives in our children and should not carry the burden of opportunists in their midst."
Watch the video and see the Democrats kill good legislation designed to protect children because the Tennessee Education Association, one of their key sources of money and votes, wanted the legislation killed.
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