Johnson County training on racial equity derailed by conservative officials

Organizers of a Johnson County training event on racial equity canceled and moved the program online this week after a conflict with two county officials led to concerns over safety.

The one-day Sunflower Summit, hosted by the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit The Gault Center, was scheduled for employees involved in Johnson County’s juvenile legal system to discuss racial disparities, bias and policy reform.

Commissioner Charlotte O’Hara fought repeatedly to bring a videographer to record the entire session. She was only pushing for transparency, she told The Star, and mentioned her struggle during two commission meetings — where she also encouraged residents to find out more about the keynote speaker, an author on the criminalization of Black youth, and said the event should include a conservative viewpoint.

Sheriff Calvin Hayden — who has aligned himself with far-right causes, including investigating election fraud claims — then informed county staff he anticipated protesters at the event and planned to bring deputies. That was a surprise to the Lenexa police chief, who already had security planned and said she did not find evidence of any real threat.

“It is also clear to me and others the sky was not falling on this event,” Lenexa Police Chief Dawn Layman wrote in an email to the sheriff, which O’Hara shared with The Star.

“The Sheriff was going to attend the event on his own. He did offer to have two officers on stand by for security if needed after some concerning posts were discovered on social media,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement.

The frenzy led The Gault Center to change plans and hold the training virtually.

“Unfortunately, the situation with Commissioner O’Hara and Sheriff Hayden devolved to the point that we do not feel like we could provide the environment that you, our guests, would need to meaningfully participate in the planned program,” the center wrote in a notice to registrants.

The center said speakers had not agreed to videotaping the session, and that recording it would not have let participants be “open, honest, and vulnerable” as they discuss personal issues. Officials also cited copyright issues.

The squabble comes as GOP lawmakers fight against diversity and equity initiatives, as well as curriculum on race, building on some parents’ frustration over public schools.

O’Hara, who has cast the conflict as only a transparency issue for the county, has previously spoken against critical race theory, a college-level concept that examines the role of institutions in perpetuating racism, and a phrase that has become shorthand among hard-right conservatives for any lesson that delves into systemic racism.

She planned to distribute a handout at the summit raising concerns about the keynote speaker’s message and instead promoting the “return of faith” and “the return of equality instead of equity.”

An issue of transparency?

Amy Borror, with The Gault Center, said more than 100 Johnson County employees registered for the summit, which is part of the nonprofit’s work contracting with the Kansas Department of Corrections. It was supposed to be held last Monday at the Thompson Barn in Lenexa.

The nonprofit’s work with the KDOC aims to address racial disparities found in its 2020 assessment of Kansas’ youth defense system, she said. And Johnson County Department of Corrections has been investigating the causes of such disparities since 2008, county staff said.

“We conduct training sessions like this across the country and have been for years,” Borror told The Star. “We do talk about difficult topics such as racial bias and racial inequality, and we do often engage in challenging, but thoughtful, conversations during those trainings. We feel this kind of dialogue is vital to addressing racial inequities that are inherent in the juvenile legal system.”

After commissioners were notified of the event, O’Hara emailed staff last month to say she would attend and bring a videographer. She said she would put the recording on Rumble, a right-leaning video platform, saying because the event is co-sponsored by the county government, “transparency is extremely critical.”

The Gault Center responded, saying they already had told the keynote speaker they would not videotape her presentation or other portions of the summit, including a simulation where registrants would work through examples of real-life problems. In an email shared with The Star, county legal counsel also said certain parts of the summit could not be recorded because of copyright agreements.

Both the nonprofit and O’Hara continued to reiterate their positions over several emails.

O’Hara then said in an email: “Also, Sheriff Hayden has asked me to save a seat for him, so please note” that she’d have multiple attendees under her name.

According to a March 20 email, the Gault Center offered to let O’Hara record parts of the event, but not the keynote speaker or simulation exercise.

But O’Hara pushed back: “I look forward to being at the Summit and I will have a videographer attending with me along with Sheriff Calvin Hayden.”

Borror told The Star that the Gault Center “let our keynote speaker and the simulation facilitators know what was happening, and they said they would not proceed with their presentations if the event was being recorded or broadcast.”

She said the nonprofit’s “interpretation of her email mentioning the sheriff was that she was bringing him to enforce her belief in her right to record.”

O’Hara denied that to The Star, saying the sheriff was going to be late to the event, so asked her to save a seat for him, which she says is why she mentioned it in the email exchanges. She said many law enforcement personnel were planning to attend, so it was not strange that Hayden was planning to go.

She said she’s made it a mission to improve county transparency, and has had constituents record other staff training in the past.

O’Hara, for example, continues to fight Chairman Mike Kelly’s decision to stop livestreaming and recording public comments during commission meetings — a choice Kelly, a Democrat and former mayor of Roeland Park, made shortly after taking office in January.

Kelly worried that misinformation spread during meetings could violate YouTube’s standards, potentially leading to county videos being removed online. Several residents protested the decision, saying it stymies public discourse. With a 4-3 vote, commissioners approved the change.

At two recent commission meetings, O’Hara brought up the conflict with The Gault Center.

She also noted the keynote speaker was Georgetown Law Professor Kristin Henning, author of “The Rage of Innocence: How America Criminalizes Black Youth.” And she read a promotion for the book, in part saying, “Discriminatory and aggressive policing has socialized a generation of Black teenagers to fear, resent, and resist the police.”

At a meeting late last month, she encouraged the public to learn more about Henning by listening to her speak on C-SPAN, and also recommended that the event be expanded to include a speaker from the conservative legal organization the Federalist Society.

“Let’s hear both sides of the political spectrum,” O’Hara told The Star.

“You can disagree with Professor Henning and her theory, and I had questioned some of her theory, but that wasn’t the issue. My issue was transparency,” O’Hara said. “I was all prepared and ready to have a vigorous exchange of ideas. I think that’s healthy.”

‘Just common courtesy’

O’Hara shared a handout with The Star that she planned to distribute at the summit. In it, O’Hara responds to the promotional excerpt for Henning’s book.

She wrote that “Professor Henning’s erroneous theory of systemic racism within law enforcement is not the answer to our juvenile criminal crisis,” and instead pushed for the “return of faith,” “return of marriage” and “the return of equality instead of equity.”

“And as a Johnson County Commissioner and as a mother and grandmother of children whom Professor Henning prefers (to) designate as minority (Black or Hispanic) children, I am here today and raising my voice in concern that Professor Henning says nothing about broken homes, God being taken from our schools and public squares, the failure of our public schools especially in inner city districts.”

O’Hara argued Henning is silent on “federal programs requiring the removal of men from the family in order to receive benefits,” as well as drugs and abortion.

As O’Hara and The Gault Center went back and forth over recording the training, the Lenexa police department was planning security.

Police Chief Layman said the center requested a plain-clothes officer for security, “which is normal for us.”

The department was prepared to provide more security if needed, but Layman said she did not see any reason to believe that was necessary.

Then last week, Layman said she received an email from county staff saying the sheriff heard there would be protesters and that he would have two officers standing by for additional security.

Layman said that was unusual, because county and city agencies typically communicate in case they need to coordinate.

She emailed Hayden asking for more professional courtesy: “We were actively monitoring the situation with our crime analysts and other staff. It has been a longstanding operational practice, and frankly just common courtesy to reach out to the home agency in these types of situations,” she wrote to the sheriff.

“I would be very interested in receiving the intelligence your agency gathered on the potential threats. It would be helpful to see your intelligence to see if we somehow missed something. We did not consider the chatter we were hearing a threat to prevent this event from continuing as scheduled.”

The Gault Center announced the in-person event would be canceled and a portion of the program would be held virtually.

O’Hara said she also had not seen anything that rose to the level of a threat against the event.

“I had no information about anything that was going to be a huge safety issue,” O’Hara said. “In my opinion, (The Gault Center) just didn’t want to hold it because I was asking questions, so they bailed.”

The Gault Center staff said they interpreted recent statements “as potential threats to the security and wellbeing of our guests and presenters.”

“These challenging discussions … ask a lot of participants: to be introspective, to challenge their assumptions and what they have been taught, to make plans to change ingrained systems and behaviors. For these conversations to be fruitful, participants must be in an environment where they can be open, honest, and vulnerable,” the nonprofit said in its notice.

“The rhetoric and misinformation surrounding the Sunflower Summit make clear the need for exactly these kinds of conversations.”

Borror told The Star that the virtual event on Monday only included the keynote presentation from Henning. The simulation exercise, as well as a panel discussion with local juvenile court experts, were canceled.

O’Hara argued that holding the event virtually where, “anyone can record off of that, I think blew the cover off of it.”

Kelly, who defeated O’Hara for the chair position last year, said in a statement: “I am disappointed that the intentional misrepresentations made by some Johnson County officials have led to an atmosphere where presenters feel unsafe and unwelcome in Johnson County.”