Teachers launch recall petition against Cedar Park council member

A group of teachers has launched a petition to recall Cedar Park Council Member Tim Kelly, who angered many people with his Facebook post last month that said teachers should return to campus immediately or be fired.

His post also called president of unions for teachers “leeches.”

Kelly did not respond to a request for comment about the petition this week.

Petition organizers need to gather 4,112 signatures, which is 10% of the registered voters of Cedar Park, by Monday for the city to be able to put the item on the November ballot.

The petition had around 1,449 signatures on Thursday morning, said Michelle Kane, a Leander school district teacher who helped start it.

“Even if we don’t get the number of signatures we need, I still think it’s sending a message,” Kane said. “It says that the citizens of Cedar Park are watching and listening.”

Kelly was censured on July 30 by the City Council for comments he has made in person and on social media. Kelly said during the July 30 meeting that his Facebook comment in July was not about teachers in Texas or in the Leander school district, which includes schools in Cedar Park.

The censure was a formal reprimand and did not carry any punishment.

The petition was started on July 30 after Kelly was censured, Kane said. She said at the council meeting that Kelly’s remark not being directed at Texas teachers was a failed “halfhearted apology.”

The organizers of the petition have been gathering signatures outside their homes and at city parks because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Many people who have signed the petition have said they didn’t like Kelly’s comments about teachers, said Mary Hufnagle, a former teacher who has also been collecting signatures.

“People who have signed said they voted for him but changed their minds,” she said. “I also watched the July 30 meeting and he kept talking over everybody and wouldn’t let people speak.”

Kelly was elected by 2,916 votes in May 2019.

Kelly was censured based on a motion by Council Member Mel Kirkland that said Kelly had violated the core values of the City Council, which include promoting fairness, dignity and respect.

Kirkland’s motion also called for Kelly to be censured for violating the part of the city charter that calls for council members to show respect and courtesy to other council members, residents and city staffers during and outside of council meetings.

Mayor Corbin Van Arsdale said at the July 30 meeting that Kelly had called another council member a “stupid idiot” at a council retreat, cursed at the city attorney and had also called other elected officials “lunatics, leprechauns and losers.” The mayor said Kelly also had called a Cedar Park mother “a prostitute, a cancer, a terrorist, a lunatic and a loser.”

Kelly said at the July 30 meeting that the motion to censure him was a “witch hunt.”