From a press release:
Joan Krupa holds news conference in front of Pleasant Hill School to discuss Jehan Gordon’s denial of an abysmal attendance record as a member of the school board and Gordon’s lying about canceling her participation in the Kiwanis debate on Wednesday
Krupa: “Jehan Gordon has sent out mailers saying she has learned from her mistakes, but these continued deceptions are disturbing and the voters have a right to know about them.”
Life-long Democrat and former Peoria County Board Chair Sharon Kennedy joined Krupa to praise Krupa’s work on the county board and explain why it is such a breach of public trust to hold a position and not show up.
(PEORIA) When Jehan Gordon deceived WHOI News yesterday by denying that she had an abysmal attendance record as a school board member for Pleasant Hill School, and she falsely claimed to have called to cancel her participation in the 92nd District Kiwanis Club debate, Krupa decided to hold a news conference to air the truth and call attention to the facts.
Gordon also recently sent out two mailers focusing on “character” and saying she had make mistakes but has learned from them. That is hard to believe in light of her prevaricating to WHOI News just yesterday about two separate matters.
Gordon also has failed to explain why she skipped out on two debates she agreed to participate in this week. She called the Peoria Medical Society hours before their debate to cancel her attendance. But for the Kiwanis Club full blown debate for just the two candidates in the 92nd District, she just didn’t show up without notifying anyone, despite her claim of doing so. She left Kiwanis leaders and members hanging as they tried repeatedly to call her when the debate was supposed to start. They continued for some time trying to reach her and then began the program 20 minutes late when they realized she just wasn’t going to show up.
Gordon told WHOI News yesterday that her “opponent does not want to talk about issues that affect people.” Krupa responded today saying, “I would love to focus on other issues, but it is hard to debate those issues when my opponent skipped two scheduled debates in two days.”
Krupa then said, “When you boil down all the problems in our state government in Springfield, it comes down to bad character. As I speak with voters they agree with me that character is a central issue in this campaign.”
Krupa released a Freedom of Information Act response from the administration of the Pleasant Hill School showing Gordon missed 40% of meetings from when she began as a board member into August of this year. Since then the school had their September meeting and a couple special meetings, giving Gordon a 32% absentee rate and being late for quarter of the meetings she did attend.
Sharon Kennedy, former Peoria County Board Chair who served as a Democrat and worked with Krupa praised the work Krupa did on the county board and said “Joan always showed up well prepared and was a model public servant.” Kennedy castigated Jehan Gordon saying Gordon’s missing such a high percentage of meetings was a breach of the public trust and that she let down the students, teachers and administrators who all rely on the leadership of their school board.
Krupa once again noted that if Gordon was a student at Pleasant Hill instead of a school board member she would be classified as a “chronic truant” with such an abysmal attendance record.
Krupa said Jehan Gordon’s lying just yesterday to WHOI about that attendance record and her not showing up at the Kiwanis debate is further evidence that Gordon has not changed her ways that have gotten her into so much trouble.
Krupa detailed aspects of the disturbing pattern of bad judgment and a lack of character in Jehan Gordon, in addition to being AWOL from school board meetings 32% of the time and being late to one quarter of those she did attend, and then denying it to WHOI News.
Gordon, who was a communications major, has played with words before to fool people into believing positive things about her that are not true. For instance, Gordon was forced to pull an ad in the primary election earlier this year that falsely said she graduated from the University of Illinois.
Jehan Gordon was arrested for shoplifting when she was 19 years old, but the disturbing aspect of that is that she only paid the fines associated with that conviction 8 years later, which was only two weeks before the primary. One wonders if those fines would have ever been paid if Jehan Gordon had not decided to run for state representative.
Continuing that pattern of skipping out on making good on convictions, Gordon was arrested for being “unlicensed,” driving without insurance and no valid registration in 2004 and 2005 when she was in her mid-twenties. Again, the disturbing aspect is that it took her years to pay the fines and she did so only when she was in the middle of her campaign for state representative.
Then Gordon had the audacity to criticize her opponent for not debating the issues, which is hard to do since Gordon skipped out on two debates just this week and then denied she didn’t show up without giving notice to the Kiwanis.
Krupa said there are vast difference for the voters to consider regarding the two candidates positions on issues, records in office, accomplishments, character and integrity.
For the little it is worth I have seen Jehan Gordon multiples times at multiple community events. I have yet to see Kupra anywhere except on Google.
quite a rant Joan
Yup, Mahnko, you got it right. Your anecdotal comment is worth little. Let the facts speak for themselves. By the way, its Krupa, not Kupra.
And Tulip, your vigorous defense speaks volumes.
Joan, the places these negative commentators with no names, can be found at rap concerts, mud wrestlings and turkey shoots or so I suspect by the “intellectual” depth of their comments.
Gordon is a falsehood teller and should step out of the race.
Merle are you making fun of the Cantonians and their nude midget mud wrestling??
This needs to be fact checked. I will travel to the next nude midget mud wrestling event in Canton and poll those in attendance to see if they are commenting anonymously in favor of Gordon on local blogs.
Yes Merle.. I am so into rap, mud wrestling and turkey shoots… LOL.
One of these elections, there will be a candidate who will rise above the negative comments; blatherings about the “failings” of his/her opponent; and let the public figure these things out for themselves. I don’t want to vote for Joan because she’s not Jehan… I want to find a reason to vote for Joan because she’s Joan.
This type of crap doesn’t help me to that conclusion.
According to Merle anyone who doesn’t believe in the RIGHT, is well, substandard. I don’t know how I’m going to break this to my midget girlfriend currently on the mud wrestling tour.
I can’t wait to get old, pull my pants up to my neck and yell:”Get off my lawn you little shits!”
Rap concerts
Mud wrestling
Turkey shoots
Who are talking about Merle? Who is the “They” that you obviously think you are better than?
If Joan feels she is better than those people, too, that is enough reason not to vote for her. SHe needs to be able to represent EVERYONE… not just the people you like.
Bad night at bingo Merle?
I went looking at the write in procedures for that office. It was not easy to find coherent information on write ins. It also was not very clear how it worked once I found it. Looked like you had to declare your intent to be write in candidate 61 days before the election. 61 days?!?! We have obviously passed that.
A good write in candidate sure would be welcomed about now.
There are a lot of reasons to vote for Joan Krupa. Attend a debate (assuming the opponant shows and there is a debate) or an event to hear from her personally. She absolutely shines!
Joan also has a very impressive bio and record of accomplishment. Some of it is here:
http://peoriarocks.blogspot.com/2008/09/republican-candidate-joan-krupa-accepts.html
Also check here:
http://joankrupa.com/2008/09/18/state-house-candidate-joan-krupa-engages-the-peoria-business-community/
You shouldn’t hold Joan accountable for the attendance problems of her opponent. She is just the messenger.
Merle and Diane,
Please. Your loyalty to Joan is noteworthy. You can all slap each other on the back at the next Rotary Club meeting. You two are a couple of Republicans who fit the bill perfectly!
Merle,
When did you become so bitter? You used to be fun. Now you sound like a grumpy old Republican stuff-shirt with a corncob up your _ _ _ _[nose?].
I can see voting for Krupa; good public service record [like 200 other people I know]. Joan might even be sincere in her desire to help central Illinois, but Aaron Schock?!? She might have secured my vote, but I believe her to be guilty by association!
Peoria politics is little more than a cozy circle of local Republican elites, running the show at their leisure…as it were. The “Circle the Mayor,” “Build the Mayor,” “Circle the Museum,” or what ever they call it is typical of Peoria politics.
This may sound like socialist bantering, etc, but the proof is in the hole…the big hole downtown. Seeing Schock/Krupa signs everywhere makes leads me to believe that Joan is all about party politics.
Joan,
Are you going to tell the rest of the world how many food stamp recipients we have in Peoria as well?!?!?!?!?
You’re right.
To my knowlege, neither Krupa nor Schock had anything to do with the hole downtown.
New Voice: How many Republican or Democratic candidates do you know who campaign against their own party? Republican politicians generally support Republican politicians and vice-versa for Democratic politicians. I believe it is always up to the voters to discern the best candidates from both parties. I very rarely have voted a straight ticket and certainly don’t intend to do so in this election. My vote this year will be more skewed toward the Democratic–with the exception of Joan and, yes, Aaron. However, I do believe that–first as Aaron did–now Joan will put party politics aside when she gets to Springfield. Our best bet is to vote for someone who will work with legislators on both sides of the aisle for the interests of downstaters. Rather than repeat my reasons for voting for Joan, you can read my comments on Vespa’s blog. None of my reasons for voting for Joan have anything to do with the personal issues about Jehan. I have known Joan for over twenty years, and I believe that everything she has done as a career and in her volunteer work make her well-suited to this job. I hope Joan wins the election, but I also hope that Jehan continues to follow her desires for public service in the future. This time youth is not on her side–in my opinion.
Diane,
“To my knowledge, neither Krupa nor Schock had anything to do with the hole downtown.”
– You may be correct, but then again…… I guess the only thing we can do is wait and see. If she wins, Krupa will be representing her ENTIRE district. The same goes for Schock. We will see which way the wind blows when the museum and other issues come up [at least on a local level]. We will see just how ‘people’ oriented these candidates are.
Sharon,
– Your post really had me going until you wrote “I do believe that–first as Aaron did–now Joan will put party politics aside when she gets to Springfield.”
You cannot be serious! You are talking about a guy who has little red, white, and blue elephants on his pajamas for heaven’s sake!!!!
New Voice: I do believe that Aaron worked for the good of downstate while he was in Springfield. I admit that my vote for Aaron is still related to my own experiences with him as a member of District 150 board member. As a teacher, I found that he was open to teacher opinions–not a usual stance for board members before that era. He listened to our concerns about how things were going in our classrooms with Dr. Royster as superintendent–so my vote for Aaron is very personal–not related to party politics.
Where can I pick up a pair of those!??
The next A. Schock ‘Garage Sale.’
Good one! 😉