Best Foes Forever

Nashville schools director Pedro Garcia isn’t a thin-skinned man. He’s well aware of what people say about him—and he’s even been known to egg it on: an autocrat who rules by fear; a leader who’s unpopular with legions of parents and teachers, not to mention a healthy number of principals; a tool of the Chamber of Commerce who works tirelessly to co-opt the monied classes to the exclusion of other constituencies. All of it rolls off the back of the towering 61-year-old educator. He was more amused than offended when former U.S. Sen. Jim Sasser mistakenly recognized him from the podium as “Dr. Gonzales” at a well-attended Nashville Alliance for Public Education fundraiser last week. “I thought it was funny,” Garcia says, before launching into a story about once being introduced as “Poncho Gonzales” when he held his first job as principal. (By the way, Sasser, the classic WASP in contrast to the Cuban-born schools director, corrected himself, but not quickly enough for the embarrassing gaffe to be forgotten.) Finally, as if the litany of other complaints about the dean of Bransford Avenue weren’t enough, many critics resent Garcia for his well-publicized flirtations with other school districts, and regard him as an ambitious district jumper who’s only biding his time until a plum superintendent job in his home state of California opens up.

That last rap on Garcia is somewhat ironic, given that his five-and-a-half years in Nashville actually make him the second most tenured director among urban districts nationwide. Asked whether he would take his California dream post tomorrow, he says flatly, “No. I’d wait until Monday,” before adding more seriously, “If you had asked me that three months ago, I would have said ‘absolutely.’ But not now.... It would have to be a hell of an offer, a real huge offer.”

His sudden loyalty to Nashville is largely mercenary, even he concedes. And it’s happened because those most rabid of Garcia true believers—local businessmen with last names such as Cigarran and Ingram—helped fund last August what was perhaps the most choreographed business-bankrolled school board election in Nashville history. School board members who had grown particularly antagonistic toward Garcia suddenly saw themselves with a lot more free time on their hands, while, by and large, serious, fresh-faced replacements stepped into their shadows. The end result was a dream come true for Garcia, who no doubt regarded the time he’d invested on the 37215 cocktail party circuit time well spent. His backers and the new board saw him as the beleaguered chief executive officer who’d been shat upon and disrespected by the previous board all over the media and around town. Collectively, his new bosses decided they’d be different. They’d give him the benefit of the doubt, along with a hefty raise, and do something else their predecessors had decided against—renew his contract. Oh, and another thing: they all but took a blood oath not to criticize Garcia or the administration outside official channels—during school board meetings, board committee meetings and one-on-one meetings with the director.

“Before they renewed my contract,” Garcia says over lunch at El Palenque, “the other 49 states looked pretty appealing.”

Board members have pretty well stuck by their pact with one another, and a core group of Nashville business leaders who have their hand in education have remained loyally pro-Garcia, doing all they can to play down the significant failures of the 70,000-student public school system—and relentlessly spin the successes.

But over the last six months or so, there’s been a volume increase in the negative chatter about Garcia. Critics complain that he hasn’t taken seriously the formal criticisms of a citizens’ panel that recently released recommendations for the school system. He’s lost respect among some independent-minded business leaders who feel Garcia is sabotaging school reform efforts. Parents and others are frustrated that Garcia’s backers try to snuff out criticism at every turn.

In short, what all the disciplined messaging from the devoted Kool-Aid drinkers can’t possibly hide is this: Garcia remains extremely controversial, arguably more than ever.

Perhaps it’s Garcia’s willingness to say what he thinks, without taking the time to edit himself or consider diplomacy, that helps explain some of the criticism against him. After some unrelated chitchat at his favorite Mexican lunch spot in Green Hills—the movie buff “endured” the crude Golden Globe Award-winning comedy Borat while his wife walked out after five minutes, and he’s in favor of standard school attire on the grounds that uniforms send a message to students that “school is important”—Garcia addresses a question about the recently released Citizens Panel Report Card, researched and written by a diverse group of Nashvillians under the auspices of the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce.