Gay school chief angered by smear fliers: Brown loses election by 110 votes after literature was mailed to homes
The flier may violate state laws since it is unsigned.

By Craig Garrett / The Detroit News

The gay president of Wayne-Westland's school board will file a complaint with Westland police this week, asking investigators to find the author of a smear flier that may have cost her re-election Monday.

Trish Brown, 33, also said her supporters are getting threatening phone calls from opponents.

"It's crazy to allow anyone to get away with ruining someone's life," said Brown, who never made her homosexuality an issue during her four years on the school board. "People have to be held accountable."

Brown is angry that campaign literature labeling her as a "butch" and "dyke" was sent to homes within the school district during the weeks before the election. There are about 15,000 students in Wayne-Westland schools and 66,000 registered voters; just 1,968 turned out Monday to elect two school board trustees. Brown lost by 110 votes. Her term expires at the end of the month.

Brown said a particularly vicious one-page flier, labeled "Take a Hike Dyke", may violate state laws since it is unsigned and it urged Wayne-Westland voters to toss her from the job because she's gay.

And attacking a candidate in campaign literature because of sexual orientation violates state campaign finance laws, Brown said. She wants police to find and prosecute the group or person responsible for distributing the unsigned flier.

Robin Moore, a Wayne-Westland school board trustee, said her campaign office received a call this week from a woman who said "her days on the board are numbered."

"We've been told they'll 'get' anyone and everyone who supported Trish Brown," Moore said. "There is a personal vendetta against her that I never realized ... it's very confrontational."

One Westland parent who did campaign against Brown said she's not concerned about a police investigation.

Gena Giannuzzi said she opposed Brown's endorsement in January of a district policy that supports the rights of gay students and employees. Four civil rights policies were unanimously approved by the seven-member school board after a national school board association pushed for the resolution.

Giannuzzi said: "It's not the school's place to regulate behavior."

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