Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

Homosexual detester says what?

College board candidate "would make many people feel uncomfortable.”

“Satan is attacking our family by perverting the concept of marriage, which God created to be between one man and one woman only.”

Dran Reese

This is not a rant from a fundamentalist church in Alabama; it is from a website launched by Dran Reese, a wealthy Rancho Santa Fe businesswoman who is one of two candidates running for a seat on the MiraCosta Community College Board of Trustees.

It is thought she has a decent shot at getting elected. The incumbent is not running for re-election and she is better funded than her sole challenger.

Reese is running to win a seat on the seven-member board that oversees the main MiraCosta Oceanside campus, a Cardiff campus, and a community learning center in Oceanside. Reese and her husband made their fortune selling an adhesive called Quakehold and other products that help make you safe in a disaster. She founded the Salt and Light Council, a nonprofit, nondenominational “clearinghouse of information” dedicated to promoting “biblical moral values in the public sector.”

Sponsored
Sponsored

Reese made her first big public plunge into education issues in October of 2013, when Channel 10 covered her effort to collect signatures for a petition that would make sure transgender students don’t get their choice of sports teams or bathrooms. A few months earlier she made a speech in front of the federal courthouse in San Diego, where she said, "Homosexual marriage is detestable…. No matter what judge, politician or movie star says it is equal to a marriage between one man and one woman.”

In 2011, Reese was quoted by onenewsnow.com, a division of the American Family News Network, as saying, “Homosexuals have no good quality intentions with children but to indoctrinate them into a perverted, sexual lifestyle.”

Rick Cassar

Reese’s opponent in the college-board race, Rick Cassar, says he doesn’t want to revel over provocative Reese-speak.

“I don’t want this to be another Peters versus DeMaio,” he says.

Cassar is a community college counselor at San Diego Miramar and City community colleges and an elected member of the Cardiff Union School District.

“As a counselor I celebrate diversity,” says Cassar. “When I see gay people who I work with get disparaged, I take it personally. In a community college setting, I think people need to feel safe and accepted. I think those views would make many people feel uncomfortable.”

In this campaign, Cassar says he would rather talk about issues such as college budgets and his proposal to make it easier for community-college students to transfer to universities. But, he points out, his opponent doesn’t show up to public candidate forums. Cassar says Reese attended one of three such debates.

MiraCosta faculty librarian Steven Deineh attended that October 20 forum at MiraCosta’s San Elijo campus.

“She calls transgender people pedophiles,” says Deineh. “The plentiful statements she's made against gay marriage is one thing. As a librarian, I'm all for freedom of speech and not censoring people. But she doesn't seem to understand much about the LGBT community, with an emphasis on the T for transgender. Publicly calling transgender people pedophiles is inappropriate, unacceptable, and is hate speech.

“Dran Reese is promoting a culture of intolerance that will create a hostile environment for transgender students and staff in our district and I think that’s extremely disturbing and problematic.”

Candidate Reese said by phone on October 30: “I respectfully decline to be part of your interview.”

Reese and Cassar are running for the MiraCosta Community College District 2, which serves 37,000 registered voters in Solana Beach, Rancho Santa Fe, Fairbanks Ranch, Cardiff, Olivenhain, and parts of the community known as New Encinitas.

The latest copy of the Reader

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Operatic Gender Wars

Are there any operas with all-female choruses?

“Satan is attacking our family by perverting the concept of marriage, which God created to be between one man and one woman only.”

Dran Reese

This is not a rant from a fundamentalist church in Alabama; it is from a website launched by Dran Reese, a wealthy Rancho Santa Fe businesswoman who is one of two candidates running for a seat on the MiraCosta Community College Board of Trustees.

It is thought she has a decent shot at getting elected. The incumbent is not running for re-election and she is better funded than her sole challenger.

Reese is running to win a seat on the seven-member board that oversees the main MiraCosta Oceanside campus, a Cardiff campus, and a community learning center in Oceanside. Reese and her husband made their fortune selling an adhesive called Quakehold and other products that help make you safe in a disaster. She founded the Salt and Light Council, a nonprofit, nondenominational “clearinghouse of information” dedicated to promoting “biblical moral values in the public sector.”

Sponsored
Sponsored

Reese made her first big public plunge into education issues in October of 2013, when Channel 10 covered her effort to collect signatures for a petition that would make sure transgender students don’t get their choice of sports teams or bathrooms. A few months earlier she made a speech in front of the federal courthouse in San Diego, where she said, "Homosexual marriage is detestable…. No matter what judge, politician or movie star says it is equal to a marriage between one man and one woman.”

In 2011, Reese was quoted by onenewsnow.com, a division of the American Family News Network, as saying, “Homosexuals have no good quality intentions with children but to indoctrinate them into a perverted, sexual lifestyle.”

Rick Cassar

Reese’s opponent in the college-board race, Rick Cassar, says he doesn’t want to revel over provocative Reese-speak.

“I don’t want this to be another Peters versus DeMaio,” he says.

Cassar is a community college counselor at San Diego Miramar and City community colleges and an elected member of the Cardiff Union School District.

“As a counselor I celebrate diversity,” says Cassar. “When I see gay people who I work with get disparaged, I take it personally. In a community college setting, I think people need to feel safe and accepted. I think those views would make many people feel uncomfortable.”

In this campaign, Cassar says he would rather talk about issues such as college budgets and his proposal to make it easier for community-college students to transfer to universities. But, he points out, his opponent doesn’t show up to public candidate forums. Cassar says Reese attended one of three such debates.

MiraCosta faculty librarian Steven Deineh attended that October 20 forum at MiraCosta’s San Elijo campus.

“She calls transgender people pedophiles,” says Deineh. “The plentiful statements she's made against gay marriage is one thing. As a librarian, I'm all for freedom of speech and not censoring people. But she doesn't seem to understand much about the LGBT community, with an emphasis on the T for transgender. Publicly calling transgender people pedophiles is inappropriate, unacceptable, and is hate speech.

“Dran Reese is promoting a culture of intolerance that will create a hostile environment for transgender students and staff in our district and I think that’s extremely disturbing and problematic.”

Candidate Reese said by phone on October 30: “I respectfully decline to be part of your interview.”

Reese and Cassar are running for the MiraCosta Community College District 2, which serves 37,000 registered voters in Solana Beach, Rancho Santa Fe, Fairbanks Ranch, Cardiff, Olivenhain, and parts of the community known as New Encinitas.

Comments
Sponsored

The latest copy of the Reader

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

East San Diego County has only one bike lane

So you can get out of town – from Santee to Tierrasanta
Next Article

Aaron Stewart trades Christmas wonders for his first new music in 15 years

“Just because the job part was done, didn’t mean the passion had to die”
Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

This Week’s Reader This Week’s Reader