By Jen Schumann | Rocky Mountain Voice
Hunter Opilla didn’t expect to speak at a school board meeting when his family moved to Durango two years ago. But after learning about the district’s gender bathroom policy—and the board’s decision to reverse a superintendent directive—he says he felt he had no choice. “Just blank stares,” Opilla recalled on a recent episode of Heidi Ganahl’s Unleashed podcast. “The board never responded to my emails.”
Ganahl’s latest podcast brings together a concerned father and a charter school founder to unpack what they call a pattern of political overreach and parental exclusion in Durango Schools. The conversation echoes issues previously covered by Rocky Mountain Voice in its Dirty Dozen series and recent reporting on board transparency and trust.
The Dirty Dozen goes deeper
“Parents are starting to fight back,” Ganahl says as she runs through “the Dirty Dozen—the 12 ways the Durango schools are hurting our kids.”
“Colorado is teed up to be the center of where a lot of bad things happen in our schools,” Ganahl said. “We put together a highlight over 12 days… the 12 ways the Durango schools are hurting our kids.”
She cites three civil rights complaints alleging discrimination in hiring, programs and policies; a federal criminal case involving a former teacher; consultant spending on DEI; and a gender‑support plan that can leave parents out of notification decisions.
“This was developed with CASB guidance, which is the Colorado Association of School Boards, and it includes therapists and counselors deciding if parents will be notified about a student’s gender transition. You’d think that they’d want parents very involved in that conversation… parents, it’s time for you to demand clarity,” Ganahl says.
Ganahl frames the money spent on a single DEI training day as another example of misplaced priorities. “Do you know what $69,000 could do for a classroom?” Ganahl asked. “Parents, you’ve got to demand a breakdown of the spending in your school district and ask why this stuff is being prioritized over education.”
“Just blank stares”: a Durango father speaks out
Opilla, who has three children in the district—one in middle school and two in elementary—told Ganahl he began speaking out after the board adopted a policy allowing students to use the bathroom of the gender they identify with.
“I thought it was a good thing when they banned political flags,” he said. “Then they backpedaled. The board is the problem.” He described emailing the superintendent and board members multiple times and receiving “a big run around” or no response at all.
He also challenged the board’s claim that the bathroom policy simply followed state law. “It’s a totally false argument,” Opilla said. “The statute talks about new state buildings having a single-stall gender neutral bathroom. It says nothing about letting people identify and use whatever bathroom they want.”
Opilla said local media hasn’t covered these concerns. “All we really have is the Durango Herald newspaper,” he said. “They’re obviously pretty left-leaning.”
He compared the board’s approach to “enabling a family member that may be addicted to drugs… it’s just going to get worse.” What kids need, he added, is love and support—but that “doesn’t elevate them to a special class where they… violate the privacy and security of other people.”
Looking ahead to the school board election, Opilla believes change is possible—but only if more parents speak up.
Many, he said, are busy or hesitant to get involved, but emphasized that the board needs to see how many people are concerned. “When it comes to your kids, it’s the best you can do—especially as a father. You’ve got to put yourself out there when things aren’t right.”
A classical school the board wouldn’t allow
Charter school advocate Kim Gilmartin, Founder and Executive Director of Liberty Schools Initiative, also joined the podcast to reflect on her attempt to bring a classical charter school to Durango in 2021. “We worked for almost two years… and the school board denied it,” Gilmartin shared.
“There were over 650 students signed up… watching parents walk out in tears was heartbreaking. They really felt that they had no options or choices,” Gilmartin said. “Over 50% of families were already homeschooling because they had no other options.”
Gilmartin, who helped lead the charter effort, said many families were drawn to the proposed school because of its academic focus—not a political agenda. “It is simply a very good, solid, content-rich curriculum,” she said.
“But many times it gets mischaracterized as being on one side of a political spectrum, which it is not.” She said the curriculum would have included phonics, Singapore Math, cursive, Latin, lessons on self-governance and “history that has not been whitewashed.”
Families, she emphasized, “just want the schools to focus on academics.”
She believes the board was “ideologically opposed” to the proposal from the start. “Based on so much of what was written in the denial resolution,” she said, “it was clear they were simply ideologically opposed to everything the curriculum stood for.”
Gilmartin’s conclusion? “Nothing’s going to change until you get the right people on the school board.”
Patterns of politics and silence
Ganahl linked Opilla’s and Gilmartin’s experiences to the broader themes of the Dirty Dozen, which also flagged the district’s gender policies, test scores and political activity.
In a case that brought its political activity under formal review, the district was fined by the Secretary of State’s Elections Division for promoting board member Katie Stewart’s State House run. Stewart now holds both positions simultaneously.
Ganahl described the promotion as a misuse of public resources, saying the district “drafted and circulated a letter endorsing Stewart and claiming she could handle both roles,” then posted it online and emailed it to over 7,000 parents and staff. “They’re playing politics with your tax dollars,” she said, noting that although the district paid the fine, “the damage is done.”
She encouraged parents statewide to “stay nosy… ask your children a lot of questions.”
Opilla said most Durango parents simply don’t know what’s happening. “When they hear about it, they’re like, ‘Oh my God, I didn’t know that was going on.’” He urged other fathers to attend school board meetings. “If it’s just me and the other dad going there every time, they’re just going to say, ‘Oh, it’s just these two guys again.’”
Gilmartin said many parents are “just praying that something will change in the future… that maybe there will be some school board members elected that believe in parental choice.”
Upcoming board meeting
The next regular school board meeting will be on October 28 at Durango High School. A meeting agenda will be posted here: https://www.durangoschools.org/apps/events/2025/10/28/29782457/?id=0.
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