Support for Wehmhoff does not legitimize his actions

The Instagram post is disgusting.

Any attempt at an explanation or rationalization does not change this.

All the sweat and love Dale Wehmhoff has given to hockey and the Norwalk-McMahon program does not change this. Neither does the outpouring of support he has received from players and parents, past and present, during a contentious process that has left Wehmhoff suspended for the 2017-2018 season.

Among several outrageous posts Wehmhoff put on his Instagram account before he was rehired as coach in 2016 — posts he has described as adult humor — one stands out as especially disturbing.

There is a photo of a van. On the van are stereotypical caricatures of two African savages and the words “2 (N-word) and a stolen truck.” Among the national haters, there had been an assertion there was a small moving company in Detroit that used this van. The meme was a sick, false joke.

A joke Wehmhoff tried to rationalize in recent days to The Norwalk Hour. He said the photo had been sent to him by a former player, an African-American, who later emailed Norwalk superintendent of schools Steven J. Adamowski that there was nothing racist behind the post.

I have a black friend so I can post something so demeaning? Seriously?

Wehmhoff supporters, who reached out to The Hour after its report of his termination-turnedsuspension, said any claims he is a racist are absurd. This may or may not be true. Putting a man’s deepest-held racial beliefs on fast, public trial certainly is dangerous business.

Yet at the very least Wehmhoff’s horrible judgment and, to this point, his lack of contrition for his Instagram posts must come under scrutiny before he ever could be allowed back as the team’s coach.

McMahon’s student body is 22 percent African-American and 49 percent Latino. Norwalk High is 20 percent African-American and 38 percent Latino. How does Wehmhoff explain the moving van meme to them? How does

Wehmhoff explain his Instagram post of a photo of a smiling Jackie Kennedy next to an unflattering photo of a shouting Michelle Obama with the words, “What Happened America?”

There must be 15 to 20 objectionable posts by Wehmhoff from 2011-2015. Posts he left standing through his first year back as Norwalk-McMahon coach in 2016-17. Most are not about race. There is a woman with her shirt open, breasts exposed, examining a man’s teeth with the words, “would this help with your fears at the dentist.” A woman pulling up a skirt to show underwear with a picture of a cat. Blatantly suggestive T-shirts about sausages. And others, about women making life hard, resuscitating a drowning victim, etc., that we can’t clean up enough to fully portray in a family newspaper.

To this point the harsh focus by Wehmhoff and his supporters has been on the anonymous emails that alerted Norwalk High athletic director Doug Marchetti and later Adamowski and the Norwalk Board of Education of the posts.

“I did everything I was asked to do, but whoever this anonymous person is has an ax to grind, and I think the Board of Ed was afraid it would make the papers,” Wehmhoff told The Hour. “If they reinstate me this year, I’ll come back. If not, I’ll never coach in Norwalk again, and they’ll be the ones to lose out and (the program) will go back to what it was. The only winner after all this is anonymous.”

Whoa. It doesn’t matter if you’re Scotty Bowman and Herb Brooks wrapped up into one hockey genius. Such imposing words do not serve Wehmhoff or, more importantly, the players he loves. Whether it is a persistent crusader who believes young people should not be mentored by a coach with a history of disturbing posts or an old hockey beef, the anonymous person is not the central part of the matter.

“We’re disappointed Mr. Wehmhoff chose to challenge this decision in the media,” said Brenda Wilcox Williams, chief communications officer for Norwalk Public Schools. “It was the district’s intention to treat this as a private personnel matter out of respect to Mr. Wehmhoff.”

Wilcox Williams repeated the district’s previous statement that the decision was not solely based on an anonymous complaint, and that the posts were determined by a subsequent district investigation to be “blatantly racist, sexist and sexually suggestive.” She said the Board of Education viewed the posts and supports the superintendent’s decision.

“The Norwalk Hour has reported on selected pieces of the story from Mr. Wehmhoff ’s point of view,” Wilcox Williams said. “We had declined comment and were surprised when Mr. Wehmhoff chose to discuss this in the press, especially given the nature of the social media post under discussion.”

With that, Wilcox Williams made available Adamowski’s letter of suspension to Wehmhoff, portions of which the coach had already referred to in The Hour article. She also made available copies of the Instagram posts Wehmhoff agreed to take down after Marchetti confronted Wehmhoff after the initial October email.

As Adamowski outlined, Marchetti did not report the complaint or share the Instagram posts with Norwalk principal Reginald Roberts. Wehmhoff ’s good fortune ran out when the anonymous emailer then brought the complaint to Adamowski and the Board of Education in December. There was a meeting involving Wehmhoff and several Norwalk education officials. A letter of termination was sent to Wehmhoff.

In his own letter dated Jan. 8, Adamowski wrote that Wehmhoff indicated he thought the posts he had received from friends were funny and wanted to share them. While it did not appear Wehmhoff directly sent the pictures to members of the team, Adamowski wrote several players “of their own admission were aware of those posts and the images were circulated to one or more of cheerleaders and their parents.” Amid the posts were hockey pictures and a cheerleader photo. Wehmhoff’s daughter coaches the McMahon cheerleaders.

Adamowski wrote that Wehmhoffs’s actions were a direct violation of Norwalk’s social media policy and an abrogation of several of the Connecticut State Department of Education Coaching Competencies and dispositions that are the basis for the issuance of a coaching permit. Wehmhoff, who has a landscaping business and is not a teacher, told The Hour he was not told about the district’s social media policy when he was hired.

What about common sense and common decency?

Much time and effort is spent by teachers and coaches these days explaining to students and athletes about the damage they can do to themselves on social media. Surely, teachers and coaches know about these damages. Even if Wehmhoff and his supporters want to stress the posts were made before he was rehired, there is zero excuse for leaving that garbage up when he became a candidate to coach teenagers in a public school. And school districts should know enough to take a cursory look at a candidate’s social media profile.

At any rate, Wehmhoff appealed the decision by NPS Chief Talent Officer Cherese Chery to terminate him. Support for Wehmhoff, a longtime area coach who had success in Norwalk in the late 1980s, had gathered in the hockey community. He and Adamowski met Jan. 2. Six days later the termination was changed to a year suspension.

Adamowski wrote: “Despite your apparent naïvete, lack of professional judgment and the demeaning attitude toward AfricanAmericans and women suggested by your Instagram activities, by all other accounts, you have demonstrated you are a skilled hockey coach who routinely goes ‘above and beyond’ for members of the team. You have earned strong support from your players and their parents.”

Roberts can choose to rehire Wehmhoff next season. He first would have to complete diversity/sensitivity training at his own expense. Maybe those supporters who are so angry at the anonymous emailer instead will encourage Wehmhoff to take what he learns and engage the broader spectrum of Norwalk students in healthy discussion. If you love your players so much, show them it’s not only about Ws and raising money for the program.

“It is clear to me coaching hockey is your life passion,” Adamowski wrote to Wehmhoff. “I trust this is a life lesson.”

Instead Wehmhoff, whose son is coaching the team in his absence, told The Hour, “If I’m good enough to come back next year, why not take the class now and come back (this season)?”

Because you haven’t learned anything yet, Dale.