CANTON – During a large, surreal public meeting that began with a search of every woman’s purse for hidden weaponry, the Cherokee County school board on Wednesday voted 7-0 to conduct a formal hearing on whether to censure its newest and most outspoken member, a tea party activist.

Among those voting to proceed was the subject of the measure, Kelly Marlow, who was elected last November. Marlow is accused of violating the board’s own rules by making an individual request for an investigation, through a June letter, to the school system’s accrediting agency.

Coloring the process was Marlow’s arrest earlier this month, for allegedly filing a false report accusing the system’s superintendent, Frank Petruzielo, of trying to run her and two others over with his car after a contentious school board meeting. A felony.

Two others, GOP political strategist Robert Trim and Cherokee County GOP secretary Barbara Knowles, were also arrested. Trim attended the evening meeting – which had been moved to the high school’s auditorium to accommodate several hundred

Attendees were led to the auditorium by corridors made of yellow police tape. All bags were hand-inspected by a full contingent of the school system’s police force.

Education has become the political hotspot in Cherokee County, largely a legacy of a charter school fight. But it has spread to the topics of vouchers and, more recently, Common Core. This note was posted Wednesday afternoon on the Facebook page of the Cherokee County GOP by Robert Strozier:

“For the love of God, literally, please behave in an appropriate manner tonight. Although there are opposing views on certain subjects, you can agree to disagree in a cordial manner.”

The evening was not an even-handed affair. The auditorium was packed with a sea of yellow T-shirts, members of SCRAM – Smart Citizens Rally Against Marlow.

PTA representatives praised the school board and condemned Marlow’s “unfounded, immaterial and inappropriate charges.” Former school board chairman Mike Chapman did likewise. “We’ve got your backs,” he told the other six.

To say the evening was awkward would be an understatement. Marlow was seated on the far stage left. At the center was Petruzielo, whom she had accused of assault. The call for the ethics hearing was made by chairman Janet Read, but neither she nor any other board member – including Marlow – spoke to it. That was left to a list of citizen speakers.

The most effective voice for the school board was John Carter of Ball Ground, a middle school band director, who said in part:

“Let’s go through the list of falsehoods that this tiny little fringe has hurled….The arrests and chain of evidence have been handled in accordance with all appropriate due process. There is no collusion or impropriety on the part of law enforcement, and any accusation to that effect is sensational and slanderous.

“They call Georgia’s decision to pursue standards that match other states [to be] indoctrination, while out of the other side of their mouths, attacking us for low performance and standards.

“They’ve accuse us of cowing to the feds with cookie-cutter curriculum, while in reality, Common Core was a state creation that allows schools and systems to select whatever curriculum they see fit.

“They’ve accused us of teaching Common Core curriculum in social studies and sex ed, that some find controversial. Get your liar’s bingo card ready. There is no Common Core for social studies. There is no Common Core for sex ed. There is no Common Core curriculum of any kind.

“Complaining to SACS is not due diligence. Anyone who would welcome a SACS inquiry into an acclaimed district such as ours is not seeking transparency, but destruction….

“One of our own school board members has accused us of using public dollars to fund field trips for students. Every parent in the room who has a child in [the Cherokee County school district] knows how laughable that is.

“In classic, counterproductive secessionism, this same board member has argued that we should withdraw from the Georgia School Board Association. My only guess as to why this would be desirable is that GSBA enumerates all the ways in which this board member underperforms.

“I just wanted to speak truth to madness. God bless the Cherokee school district.”

Supporters of Marlow reached outside Cherokee County and tapped Debbie Dooley of Tea Party Patriots – a resident of Gwinnett County. Said Dooley:

"Activists are going to ask a lot of questions. There’s a lot of suspicion between conservatives and the public school system. In Gwinnett County, we can criticize and ask questions of our school board, and we’re not attacked by teachers.

"We’re not told that if you say something negative or you question or criticize your local school board, that you want to destroy the public school system. We’re not told that, if you support school choice or charter schools, that you’re not a public school supporter.

"That has basically happened. We have had teachers with the Cherokee County school system post things on Facebook, calling tea party activists fascists. Saying that we need to be purged from the Republican party. It’s on their personal time, but that is typical of why conservatives are suspicious of the public school system.

"…I’ve been appalled at some of the reactions I’ve seen simply because we’re asking questions….I think there is much to do about nothing with Ms. Marlow’s letter of complaint to SACS. She’s simply trying to get answers to questions."

 In a private conversation, Dooley said that tea party activists in Georgia intend to make precinct-by-precinct organization a priority in Cherokee County.

There was no question of the outcome, which was accentuated by the final speaker – a petite female high school student who accused Marlow of threatening her peers. “For students nearing graduation, accreditation is everything,” she said.

The end result:  Sometime in late August or September, a legal-ish airing of the case against Marlow, and her case against the school board, will be held in a public – but perhaps more subdued – arena. A grand jury that might consider the pending criminal charges isn’t scheduled to meet until Aug. 12.

One last note: I can’t say I stayed through the entire meeting, but as I was walking out, I heard board member Michael Geist wonder out loud whether the Cherokee system should consider putting solar panels on some of its larger buildings, as a means of addressing some of its power costs. Looks like the Dublin experiment may be spreading.

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From the wilds of Washington, via Daniel Malloy: The U.S. House on Thursday night passed the Department of Defense spending bill for the coming year. A couple of amendment votes are worth noting.

First, Michigan Republican Justin Amash proposed to ban the government from obtaining "metadata" from Americans without reasonable suspicion that the target was involved in terrorism. Pushed by liberals and libertarian-leaning Republicans, the amendment -- a response to the NSA snooping scandal -- was narrowly defeated. The vote tally for Georgia's members reflected the odd split, and divided the GOP Senate hopefuls: Reps. Paul Broun and Jack Kingston backed the effort, while Phil Gingrey voted against the amendment.

Other Georgia yes votes: Tom Graves, John Lewis, Tom Price. Other nays: John Barrow, Sanford Bishop, Doug Collins, Hank Johnson, David Scott, Austin Scott, Lynn Westmoreland, Rob Woodall.

Another noteworthy amendment for the Georgia delegation was co-written by Barrow to halt military civilian furloughs under sequestration, while keeping the spending cuts in place. It passed unanimously by voice vote. The win was particularly sweet for Team Barrow after the amendment had been lambasted by the Augusta Chronicle editorial board as "little more than grandstanding" from a minority member with little clout.