A crisis public relations consultant hired by the Broward school district told an audience last July that some critics of the Broward County school district’s Promise program, which permitted students who committed minor crimes to avoid jail, were “crazies.”
Sara Brady, who was hired in the aftermath of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting of February 2018, also referred to South Florida Sun Sentinel reporter Scott Travis as a “nasty, skanky reporter” who “smells bad … he is sloppy, he’s reckless, he’s mean, and he smells bad,” as she and the audience laughed, prompting Broward school district spokeswoman Tracy Clark to respond, “Sour milk!” and trigger more laughter, according to the Sun Sentinel.
Brady’s comments followed a state commission finding in June that doubted the Promise program had affected the shooting. Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, chairman of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School School Safety Commission, said, “I don’t think the Promise program has a hill of beans to do with the outcome of this. I think what has to do with the outcome of this is why he was able to get out of that car and wander through an unlocked door and get into that building totally unchallenged. You’ve got access that was free and unfettered.”
Brady stated, “And sure enough, all the crazies kind of came out. The district knows who the crazies are and who the opposition is, and so certainly they seized on it and started putting stuff out there.”
Hunter Pollack, whose sister Meadow was murdered in the high school shooting, fired off this tweet on Monday when the video surfaced:
Pollack fired off another on Tuesday:
Brady apologized, writing in response to Pollack, “Mr. Pollack … my remarks were intended to poke at the media in general. I offer my profound apology for my lapse in judgment and display of disrespect.” She tweeted, “My comments about ‘crazies’ were part of an overall presentation for communication practitioners and were in reference to the anonymous trolls and bots who seemingly always appear after these hideous tragedies.”
Brady, who had served as a police reporter at the Orlando Sentinel, admitted later, “I probably went a little overboard in my comments about the reporter. It’s just kind of shop talk. I acknowledge that.” She added, “My bigger concern is that anyone who lost a loved one thinks I was referring to them. And I was not, in any way, shape or form.”
School board member Robin Bartleman forwarded a link to the video of Brady’s statement to Broward school superintendent Robert Runcie, asserting:
FYI, many of those people asking questions were the victims’ families. She also speaks derogatorily about the Sun Sentinel and Scott Travis. Criticizing the media and his questions are fair game; however, she certainly did not model our character traits and went way overboard including telling the audience how he smells terrible and Tracy Clark shouts out from the audience “like sour milk.”
Runcie stated of Brady, “She doesn’t work for us anymore, nor will that person ever be working for us again.”