Michael Beane resigned from his position on the Commerce Independent School District Board of Trustees this morning. The announcement came at a special meeting of the Commerce ISD board.
Beane played a central role in the highly publicized incident on May 20 involving Commerce police chief Kerry Crews and Texas A&M University-Commerce student Carmen Ponder. Beane initiated a verbal altercation in the parking lot of the Commerce Walmart. Beane has said that his actions were in response to Ponder’s driving.
“I did not call her anything racial at any point in time, nothing at all,” Beane told dfw.cbslocal.com. “I did say a couple curse words at her, but nothing racial at all.”
Ponder has accused Beane of calling her a “black b----“ during the confrontation. Ponder initially identified Crews as making the remarks, and it was that account of the incident that went viral online. Ponder later identified Beane as being the other party in the road-rage incident.
Beane has said that he and his family have been receiving threats since his involvement in the incident became public. Beane said that his resignation was motivated by his opinion that the publicity has been bad for the school district.
Crews became involved in the confrontation at the request of Beane. Ponder was arrested and charged with evading detention, although the charge was later dropped. As a result of fallout from the incident, Crews has announced his intention to resign from the Commerce Police Department and will move into an Assistant to the City Manager position.
