Topeka ? Democrats on Wednesday criticized State Board of Education member Connie Morris for her newsletter that ripped several board members and her stay at a posh hotel in Miami Beach, Fla. – both paid for by taxpayers.

Two Democratic board members described the newsletter as character assassination and improper, while the Kansas Democratic Party blasted Morris, a Republican from St. Francis, for billing taxpayers $339 per night for six nights at the Fontainebleau Hotel.

“There are families throughout Kansas who spend less on rent in a month than what she spent in a single night. So much for fiscal conservatism,” Kansas Democratic Party Executive Director Mark Simpson said.

After a heated discussion Wednesday about the newsletter during the State Board of Education meeting, Chairman Steve Abrams, a Republican from Arkansas City, said the policy committee of the board should review board policies on mailings to constituents.

Morris didn’t back off her newsletter or her trip in April to attend a conference in Miami Beach on magnet schools.

Morris said she welcomed the review of policies on member mailings.

“I’d like to know what the parameters are,” she said.

The policy committee includes Morris and two other Republican board members, Carol Rupe of Wichita and Ken Willard of Hutchinson.

In the newsletter, Morris blasted proponents of science standards being considered by the board that supported evolution, and she made personal, negative comments about board members who disagreed with her. Morris has sought reimbursement of $166 for the newsletter.

Democrat Bill Wagnon of Topeka said the newsletter was partisan and amounted to “character assassination.”

“I object to the taxpayers of Kansas paying for attacks on me,” he said.

During the Miami trip, Morris said, she stayed at the resort because that was where the conference by the Washington, D.C.-based Magnet Schools of America took place. She said she did not want to stay at less expensive nearby hotels.

She said she could not get the less expensive conference rate, which, according to a schedule of the conference, was about $166 per night, less than half of what Morris’ room cost.

Magnet Schools of America did not return telephone calls by the Lawrence Journal-World.