Meeting Times 

by Alex Saitta 

October 24, 2016 

 

 

Forever, the school board has held its regular monthly meeting in the evening on the fourth Monday of the month. Once in a while, if there is a holiday (e.g., Memorial Day) the meeting is held on the next evening. So I was suprised to get a notice the 6 pm, Monday, Oct 24th meeting would be cancelled and the meeting would be held Friday, October 21 at 9 am instead. 

 

I went to the Friday morning meeting, and when it came to the vote cancelling the Monday October 24th meeting,  I asked why is the regular Monday meeting being cancelled? The chairman said she scheduled this special meeting Friday morning because she would be out of town next week. I then said, a chairman has never tried to cancel a regular Monday meeting because they were not going to be here. The vice-chairman has the job to run the regularly scheduled meeting when the chairman is out.  

 

The meetings are for the public and are to be scheduled when the public and the press is available to attend. It is not about the personal schedule of any one board member.  

 

I also objected to the trend of regularly having meetings when the public and press is unlikely to attend. Look at these dates and times of many meetings this year. 

 

Jan 30, Sat 7 am, 

Feb 6, Sat 6:30 am 

Mar 12, Sat 7:30 am 

Apr 12, Tues7 am 

Apr 21, Thurs 7 am 

Jul 21, Thurs 7 am 

Aug 6, Sat 12:30 pm 

Sep 23, Fri 8:30 am 

Oct 21, Fri 9 am 

 

Henry Wilson (Dacusville Trustee) has not been able to attend the last two meetings because they were during working hours. This also supports my point that all meetings need to be scheduled after work when the public, press and all board members can attend. 

 

Look at the list, that is 9 meetings this year on either off-days or off-hours or both. Either there is a purposeful desire to have meetings when the public is unlikely to attend or there is a disregard for the public’s schedule and when they could attend.  

 

The motion passed 3 to 1 to cancel Monday's regular scheduled meeting, and have it Friday morning instead.  

 

 

 

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