Berkeley County Board of Education acts with ignorance or arrogance

On Nov. 15, six members of the Berkeley County Board of Education voted to fire the school district’s superintendent and its attorney and hire a new superintendent and attorney. These actions may have been illegal.

 

Meetings of this school board are governed by the South Carolina Freedom of Information Act. As a starting point, the law requires that if there is an agenda for the meeting that it be posted in advance of the meeting. It appears that there was an agenda for the Nov. 15 meeting, but it did not include any reference to replacing the superintendent and attorney.

 

The law requires the board to announce the specific purpose of any portion of the meeting closed to the public. It does not appear that the statement of purpose for the closed portion of the meeting satisfied the “specific purpose” statement.

 

The hiring of the new superintendent and attorney suggests strongly that some sort of search was carried out to select the persons named to these positions. The legal problem is that there was never a public meeting where a vote was taken to authorize a search.

 

The new superintendent has issued a statement saying that he was contacted on the Sunday before the meeting by the new chairman asking if he would be available to take the job. This statement is actually an effort at misdirection to divert attention from the actions of the board.  The new superintendent is not accused of acting in violation of the law. It is the board members who seem to have acted in violation of the law.

 

When did board members meet either in person or electronically to decide in advance of the Nov. 15 meeting to replace the superintendent and attorney? Any meeting of a quorum of the board that was not preceded by notice and convened in public is illegal.

 

I’m guessing that someone defending the secret cabal’s action will say that there was never a meeting of five members of the board — a quorum for a nine member board. It is my understanding that several of the terms of the nine members had expired; therefore, there was a reduced number of board members which reduces the number for a quorum. Say there were two members whose terms had expired and their replacements weren’t sworn in until Nov. 15. A quorum of a seven member board is four.

 

The most significant issue here isn’t the particular provisions of the law that may have been violated. If the board didn’t know what the law required, its ignorance is inexcusable. The board had one lawyer who was fired and a second lawyer who was hired on Nov. 15.

Certainly one of those folks could have given some guidance to the board.

 

The significant issue is the arrogance of people elected to govern a school district with thousands of students and hundreds of employees. 

 

The General Assembly of South Carolina has enacted a law which states that it is vital in a democratic society that public business be conducted in an open and public manner. The Supreme Court of South Carolina has said repeatedly that this law exists to prevent secret government activity. 

 

This school board displayed its disregard for the students, parents, employees and taxpayers of Berkeley County by acting in secret without the benefit of any comment by anyone outside the gang of six. That is unabridged arrogance.

 

The board is likely to be sued over its actions either by citizens or the deposed superintendent. Any suit or suits come with a cost. The board will hire lawyers to defend its actions. The deposed superintendent may be entitled to damages for a breach of his contract. A suit under the Freedom of Information Act may result in the district having to pay the attorney fees and costs for a citizen who is successful in a challenge to the board’s actions.

 

Beyond the financial exposure, the board has in one meeting destroyed any credibility it might have moving forward and hired a superintendent who will begin his tenure under a cloud.

 

Jay Bender is an attorney for the South Carolina Press Association and a retired media law professor at the University of South Carolina.