|
Observations
August 22, 2019 |
 |
 Wingate Lassiter |
School board's closed sessions,
restricted forums lead to mistrust
I've been covering local governing boards off and on for many years, yet I've never seen a board that meets behind closed doors half as much as the current Johnston County Board of Education.
The stated purpose of those closed sessions is to discuss personnel --- a permitted purpose under North Carolina's Open Meetings Law. But when the school board spends the first two hours of each month's regular meeting in closed session and then returns to closed session at the end of every month's meeting, one can't but wonder if some of those discussions fall outside the boundaries of permitted personnel sessions.
What's more, Johnston's Board of Education has an unusually restrictive policy of requiring anyone who wishes to address the board during the "Public Comment" period of each month's meeting to submit their statements, in writing, a week in advance. Again, the reason given is that staff needs to filter out any remarks deemed damaging to school personnel.
And now, with folks at Clayton up in arms over the unexplained removal of their high school's popular principal, the response from school administrators is that the issue cannot be discussed publicly because that would violate the confidentiality of personnel records.
What follows all that is a growing mistrust of school officials by a public kept in the dark time and time again.
Contrast our school board's handling of sensitive matters with a truly "open door" policy at meetings of our County Commissioners as well as the Smithfield Town Council. Both of those boards have "Public Comment" spots on their monthly agendas when anyone who wants to speak may do so without making an appointment or submitting a statement in advance. And the County Commissioners go so far as to allow "Public Comment" near the start of both their morning and evening sessions the first Monday of every month.
That may seem risky to school officials. But what's more risky is discouraging folks from speaking their piece about the public's business. It appears Johnston's school leaders are destined to learn that lesson the hard way.
Oh, by the way, the Board of Education has given notice of a special meeting called for 6 p.m. next Tuesday (August 27). But neither you nor I will be allowed to attend. It's to be another closed session on personnel.
A refresher on school-bus passing law
The N.C.
Department of Transportation put out a timely message this
week about what state law requires of us motorists when
meeting a stopped school bus. Here are the rules:• On a two-lane road, all traffic in both directions must stop.
• On a two-lane road with a center turning lane, all traffic must stop.
• On a four-lane road without a median, all traffic must stop.
• On a divided highway with four or more lanes, only traffic following the school bus must stop.
• On a road with four or more lanes and a center turning lane, only traffic following the bus must stop.
NCDOT reminds us that illegally passing a stopped school bus carries a $500 fine plus four "points" that could increase your auto-insurance premiums by 80%.
Few things in one's life are worse than "running over" a helpless child.
He remembers working in tobacco....
From JAMES ALLEN, a Sun subscriber:
Your focus on tobacco (in last week's edition) was a welcome retrospective. I can still remember the smell that permeated the town when the cured leaves were sitting on sheets and sleds in the warehouses that lined main street, waiting for auction. (I found the smell quite pleasant, I must say.) I confess I hadn't remembered there were that many warehouses downtown, though.
Your picture of the boys pulling suckers from the plants reminded me of the occupational hierarchy and the pay scales of that time. Croppers and tractor drivers got the best hourly pay, as I remember, followed by handers, tie-ers, pokers, and hangers. (I welcome correction on nomenclature and more explicit ordering of pay rank, of course.)
My uncle, who farmed tobacco just west of town, once allowed me close enough to the process to get my hands stick (from a brief bout of "handing"), but I soon found an excuse to retreat to the house for refreshment and recovery.
Thanks again for this reflective piece; these are in some way affirming and regenerative.
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