The Board is notified that three of us can not call a school board meeting on Monday:
william hanson
12:44 PM (1 hour ago)to William, School, Kerry
School Board members,FYI, this proposed meeting on Monday would not meet the three
(business) day public notice requirement as we have previously
interpreted it for meetings of the board. A meeting for Monday would
have had to be posted on Thursday.
My Reply
Mr. Hanson,
However the District has “interpreted” this law in the past the interpretation flies in the face of the language in Minnesota Statute 123B.09,Subd. 6. which reads:
Meetings. A majority of the voting members of the board shall constitute a quorum. No contract shall be made or authorized, except at a regular meeting of the Board or at a special meeting at which all members are present or of which all members have had notice. SPECIAL MEETINGS MAY BE CALLED BY the Chair or Clerk or ANY THREE MEMBERS UPON NOTICE MAILED TO EACH MEMBER AT LEAST THREE DAYS PRIOR THERETO.
.
Your interpretation of this statute fails on several counts.
1. Today is Friday which is four days before the Monday meeting. There is no mention of “business days” which exclude Saturday or Sunday in the count. Furthermore, the statute requires that the notices be “mailed to each member” three days prior thereto. I put the notices in the mail at the Mount Royal Post office yesterday, Thursday, which is three business days in advance of the Monday meeting. But note again, that “business days” are not alluded to in the operating statute. If the Business Office has mailed out notices in the past not counting weekends that has only been its “practice.” It does not require three board members to follow the Business Office’s example.
2. In addition to the notice by mail we emailed the notice today to all school board members and the Administration which, again, is three days in advance of Monday’s date. However, the statute does not say anything about email being required. Our emailing it was simply a courtesy to board members and staff.
3. And on that score, I recall being called by Human Resource Director, Tim Sworsky, on the Friday before the Monday meeting at which I was censured. The email notice may have been sent out on Thursday but I had not read it. The call was made to me late Friday afternoon so I had barely two business day’s notice of my imminent censure. You will note that the Thursday email notifying me of my censure meeting was the same day of the week we mailed out our notice to Board members calling next Monday’s meeting – three business days but five days considering the weekend. I would hate to think that your interpretation of state statute is different for meetings called to censure school board members than it is under statute for three school board members to call a special meeting.
4. At no place in this statute is there any mention of the requirement of a “posting” of the meeting. In any event, the members of the school board do not control the District’s website. However, I did tell the Superintendent’s Executive Secretary of our intention to hold a meeting earlier this week. I would hate to think that this last minute quibbling about the District’s past practice is an attempt to violate state statute by our District Administration although I am aware that some Board members may not be happy about our legal calling of this meeting.
I suggest that the Administration post the meeting as soon as possible on the website as the media and the public have all been alerted by three members of the School Board, required by statute, about this meeting. I hope you insure that the public speaker system is set up and the doors are unlocked as well.
Yours cordially,
Harry Welty
Member of the Duluth School Board
Maybe I should take this opportunity to ask Mr. Hanson to expunge my censure. I would except that I am far too proud of it to let the School Board take it away from me.
