Changes will go to the full board for consideration
By Jennifer Eisenbart
Editor
In a Policy Committee meeting that dug into the semantics of “political,” Burlington Area School District officials came up with a revised citizen representative policy Monday night.
While it took nearly an hour to iron out all the wording – up to and including the differences surrounding personal gain and political gain – the new policy will go to the board next week for its first reading.
The new policy features two major changes, which read as follows:
• “Citizen representatives are reminded that they represent the community at large. Their position may not be used as a means to lobby the board for the purpose of personal or commercial gain. Those doing so may be subjected to removal at the discretion of the board.”
• “Citizens shall make application to serve through the superintendent’s office. Applications will be reviewed by the various committee heads to determine their interests and qualifications to serve on the respective committees. Candidates’ names will then be submitted to the Personnel Committee for their review with a rational stating their qualifications.
“The Personnel Committee shall interview citizen applicants for the purpose of assessing their qualifications prior to recommending their appointment as citizen representatives. Upon review the Personnel Committee will then make their recommendations to the full board. Citizen representatives shall be appointed at the September meeting of the School Board. There is no obligation to fill the seat.”
The change in policy also highlighted the move approved at the October board meeting – to make the citizen representatives non-voting members of the committees on which they serve.
That resulted in one of this year’s appointees apparently choosing to resign. Bob Lemken, who had been chosen to serve on the Buildings, Grounds and Transportation Committee, reportedly emailed members of the School Board to inform them of his decision.
School Board Member Roger Koldeway read Lemken’s email in order to point out the argument against removing voting rights. He said Lemken called the lack of voting rights “a perfunctory exercise in futility.”
“We’re alienating the citizenry,” Koldeway added. “I think we should give anybody a try who wants to be on it.”
School Board Member Jim Bousman added that he also spoke with Lemken after receiving the email, and that Lemken conceded the fact that, voting rights or not, the committees were, in fact, advisory groups to the full board.
But while wording of the two major changes was debated, most of it came on the first portion – a change Bousman read to the assembled Policy Committee and the other members of the board present.
He wanted to include one more amendment – that the citizen representative position not be used as a means of political gain.
Both Koldeway and fellow board member Phil Ketterhagen disagreed with the Bousman’s potential addition.
“I think that’s good, but who’s going to be the judge and the jury?” said Ketterhagen.
Koldeway did not like the use of the word “political.”
“Everyone has their own politics, their own morals,” he said. “Politics is part of life. I don’t think we should eliminate someone because of their politics.”
Bousman clarified that wasn’t his point, saying he wanted the phrase “political gain,” and not just politics.
After going back and forth for somewhere between 15-20 minutes, the wording was finalized to its current form.
Citizen representative Susan Kessler wanted to add that the seats need not be filled if qualified candidates could not be found.
The decision was made to go simply with “no obligation to fill the seat” when Koldeway objected to the wording – and pointed out that without his seconding of the motion (Rosanne Hahn was absent), they could not move forward.
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