By Margaret Hopper

Following up on the information Silver school board member Tony Egan says he received while in the training sessions at Santa Fe recently, the following points seem important for the public to know about speaking at board meetings in the public comment periods.

The information was authored by Elena M. Gallegos, attorney, of the firm Walsh Gallegos Trevino Russo and Kyle P.C., and Ami S. Jaeger, general council for the Santa Fe Public Schools. The structure appears to be that of a training session for school board members. The information copyright is for 2016. The title is Managing Public Comments At School Board Meetings.

The first points presented were that the Open Meetings Act (OMA) informs that the public has the right to attend board meetings and listen, citing NMSA 1978/ 10-15-1(A) (1999). The exception is the closed portion. The board meeting is a limited public forum for the receipt of information; Mesa v. White, 197 F.3d 1041 (10th Cir. 1999).

If board policy/practice permits public comment at a meeting, that part is considered Gǣlimited public forumGǥ ... MacQuigg v. APS, Civ. No. 12-1137 (D.N.M. 2015). So, a board may restrict speech. The restrictions are to be viewpoint neutral and reasonable as to the board's purposes. Shero v. City of Grove, OK., 510 F.3d 1196 (10th Cir. 2007).

MacQuigg v. APS, Civ. No. 12-1137 (D.N.M. 2015) continues that in the board's limited direct authority over personnel issues, prohibiting discussion, with the exception of the superintendent's performance, is in its legitimate interest.

(The board)... may discuss sensitive personnel or litigation matters in closed session but that should not prevent the public's ability to present its views. OMA doesn't require the board to comment or respond to such matters brought up in an open meeting. Mesa v. White 197 F.3d 1041 (10th Cir. 1999) (involving county commission and county manager).

While policy prevents attacks on personnel, personal attacks on the board appear to be allowable. But threats are not. Violent and disturbing content is not protected. Doe v. Polaski 306 F.3d 606 (8th Cir. 2002). An intent to cause harm or injury is deemed to be a threat, even if communicated to a third party. Whether the speaker intended to carry it out or was even capable of doing so is not required. Whether the statement was communicated is the issue.

Courts do not determine either the wisdom or compassion of school administrative decisions. These are elective decisions. Wood v. Strickland, 420 U.S. 308, 325, 95 S. Ct. 992, 43 L.Ed.2d 214 (1975) as cited in Doe v. Polaski 327.

Restrictions that are content-neutral as to time, place or manner, are permissible if they serve a significant (board) interest, advance that interest, and leave open alternative channels for communication. A quote from Shero v. City of Grove, OK, 510 F.3d 1196 (10th Cir. 1196) stated a 3-minute time limit was appropriately designed for order and efficiency, and the person could use other means and media to communicate additionally.

The information in the school board's training suggested other practical controls, such as reasonable limits to the number of speakers on a certain topic, allowing a single speaker to represent many others of the same position, limiting and enforcing times allowed per speaker as well as total allowable time for comments.

The information also suggested setting boundaries before such comment periods began, as well as a disclaimer on the board's part. As to responses, the training report said no response was required, and the board should not respond to items not on the agenda.

If the board chose to respond, it could refer the topic to a later meeting and place it on the agenda, pass the topic to the superintendent, respond to it at a place more appropriate later in the meeting, or simply thank the speaker and go on with the meeting.

This training guide also suggested additional controls such as requiring a 24-hour or other advance notice for speakers, placing relevant policy information at the sign-up table, adding speaker identification to the resulting minutes, or requiring speakers to meet voter, residential or other relational restrictions for the right to speak.

By looking back on years of articles written on the Silver school board, and reviewing the public comments from the past two years at those meetings, it appears the board might want to offer serious policy changes to the speaking public. Hopefully, the ideas from the Santa Fe attorneys and their workshop materials will inspire some upgrades for the speeches people have given in the recent past.

Records show that some parents, activists and teachers have spoken properly in the comment periods. They observed the rules, were polite and to the point. Others raised their voices, made demands that the board do unauthorized things or break the rules, allow misinformation to stand, or humiliate their targets, perhaps not understanding the nature of a board meeting.

The record shows the board patiently informed patrons of the rules and asked them to go through the Gǣchain-of'-command,Gǥ to resolve differences; discussing issues first with building principals, teachers or others, not ask for Public Comment time. Business items and policy are the priority of the meeting.

Streib's more recent comment is that a school board meeting is a private meeting for board business but it is held in a public setting. This meeting is not a time for non-business topics or personal opinions. There are other settings for such topics. Public comment should center on business the board is addressing. A large number of speakers, as shown in past meetings, don't seem to understand that.

Aside from listening to these comments, the board seldom responds to them; the topics are not on the agenda. Reports come back from parents and others saying the administrators would not respond; they say this is offensive. Equally often, administrators have said there is no record of attempts to meet, either in person or by telephone, so to them, the attacks appear to be the goal, not any serious efforts to inform or problem-solve, and this should be done at other places, not board meetings.

Some misunderstanding appears to be over demanding to be placed on the agenda, which is not the same as a request to resolve a personal issue. The board says it is not obligated to place non-business items on the agenda; many of the personal opinions stated are not appropriate for the public meeting; other contacts would give better results, anyway.

Past articles printed by the Beat show that accusations of mishandling student disputes, requests to inform the board of personnel complaints, demands that the school inform the entire community of each and every business decision, have been made. Other demands that the board reprimand students over signage or words spoken, not even on school property, have also been made in Public Comment.

On one occasion, an attending policeman informed a speaker that the accusation was misinformed. Response had been taken by the district, he said, but the board was not allowed to disclose its own actions publicly. Still, speakers at Public Comment periods have demanded full disclosures of personnel findings and board actions, which would be illegal for board members or administrators to divulge.

Patrons, who seem to be unaware of responsibility, persist, telling details of instructor-administrator confrontations in public. They have demanded that decisions be reversed. They have asked for details of financial business that would require another two or three full-time employees to supply that information.

Public comment is legal and can be informative, especially when the community speakers stay within the rules. According to the board, the problem is that no matter how many times the Silver board tells people that exposing information on school employees is improper, speakers continue to demand the off-topic bits that must not given, by legal directive. When the board, by keeping silence on these topics, merely says GǣThank you,Gǥ the speakers come back in later meetings announcing to the public that they were stalled or disrespected. Articles in the Beat reflect this.

Some have repeatedly told board members they will personally see that they are defeated in the next elections for not taking actions the speakers demanded. It appears no amount of rule-reminding gets through to those who want-what-they-want, regardless of law. Past articles record this, too. And the word goes around town that it is time to bring certain people down.

Many of the GǣspeakersGǥ have not used the proper channels to vet their accusations before a board hearing. This board-admin-bashing has gone on for a long time, now. Would these same publicinterruptions be allowed in the business meetings of city, county or other corporations? It seems the public cannot grasp the significance of a business meeting. It is the responsibility of the board president to see that such abuses are minimized, board members have remarked.

In some of these meetings there may be more time spent disrupting and name calling than in actual school board work. These meetings stretch out for hours to give a few people their chance to speak out. Board members actually have to do their work, through all the confronting and doubt-casting, and then being charged that it shouldn't have legal counsel.

There are very good reasons for not responding to what may be provocations. The board works and does its job under conditions that might be termed unusual and unnecessarily stressful. These very people who charge that legal advice now costs precious dollars that should be spent on kids are the very reason the board makes extra calls for advice, according to some on the board.

In comments after the meetings, members have said the accusations were untrue, but it wouldn't bemsmart to respond. Some board members say off-the-record that this appears to be Gǣset-upGǥ and it has to take extra care before speaking.

There is plenty of evidence that new administrators have cleaned up serious budget problems from the past; there wasn't enough money back then to do the technology upgrades, but a good party for the right people was no problem. When new people came, and the budget was analyzed, lots of things had to stop. GǣDeferred maintenanceGǥ on facilities had been GǣdeferredGǥ much too long. The technology gaps had to be addressed.

Why wasn't this addressed earlier? When Lon Streib first entered, who in the community, other than the board, bothered to give him a reasonable welcome, let alone offer to help him see the big picture? Or say where to go to for help? He said he discovered the critical needs the hard way, without much budget to cover those needs. Do you know why he dipped into the GǣreservesGǥ?

The word is that Gǣdelayed issuesGǥ were about to flood the school away. They couldn't wait any longer, and he refused to hide them. The truth was embarrassing, so he said he decided to take the blame on himself, and he asked the board to be gentlemen, too. Go in and do your own research. The evidence may take time, as it is now archived, but you should get real answers.

As for welcomes, believe it or not, people actually said in public, GǣThese jobs belong to us. We want them for ourselves.Gǥ Yes, these comments were aired as public input. Streib, he said he hired a few more outsiders to make the upgrades possible. Problems had to be answered. Excuses would no longer do. Money was short but changes had to be made. And he had to have positive people making changes.

Ben Potts and his men have done the absolutely impossible with technology. Now more kids graduate without last-minute trauma. Curriculum changes get results. Book company representatives come in to analyze conditions and suggest how to get better results with programs the school has paid for. Then, the teachers themselves analyzed scope and sequence of major subjects and corrected past glitches.

The new VoTech gets results, too. The credit recovery classes appear to be phasing out, with far more dual credit work at WNMU. Improvement, or not? Students are using computer research skills to a far greater extent. Books have their place, but online research gives newer, fresher answers. It prepares kids for computer testing, as is happening now.

The business practices are now improved and secured from easy seizure, says Streib. The archives are up to state mandates, protecting sensitive information. These changes are undeniable, despite endless criticisms. But the same resources, or even fewer than before, were used to do this. The money seems to be working better. Perhaps some GǣThank-yousGǥ are in order, somewhere.

The misinformed accusations continue. Improved management practices hold a tight line on the budget. Fear reigns that the budget, the funds, will crash. With carelessness, they would, said Streib. Perhaps things are being held to a higher standard, now. Work that Gǣcouldn't be done beforeGǥ is being done now, on a much tighter budget.

What is the bottom line on all this? The complaints that were made two years ago don't stand a chance today, because people within the district responded politely and eventually got the point across that the scandals didn't happen, or the charges weren't true to begin with, or that better budgeting gets more done on less money.

Since the old accusations no longer work, the charges now are about too little respect for Gǣcommunity opinions,Gǥ not enough Gǣcommunity controlGǥ of the school, or that GǣoutsidersGǥ shouldn't make decisions for Silver. Did any of these people go into an administrative office to ask for information first, and then offer ideas on how to make things work? Did any offer to personally help? Streib says he has asked some of the critics to come in and help. They gave no response whatsoever.

Are non-facts, misinformation, unrelenting criticisms and devious set-ups really helping the kids in the district? Do the irate public comments solve problems, or are they aimed at hindering what may actually be reasonable improvements and those who make them possible?

Maybe the real reason was simply stated many months ago: GǣThese are our jobsGǥ... and they refused to help Gǣan outsider.Gǥ Cooperation is possible, but it hasn't happened yet. Perhaps better handling of the public input periods would help. People might speak more positively if they simply knew the rules.

Tony Egan is to be thanked for getting facts from state level about the public input periods. If people take these legal opinions seriously and try to make them work, the public input periods could help the district. It might even help the kids. The whole community could take pride in changes that are happening. And evidence suggests there are some good things going on.