The School Board Is Listening

By Dave Freneaux

    Monday night the Central Community School Board reconsidered a committee decision to change the format of Public Comment on agenda items.  The recommendation of the School Board Human Resources/Policies Committee had been to hear all Public Comment prior to Board Members discussing each agenda item.  This would have been a reversal of the practice in place for the past four years, in which Board Members have expressed their opinions and explained their positions on an issue prior to taking input from the public.  The Board voted unanimously to remove the changed language from the policy and leave the speaking order as it has always been.

     Members of the public who had attended both the Committee and Board Meeting came to the podium during the allowed Public Comment period and thanked the Board for listening to the input of the citizens and reconsidering the change.  At the Committee Meeting a week prior, the vast majority of the public input called for the speaking order not to be changed.  The Committee, consisting of three School Board Members, voted to recommend the speaking order change to the full Board and anticipated seeing whether the changed order was beneficial to the Public Meeting process.

     The result of this process emphasizes the need for public participation, and demonstrates the willingness of Central's elected officials to listen to and consider the input of the people who elected them.  School Board meetings are held on the second and fourth Monday of each month, usually at Kristenwood Reception Hall on Greenwell Springs Road just south of the Sullivan Road intersection.  The meetings are publicized in the Calendar on page two of CentralSpeaks.com the Thursday prior to the meeting.  All meetings are open to the public.