by Terry Rogers
At the November meeting of the Milford School District Board of Education, the board voted in a three-to-three tie not to send a letter, drafted by Board Member Dr. Adam Brownstein, in response to a recent National School Board Association (NSBA) request for federal assistance related to school board protests. Because there was not a full board seated during the vote, School Board President Jason Miller placed the letter on the agenda for December as an action item.
“First, we have to have a motion and pass a motion to reconsider this,” Miller explained. “I am seeking a motion to reconsider our response to the NSBA letter introduced by Dr. Brownstein at our last meeting.”
Vice-President Rony Baltazar-Lopez pointed out that this matter would not be up for debate and asked that, moving forward, these types of reconsiderations not be added as an action item on the agenda.
“Having the NSBA letter response on the agenda for this meeting as an action item implies that an action has to be taken,” Baltazar-Lopez said. “As indicated in our new approved meeting minutes for last month, this board failed to move forward with the motion to release the letter to NSBA and there was no other motion after that. If any member of the board wishes to ask the board for reconsideration, including Dr. Brownstein’s letter, he or she should prescribe to the Robert’s Rules of Order for having that reconsideration which, as a reminder, is our board policy 8502. Doing otherwise is impractical, not supporting transparency and possibly a violation of the Freedom of Information Act.”
Baltazar-Lopez then asked Miller to postpone the question of Brownstein’s letter indefinitely, something that would only require a simple majority vote. Board Member David Vezmar asked Baltazar-Lopez to clarify his motion. Baltazar-Lopez responded that it was another way to say they were not going to vote on moving forward with the motion to send the letter.
“Essentially, Mr. Lopez is asking us to kill the conversation,” Miller said. The motion to postpone the discussion indefinitely was approved with Baltazar-Lopez, Kris Thompson, Vezmar and Jean Wylie voting in the affirmative while Brownstein and Scott Fitzgerald voted against the measure. Miller abstained from the vote.
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