News
Montana School districts exploiting privacy to shut out public
Over the last two months, trustees for several Missoula-area school districts have used privacy as a tool to shut the door on the public and hold closed meetings to address internal problems.
Known as an executive session, this secret, closed-door approach has become the de facto means by which our school boards are resolving their most pressing issues. But doing so disregards the fact that boards are elected by the public – and school employees, including superintendents, teachers and principals, are paid by the public.
In many cases, it may also disregard state law.
If the public doesn’t want to get left in the dark – if it wants to know what its officials are doing – it can’t stand for privacy excuses and stonewalling county officials. If it wants more transparency, it must consider who it elects and who’s writing its laws. The two points go hand in hand.
By Martin Kidston
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