Open Meetings - how much notice is enough?

Let's say you are a taxpayer and are interested in how your taxes are being spent.  Let's say you are interested as well, in how your power is being spent.

The spending of resources and the wielding of power takes place in public meetings.  The decisions made in "not in public" meetings, either enjoy an exception to the Open Meetings Act, or are made in violation of it.

If you want to attend, maybe even participate directly in a public meeting, you need know what is going to be decided, and when.  You need to see the agenda.

The problem with building and posting an agenda, is knowing what to put on it.  If an issue is known well in advance, the agenda can be built and published, well in advance.  An issue that occurs with no notice, cannot be placed on a long range agenda.

The newly revised Open Meetings Act recognizes basically two kinds of issues; those which can be foreseen 72 hours in advance, and those which cannot and are considered emergencies; too urgent to put off until the next regularly scheduled meeting.  Too urgent even, to put off until an emergency meeting can be held.

The leadership of the APS would like to take advantage of another option; issues the come up less than 72 but more than 36 hours before the meeting and which are too urgent to put off for 72 hours more until an emergency meeting can be held. 

The board could take a path of their own.  Other governmental decision making bodies provide more notice than the law requires.  A very few,  post their agendas "as built".

The board, if they wanted to, could hold themselves honestly accountable to higher standards of conduct than the law; the lowest standards of conduct among civilized human beings.  They could if the wanted to, hold themselves to the same standards of conduct they establish and enforce upon students; higher standards of conduct than the law.

The elephant in the room; the obvious truth that is being ignored, is that the school board has established standards of conduct for students requiring them to "do more than the law requires and less than the law allows".  They don't want to hold themselves accountable to that same standard.  They will vote, link, to do only what the law requires.  They will disenfranchise interest holders as much as the law allows.

The APS School Board expects students to "model and promote" honest accountability to higher standards of conduct than the law.  Specifically, the APS School Board expects students to model and promote the Pillars of Character Counts!; a nationally recognized, accepted and respected code of ethical conduct.

Were APS School Board President Marty Esquivel accountable to the standards of conduct for which he is the senior-most role model, he would be arguing for the maximum notice they can possibly provide; posted as built, 72 hours notice except in an emergency.

He will not, because he doesn't consider himself to be the very senior-most role model of student standards of conduct.

He told me once that the reason he was not accountable as a role model for students, is because he isn't really an "educator".

Else, he is incompetent; he doesn't comprehend what being the senior-most role model of accountability to higher standards of conduct actually means.

Now the conspiracy nut part.

There is an ethics and accountability scandal in the leadership of the APS.

The establishment media, the Journal, KRQE, KOAT, and KOB, know that the leadership of the APS abdicated as role models of student standards of conduct.  They know the board voted unanimously to remove the role modeling clause;

In no case shall the standards of conduct for an adult
be lower than the standards of conduct for students.

from their own standards of conduct.

They know there are two standards of conduct in the APS; one for students and one for adults.  They know that students are expected to hold themselves accountable to higher standards than their adult role models.

They know that character education has been abandoned in the APS.

They know there is no swift and certain accountability for senior administrators or board members, to meaningful standards of conduct and competence. They know about the cover up of felony criminal misconduct by senior APS administrators in their publicly funded, private police force.

The establishment media is relentless in their refusal to investigate and report upon the ethics and accountability scandal in the leadership of the APS.

Ask yourself, if any one of them actually investigated, and after that investigation were able to report that the leadership of the APS is honestly accountable to higher standards of conduct than the law, would it be newsworthy?  would they report it?

If they could report that the leadership of the APS was even honestly accountable to the law, would it be newsworthy?

If they found the opposite; if they found that the leadership of the APS is not actually accountable to meaningful standards of conduct and competence, would it be newsworthy?

Either way, an investigation and report upon ethics and accountability in the leadership of the APS is newsworthy.

They; the Journal, KRQE, KOAT and KOB all know.
I know they know because I told them.

They won't investigate because they know they will find credible evidence of an ethics and accountability scandal and they would rather be part of the cover up than the exposé.




photo Mark Bralley