hollasa

Yes, I was involved in that thread (on a different computer, couldn't recall my login info). When I received the response "The board may grant it, and the board may take it away. The board need not respect any consultation period of its own creating. " I was confused, went reading in my copy of RONR a bit more, some additional searches, and ended up more confused. At that point, I thought I'd try to clarify some of the questions at hand, without some of the specifics that seemed to send people off on tangents on the other thread. So this is a school board, where the board are the members. The relevant portions of their policy on policies says: Given this language in their policy on policies, I was stunned when they decided to immediately implement two new policies, one on the role of the board, and one on the role of the superintendent, by "waiving" the current policy on how to develop policies. I have been attending these board meetings for years now, and this is quite outside their normal process. That they chose to gave no public notice of what they were planning to do is annoying, but does not reach this level of wrongness.

My local school board voted to add two new policies the other night. They have a policy on how to add policy, that states that there must be a 60-day public consultation period. They have the option to approve a policy in principle before the 60 day period, but there must be 60 days. However, the motion they handed out at the meeting stated "That Policy X Policy and Policy Development and its attendant Regulations be waived and that Policy Y Role of the Board and its related Appendices be approved". I will note the policies were distributed the Friday before, as usual, and the public was expecting to make comment on them during the review process. They also typically distribute the motions with the agenda package, rather than after any comments can be made. I've never seen them do anything like that before - certainly, they've always been very adamant in the past that policy is policy, and they can't go against policy. One of the board's main jobs is policy, and they have quite a number of policies around (and five bylaws). Their bylaws do state that in all meetings, procedures shall be guided by RONR, except where provisions of the bylaws or the School Act may conflict. All trustees were present, their first policy passed by a 4/3 vote, and the second passed unanimously. I am unfamiliar with a process for waiving policy in RONR. Presumably, they meant something like Suspend the Rules - but would that even apply to policy?