Date: Sun, 26 May 2013 23:11:09 -0400
From: virginia penley
Subject: County Commissioners and the Bd of Education (possible closed door?)
What Bert Bowe was too polite to mention, but I am not, is the fact that the Commissioners Bock, Petty and Stewart each called the committee chairman *as individuals* and stated objections to the special election after the full Board of Commissioners met, and passed a resolution calling for support for the Deb McManus (HD54) bill asking the GA for this special election.
This was the reason given to McManus for killing the special election, that a majority of our Board of Commissioners had contacted her, so it was with drawn. Not that the Board had withdrawn it, but that the individual members had, and that constituted a majority.
Never mind that the official record showed their support, they called and withdrew it privately.
This means the 3 met, apparently in closed door conference, after the open hearing at the Board of Commissioners’ decision to support the election, and each one called the committee chairwoman and withdrew his support of the vote to support it.
This smacks of back room politics, avoiding the open meeting laws, and certainly citizen participation in democracy. It may be illegal.
The choice of the next Bd of Education member should, in my mind, reflect the student and parent demographic of Chatham County. In any case, it should be the choice of the people, not a choice of secret meetings and chikanery.
Bock, Petty and Stewart have gone behind the back of the Bd of Commissioners’ oath they swore to uphold when they did this. Remember it at their next election.