By Steve Gunn
EAGnews.org

HARVEY, La. – For the past year or so, we’ve been watching and applauding Louisiana’s Jefferson Parish school board for taking a series of strong stands in favor of students and taxpayers and against the local teachers union.

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But now we’re forced to wonder about a board which appears ready to throw one of its own under the bus for calling out the district’s finance officer during a public meeting.

The board was recently debating efforts to seek new vendors for dental and vision insurance and other employee benefits, according to the Times-Picayune.

During that discussion, board member Cedric Floyd blasted finance officer Robert Fulton for, as the newspaper put it, “mismanaging the vendor selection process and producing an unfair result.”

Floyd did not mince words.

“Mr. Fulton has not been qualified or capable of running a first-class system to keep us from running in the sewer,” Floyd said during the meeting.

Those comments prompted the board to vote 6-3 to start a legal investigation to determine if Floyd violated a state law that says school board members are only allowed to supervise superintendents, and are not allowed to “interfere” with the work of other employees.

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What a stupid, anti-taxpayer law.

We think it’s probably safe to assume that Fulton is liked and respected by the majority of Jefferson Parish school board members. That’s all fine and good. We can even accept the possibility that Fulton does an excellent job and Floyd was incorrect and unfair in his critique.

But the idea that a school board member should be quiet when he or she perceives that something is wrong is totally absurd.

School boards are elected by citizens to govern school districts. Unfortunately that rarely happens. Board members across the nation are typically taught that their role is to establish “broad policies,” then passively step aside and let the superintendent and his staff run the show with little critique or oversight.

Sometimes that policy is even enshrined in state law, which is obviously the case in Louisiana.

How stupid. We elect school board members to govern districts the same way we elect members of Congress to govern the nation. Telling board members they cannot freely express their opinions about school policies and top administrators would be like telling members of Congress that they have no right to criticize the attorney general or secretary of state.

Efforts to legally muzzle school board members will only make conditions more favorable for school administrators and teachers unions to operate our schools their own way, with no public accountability.

School board members are the representatives of the people who pay for the schools. When you tell them to mind their own business, you’re telling voters and taxpayers the same thing.

That’s definitely not what democracy is supposed to look like.