By Mary O’KEEFE

At the June 10 Glendale Unified School District Board of Education meeting, the motion to remove an agendized information item launched a lengthy debate. 

The item in question was Information Item 8, “Proposed Revisions Regarding Board Bylaws,” dealing with five specific areas: Board bylaw 9012 – Board Member Electronic Communications, Board bylaw 9250 – Remuneration, reimbursement and other benefits, Bylaw 9323 – Meeting Conduct, Bylaw 9270 – Conflict of interest and disclosure code and Bylaw9271 – Code of ethics. 

This item – Information Item 8 – was proposed by GUSD President Shant Sahakian and was written by him with input from board member Kathleen Cross. He also reached out to numerous school districts and other experts in the field of education. 

CVW reached out to Sahakian and asked what prompted the proposed changes and the revision of the code of ethics. 

Sahakian said there were a few factors including concerns with what other districts are facing; recently Burbank Unified School District (BUSD) dealt with the issue of the BUSD approval of a contract with a maximum amount of $90,000 to a company called Specialized Support Services. The contract was “purportedly signed” by the adult daughter of a BUSD trustee member who did not recuse herself from the vote to approve that contract. Pasadena Unified School District also recently dealt with an ethics issue regarding the conduct of one of its members.

Sahakian was also concerned about possible questions of ethics within the GUSD board. This proposal, he said, would make conduct clear for board members.

During the June 10 meeting, member Neda Farid made a motion to postpone the discussion of Item 8 – the bylaws discussion. Her reasoning included that she would rather have the item discussed at the board of education’s retreat or at a special meeting. She voiced concern that this proposal was created by two board members, Sahakian and Cross, without input by other members.

Cross pointed out that was the reason the item was in the Information portion of the meeting – so that the board could discuss it and get input from all of its members. 

“We are just postponing it, basically? I guess that’s what I don’t understand – why we wouldn’t just talk about it? Also it allows the public to understand it a little bit better,” Cross said.

She pointed out that Item 8 is an information item and that after reading it once it wouldn’t have to be approved. 

“In my view this is a more restrictive policy than what is mandated and, as this is going to create guidelines by which colleagues would have to conduct themselves and staff, for example, by way of the use of an ethics officer, which would be an employee, there would be potential conflicts of interest with some of the points here in the policy,” Farid said. 

The proposed bylaw 9271 deals with the Code of Ethics of board members. The proposal includes the creation of a new position of Ethics Officer. This would be, presumably, a paid position. If an individual thinks a board member is conducting him/herself unethically the individual would file an ethics complaint. That complaint is then reviewed by the Ethics Officer and if there is merit then it would move to a third party legal review. 

District funds would have to be used for the new staff member and third party legal firm, and this process could possibly be abused by individuals with issues against a specific board member; however, there are provisions available that deal with abuse of the ethics complaint system. 

Sahakian was opposed to the delay of the discussion and stated there was not a board retreat scheduled and asked for a specific date for the special meeting, if that is the path forward. 

At one point Farid rescinded her motion; however, board member Telly Tse made another motion to delay. After a long discussion the vote was three voting to delay by Ingrid Gunnell, Tse and Farid voting and Sahakian and Cross voting against the delay.  

Farid said during the June 10 meeting that she would like to see a proposal that reflects all the members of the board. 

“I’m looking for something that our colleagues can work on together that I believe for the good of the group would be perhaps a more effective document than what you [Sahakian and Cross] have presented,” Farid said. 

Cross again questioned why the discussion could not start as agendized, adding she did not expect a vote on a final revision but thought starting the discussion rather than delaying it would be prudent. The June 10 meeting would be the opportunity to talk about Information Item 8as a group. But in the end discussion of Information Item 8 was postponed. 

The special meeting to discuss the bylaws revisions is tentatively scheduled for July 16 at 5 p.m. at the GUSD office, 223 N. Jackson St. It will also be streamed online at www.gusd.net.

To read the proposed bylaw revisions go to https://tinyurl.com/yzw9u7hc and scroll to page 248. 

CVW will continue to follow this story.