The Examiner U-46 News Feed

U-46 resolution supports more remote meetings

By Seth Hancock
  The Board of Education in School District U-46 wants to make it easier to avoid seeing large crowds, like that at the July 19 meeting with parents opposed to mask and other COVID-19 mandates.
  By a 6-0 vote, board member Kate Thommes was absent, the board approved, at its June 21 meeting, a resolution to submit to the Illinois Association of School Boards (IASB) for a vote at its annual conference in November. The IASB is a taxpayer funded lobbyist group for government-run school districts.
  The resolution, which Superintendent Tony Sanders said he “did take the lead” to create, is to lobby the state to allow boards to meet electronically beyond the COVID-19 era. It would only require one person (a board member, chief legal counsel or chief administrative officer) to be physically present at a meeting.
  Currently, a board member would need a legitimate reason, like a business trip or illness, to be allowed to phone into a meeting, but this would be “nice,” said board president Sue Kerr, because a board member could “take a vacation but also still participate.”
  The resolution’s statement of rationale: “The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated that Illinois school boards can effectively conduct the public's business while increasing transparency and access to its citizens. With appropriate guardrails, including public notification of how the public can participate, the proposed resolution is intended to allow Board members to conduct meetings via audio or video conferencing even during periods when there is not a public health emergency.”
  Also unanimously approved on June 21 was the travel expenses for that November IASB conference. The cost is in a not-to-exceed amount of $5,750.
  Kerr and Thommes along with board members Dawn Martin, Veronica Noland, Melissa Owens and Eva Porter all signed up to attend as did Sanders. Along with conference fees, taxpayers will fund “travel including meals and lodging” to Chicago for the conference between Nov. 19 to 21.