School and city officials looking at ways to continue
communicating
Morgan Hill – Since Superintendent Alan Nishino began running the Morgan Hill Unified School District, monthly meetings between district and city officials have gone by the wayside.
The regular City/School District Liaison Committee was dissolved, but officials say communication between the two government entities is not a problem.
Formerly, the committee was made up of former Superintendent Carolyn McKennan, City Manager Ed Tewes, four elected officials – two school board trustees and two city councilmembers – plus members of city and district staff. Committee members met monthly, alternating meeting locations between the Council Chambers, the District Office and various district school sites.
The city is interested in meeting with district officials on a regular basis again, in some format, according to Tewes.
“We’re interested in continued good relations with the school district; we have any number of shared interests,” he said. “We’re looking for the appropriate forum to deal with those. Superintendent Alan Nishino and I meet fairly regularly to discuss issues at the administrative level, and from time to time the elected officials have time to talk at other meetings, such as the Coyote Valley Specific Plan Task Force meetings.”
City Councilman Larry Carr said he, too, would like to resurrect the City/School District Liaison Committee.
“I would certainly like to see us bring back that formal structure of the City/School Liaison Committee,” he said. “I think the opportunity to have public discussions together, that is important. A very good role of that formal committee is bringing out things into the public. I find a lot of value in it. It’s an opportunity to get a lot of information about what the district is doing and to share things that we are doing.”
Topics the committee regularly discussed included use of district and city fields and parks, the lease by the district of the city’s corporation yard on Edes Court, planning of future housing development and school construction, the School Resource Officer program, school safety and emergency preparedness.
Former School Board President Shelle Thomas, who was a representative for the board on the City/School District Liaison Committee, said she would like to see the committee resurrected.
“I believe it was a key element to reaching out in the community, to understanding the community we live in,” she said. “Our elected officials have to have a relationship with each other. They need an opportunity to sit down face to face and discuss issues that are import to us all.”
As he understands it, the committee meetings were discontinued, said Carr, who also sat on the committee, when Nishino was hired by the district in June 2005.
“It was my understanding that while the leadership changes were underway, that it was best to let everybody get their feet under them at the district level,” he said. “From my perspective, it was about making sure that Ed Tewes and Alan Nishino were talking, figuring out their relationship, which would be easier without the problems elected officials sometimes bring on.”
The district is still considering the best way to handle common projects with the city, according to School Board President Mike Hickey.
“I had talked to Alan about that, to see if there was a a way to reconfigure it so that the meeting was more productive,” Hickey said. “In the past it hasn’t been overly productive. So far we haven’t come up with a way to reconstruct the meetings in a constructive way.”
Nishino said he is still trying to reach out to the community to find the best way to communicate.
“We’re trying to find ways to communicate better, and right know, I don’t know if a structure like the committee that you’re talking about is what we’re looking for,” he said. “I’ve been meeting with Ed on a regular basis, of course, and I know our board members and the council communicate. I’m also going to be setting up a meeting with Dan Ehrler (executive director) of the (Morgan Hill) Chamber (of Commerce), because I think a good relationship between the business community and the school community is also important. There are still a lot of things we’re exploring.”
Marilyn Dubil covers education and law enforcement for The Times. Reach her at (408) 779-4106 ext. 202 or at md****@mo*************.com.
