For Morgan Hill Unified School District’s board of education, time does not heal old wounds.
Before freshly sworn-in trustee Tom Arnett could get comfortable in his seat on the governing dais, the squabbling trustees were back at it Aug. 2.
Right out of the gates, the fractured school board failed to adopt the night’s agenda via a 3-3 deadlock, due to the absence of a scheduled vote on the new board president and vice president. Trustees David Gerard, Gino Borgioli and Rick Badillo asked why there was no such item on the agenda, as was promised at the December 2015 meeting.
With Trustee Donna Ruebusch out of the country Tuesday night, Board President Bob Benevento explained he wanted to “save the district from further embarrassment” of another deadlocked 3-all vote on the board reorganization. He asked for one of the dissenters to reconsider their vote so they could move forward with the district’s business as scheduled.
Benevento, Arnett and Vice President Ron Woolf voted to approve the Aug. 2 agenda, while Gerard, Borgioli and Badillo were opposed.
After about 20 minutes of hearing arguments, Gerard agreed to withdraw his motion to add the reorganization vote. He swung his vote to approve the agenda by a 4-2 margin, and the board rolled through the public items, which included three unanimous votes.
Prior to that, Superintendent Steve Betando echoed Benevento’s sentiments of delaying the reorganization vote, while Gerard and Borgioli stressed the importance of sticking to the promise made months earlier. At the Dec. 15, 2015 meeting, the six-member board deadlocked on votes for the next board president and vice president. However, it was then agreed and approved by a 4-2 vote (Gerard again shifting the majority vote) that Benevento and Woolf would keep their titles on an interim basis until a seventh trustee was sworn in and a majority vote was possible.
The board was down one member after former trustee Amy Porter-Jensen resigned in October 2015.
Gerard, Borgioli and Badillo wanted to stick to that agreed-upon plan regardless of Ruebusch’s absence at the Aug. 2 meeting.
“It’s irrelevant if a trustee isn’t here,” Borgioli said. “We only need four for a quorum and all you need is a quorum to continue with a vote….The board made a promise in December. I’d like to live and abide by that promise.”
Benevento, Woolf and finally Arnett replied that it was only right to wait until the next board meeting when all seven members were present to hold the reorganization vote. Woolf commented that he would extend the same courtesy if any other trustee was absent from the meeting for such an important vote.
“I’m sick of 3-3 ties,” said Woolf, predicting the outcome based on the past votes. “We’re talking two weeks here.”
Arnett said ever since he was elected in June, “this issue has heavily weighed on my mind” and he didn’t want to have any part of the “power struggle” between the two feuding factions.
“Democracy will exist on this board no matter how we behave, but for democracy to function well we’ve got to get through this so we can work together,” said Arnett, whose comments drew some applause from the audience.
Arnett concluded that he was in favor of waiting until the Aug. 16 meeting to select a board president and vice president..
“I think it’s important that the decision be made not based on trying to seize opportunities for making in-roads with one agenda or another,” he said.
Borgioli said he understood where Arnett was coming from but the superintendent and board president showed him “no respect or dignity” when they ignored his request to hold a special meeting in July to handle the matter.
“I don’t understand why we need to wait,” Gerard said. “We have been blocked at every point to get this done in a rational, logical fashion.”
Audience members join the fray
The theatrics leaked out to audience members as well. Julie Zintsmaster, former MHUSD trustee and retired executive secretary to the superintendent, stood up and called for point of order to halt the debate over the non-agendized item. She claimed the board was treading closely toward a Brown Act violation since the reorganization vote was not on the Aug. 2 agenda posted for public review beforehand.
“This isn’t on the agenda and you need to allow public comment,” said Zintsmaster, who later repeated her argument during the public comment portion of the meeting. “I have never experienced a board agenda item being added at the meeting.”
There were even more fireworks when local activist Karen Fitch shouted that board policy was broken by allowing Zintsmaster to speak since she hadn’t turned in her speaker card prior to the meeting. As Zintsmaster spoke at the podium, Fitch then walked up and handed in a tardy speaker card request. Fitch, who is a member of the Parents for Positive Change movement that sought to recall Benevento, said she took time off from her vacation to attend the Aug. 2 meeting because the board promised in Dec. 2015 to conduct the reorganization vote.
Among other duties, the board president helps set the meeting agenda and facilitates the meetings.
Earlier, former MHUSD trustee Claudia Rossi, who now sits on the county board of education, warned Arnett that certain members of the board (Gerard, Borgioli and Badillo) were disruptive.
Another speaker, Ida Cazares, said she was disappointed that the vote was delayed. “This further fuels the distrust that parents have,” she said.
