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Livermore school trustees agreed last week to revise their regular meeting calendar for the remainder of the academic year, axing all morning meetings in favor of hosting evening-only sessions for the sake of bolstering community trust.
Under the approved calendar, daytime workshops, wherein trustees do not take action or vote on items, can be scheduled on an as-needed basis.
The new schedule marks a shift away from the previous calendar, in which most months featured one evening meeting and one morning meeting for the Livermore Valley Joint Unified School District Board of Education, with daytime sessions focused mainly on school site presentations.
Coinciding with the scheduling discussion at the Jan. 13 regular meeting, the boardroom was tense with community members expressing their opposition to budget cut options and support for the board’s approval of a tentative agreement with the teachers union Livermore Education Association.
The board adopted the calendar revision via 4-1 tally — Trustee Deena Kaplanis casting the sole dissenting vote — in effect, setting up two additional evening meetings this school year including Feb. 24 and March 24.
“In the past several months, we’ve had trust issues with the community and I think the addition of two evening meetings is worth a step towards building that trust,” Board President Steven Drouin said.
Last May, the board approved a meeting calendar to host one evening and one morning meeting most months.
“When we went to these morning meetings, the perception was lack of access and I think… public access to public institutions is essential,” Trustee Craig Bueno said.
The trustees started revisiting the schedule during their Dec. 9 meeting, but ultimately tabled a decision on whether to rename several morning meetings as workshops. The reclassification was meant to align the name of morning meetings with their format and function of “deeper, topic-focused discussion and school site presentations”, according to the staff report.
Upon returning to the subject last week, options before the board included maintaining the previous schedule as well as hosting one evening meeting and one morning workshop most months, Drouin explained.
In response to the possibility of meetings becoming evening-only, Trustee Emily Prusso expressed a scheduling conflict due to her working hours. However, Prusso said she would try to attend the meetings if the board voted for the schedule.
“I want you to be there — Trustee Prusso — but I also think that at this particular junction for our community, transparency is paramount,” Trustee Christiaan VandenHeuvel said.
VandenHeuvel’s comment was met with cheers from the audience.
Kaplanis also expressed support for transparency and alternatively backed a schedule of one evening session and one morning workshop most months, with workshops excluding items that the public might want to comment on. Students will be able to attend more of the board meetings if they are held once a month, Kaplanis added.
“We can say that workshops won’t cover items that the public wants to comment on, but there’s a trust issue with the community right now,” VandenHeuvel replied.
Upon passage of the new schedule, the crowd once again broke out into cheering and applause.
