School Board Talks Openly About Secrets

The Cobb County Board of Education struggled to sort out secret meetings, private conversations, retreats and openness during members’ second training session with Georgia School Boards Association consultant Tony Arasi on Wednesday afternoon.

“I need to understand secret meetings because I need to know if we’re having secret meetings going on,” said board Chairwoman Alison Bartlett, whose Post 7 includes .

The training session came two days before Mark Elgart, the president and CEO of accrediting agency AdvancED, said two of the three areas the school board must address for the to receive unrestricted accreditation in December are training to overcome board members’ inexperience and a commitment to open meetings with full access for all members.

The third area involves developing data all board members can accept when they make decisions such as setting the school calendar.

During Wednesday’s 90-minute training session, Arasi went over the results of a self-assessment the board members filled out. The consultant said the board was honest and rated itself low.

Arasi said one board member, whom he didn’t name, cited “secret meetings” as a way the board failed to “adhere to its adopted code of ethics.”

South Cobb board member David Morgan of Post 3 suggested having each board member try to define secret meetings.

Morgan said secret meetings could be four board members gathering without the other three, but he also said secret might not be the right word, choosing instead to call such a meeting anything that doesn’t seem on the “up and up.”

North Cobb member Kathleen Angelucci of Post 4 said a secret meeting is not public, doesn’t provide notice to other board members of its existence, and could involve two, three or four board members.

Morgan said he didn’t believe a meeting he had with Angelucci at the was a secret meeting. He called her, they set a time, and they talked.

But Angelucci said the issue is more about the “perception” of a secret meeting.

Board Attorney Clem Doyle said some board members had spoken to him about secret meetings, possible violations of the state Open Meetings Act and “exclusion from the process.”

Smyrna representative Tim Stultz of Post 2 said only the person who wrote “secret meetings” on the self-assessment could define the term.

“I have no problem with two of you going to lunch, although I really do like Australian Bakery. But when there are four people, I see that as something very, very different. That’s a quorum,” West Cobb’s Lynnda Crowder-Eagle of Post 1 said. “Even if you’re not meeting, maybe four people or three people or whatever, having a conversation about board business, I just think we should all be privy to the same information–if we are truly committed to working as a unified group.”

David Banks of Post 5, who represents East and Northeast Cobb, said he didn’t know of any secret meetings. 

East Cobb member Scott Sweeney of Post 6 said a group of four people got together privately, “but I wasn’t invited.”

Sweeney said he has held phone conversations or meetings with every board member, and he plans to continue them to “keep the dialogue flowing.”

Bartlett fears that “secret meeting” implies collusion, and that “deeply concerns me.”

The board also talked about media leaks and possibly holding quarterly “mini-retreats,” but Crowder-Eagle said she took heavy criticism in the past in the Marietta Daily Journal for holding retreats.

“There’s always been a problem getting together and working on things,” Crowder-Eagle said.

“We need to recognize there’s a lot of external problems” with retreats, Bartlett said.

Crowder-Eagle said retreats raise “questions about openness and transparency.”

The board didn’t get all the way through the 21-page self-assessment results but plans to finish the discussion with Arasi at the June 8 work session. Arasi said he also plans to discuss with the board the new state requirements for school boards.