By Kirk Dopson
Will the Rainbow District School Board really be doings things differently this time? Time will tell. Director Norm Blaseg indicates “we're creating a different storyline”.
Let’s take a look at RDSB’s most recent story as quoted in the media.
Here are some of the recent controversial decisions the Board has mandated and handed down under the guidance of Chair Doreen Dewar since the last accommodation review occurred:
- The board, by majority vote, has revised the guidelines for public presentations, making it more difficult for the public to make presentations to the board (and conversely provided no timelines of when the board has to respond to queries made of them during a presentation).
- Denied livestreaming of their public meetings despite the fact that many other school boards in Ontario do.
- Banned the public from video or audio recording of the board’s public meetings (press excluded).
- Effective Oct.2, 2012, on the recommendation of the director of education and the board chair, banned two parents, one a school council member, one a mentor for award-winning Rainbow Robotics team, from the RDSB office and all RDSB secondary schools (all locations where board meetings are held), without providing any official notice, hearing or procedural process of why they had been sanctioned, what the length of the sanction is, or when the imposed sanction will come up for review or how the review process would work.
- At the Sept. 23, 2014, board meeting, when a motion was brought forward by trustees Robert Kirwin and Larry Killens to remove the trespass ban (as noted in Point 4), Killens, the “seconder” required for a motion, was ordered by Dewar to leave the meeting, thus ensuring the motion could not move forward. The public was also asked to leave. When the public was invited to return, along with Killens, the motion to remove/revisit the sanction disappeared.
- The board majority refused to address concerns raised by one of their own trustees regarding the Sudbury Student Services Consortium (ie. bussing issues), thus ignoring a student safety and procedural concern.
- The board majority adopted a revised set of Accommodation Review guidelines which allows for a shortened process with less opportunity for public input. While being a government mandated change, the trustees have the power to amend the timelines (but have not).
But the story of dysfunction doesn’t end there.
The culture at recent public board meetings clearly shows a rift growing between members of the board, particularly between trustee Larry Killens who represents Manitoulin Island, and the chair, Doreen Dewar, over a question of breach of confidence. Killens has turned to call in the Ombudsman, whose report (released this July) has found the board to be lacking in their adherence to their own guidelines and policy.
In their attempt to marginalize Killens, since July, the board has on three distinct and separate occasions proposed amending their governance bylaws regarding how a trustee participation can be blocked in an in-camera meeting (where the public cannot attend).
The first change was to ban all note-taking by the trustees during in-camera meetings. One of the trustees, speaking to that ban, declared their research revealed that of 29 boards in the province, not one mandated this prohibition.
The last two changes centred around a trustee’s ability to attend in-camera meetings by teleconference or videoconference methods. As well, the same trustee who spoke in her report, did her research and reported to the board, of 29 boards in the province, this is not only not done, but strategies are put in place by other boards to facilitate trustees participating at all times.
While these changes affect all trustees of the board (and particularly trustees representing rural areas), there is little question these changes are directly aimed at Larry Killens, as evidenced by a recent tirade by Chair Dewar at the Sept. 13 Strategic Planning meeting.
In her address to the board, Dewar proclaimed her belief that she has lost the faith in one board member, who she feels is the sole existing trustee of nine who has breached the board’s code of conduct with respect to confidentiality, thus not upholding the integrity of the board.
Dewar further went on to proclaim she has not acted on this as the board cannot expect to rely on their code of conduct to deal with breaches of confidentiality, as the process is too onerous. So, in order to be able to side-step the code of conduct requirements, Dewar moved a motion to amend the board’s governance bylaws.
That requirement is casting a wide net, to refuse trustees the ability to participate in in-camera meetings using electronic methods (i.e. teleconferencing or videoconferencing). Sadly, it does accomplish restricting Killens, but also penalizes the other trustees. Thankfully, this motion, which was supported only by trustees Bob Clement, Dena Morrison and Tyler Campbell, was soundly defeated.
To recap, since the last accommodation review, the Rainbow District School Board has become more restrictive, secretive and less transparent, not only towards the public, but also with respect to themselves.
Maybe Director Blaseg is right – we are getting a different storyline. A tragedy.
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