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response 1 of 4:
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Jun 10 23:10 UTC 1995 |
While, in Ann Arbor, individual school board members couldn't suspend a
student, and a vote of the whole board would only be needed for an expulsion,
a situation like this could happen if it were an expulsion and there were only
three school board members. If I were the third board member, my vote against
it would have been public, and at that point trying to stay in support of the
other two board members would look very hypocritical. I also feel that
elected officials should always be willing to explain their votes, and defend
them. I would state my position on the issue. I wouldn't try to defend a
board vote that I thought had gone the wrong way.
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polygon
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response 4 of 4:
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Aug 26 14:31 UTC 1995 |
Actually, there used to be many three-member school boards in Michigan.
Back on the days of the "one-room schoolhouse", each of those schools
was a "primary school district" that was administered by a three-member
elected board.
In general, elected bodies are not allowed to take secret votes. So, the
question is somewhat moot. But there are probably some analogous issues
in the private sector; a corporation or organization board of directors
can vote in secret and have issues of solidarity, etc. I don't think I
can readily predict how I would handle such a situation without knowing
what the issues and circumstances were.
Even in public bodies there is occasionally an issue of maintaining the
organization's secrets. For example, when I was a county commissioner, we
had a situation where the county was in litigation over a particular
problem. Every so often the county attorney would brief us in private
about the course of this and other legal matters. One member of the board
had an interview with a local TV station and disclosed extensive details
about the county's legal strategy, options, expectations of how much money
we would have to offer to settle the case, etc.
Fortunately for the county and its taxpayers, the TV station was too
appalled by this indiscretion to make these things public. The board was
called into closed session to discuss this, and the county attorney,
visibly shaken, gave a stern lecture which chastised but did not name the
offending member. Most of the board had been unaware of the incident;
finally one woman burst out with: "Well, who was it?"
The chair of the board looked gravely down at her and said softly, "Look
who's not here." And indeed, there was only one commissioner (of 20)
absent. Another commissioner happened to be sitting in the seat of the
absent member to confer with someone; she shrieked and leaped out of his
chair as if it had turned red-hot.
In any event, I and the other commissioners regarded this incident as a
serious breach of trust. Even if he didn't agree with what the county was
doing, he had an obligation not to actively damage the county's legal
position.
Unfortunately, he went on to be re-elected numerous times.
To be perfectly honest, I think the problem had less to with a lack of
ethical standards than with the fact that this fellow was fairly
dim-witted. If he was really too stupid to know better, what was he doing
in a responsible elected position? The answer has to do with the severe
shortage of qualified candidates in our political system which has
developed over the last 20 years. With the pool of available people so
small, the caliber of those ultimately elected is falling.
Perhaps there should be some kind of ethical obligation for those who
*are* fitted for public office to spend at least a little time at it, to
serve on a school board or city council or even a planning commission for
a few years. Even running for office without success helps, because it
expands the number of choices. This sort of civics-textbook attitude used
to be widespread in America, but it is rapidly dying out.
(Sorry about rambling on for so long. I guess I'll let it stand.)
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