In an executive session held Jan. 5, South Pike School Board trustees voted 4 to 1 not to offer Dr. Bill Gunnell a renewal of his contract as superintendent for the 2012-13 school year.
The minutes for the executive session, provided Friday by board attorney Lem Mitchell, show that John Hilbert made the motion to make a preliminary determination not to offer Gunnell a renewal. Angia Jones-Lee seconded. Eva Andrews and Sam Hall also voted not to offer Gunnell a renewal. Dr. Luke Lampton cast the dissenting vote.
Board members last week declined to comment on their vote made in executive session. The original minutes of the January executive session did not include anything about Gunnell.
Gunnell told the Enterprise-Journal shortly after the Jan. 5 meeting, that he was not seeking renewal of his contract. A renewal requires the superintendent's written request to the board. But the board members apparently were unaware about the letter of intent stipulation when they cast their 4-1 vote.
Questioned about the executive session vote this month, Mitchell confirmed that the board took a vote during the executive session, but cited privileges under the law involving personnel matters in declining to release the information.
Last week the Enterprise-Journal delivered letters to South Pike and to Mitchell’s office asking for a complete copy of the Jan. 5 minutes, including the votes by each school board member.
The letter pointed out that state law requires public board minutes to disclose the results of votes taken in executive sessions.
On Friday, Mitchell delivered a new version of the minutes to the Enterprise-Journal with the action about Gunnell and the vote of each member.
The board’s reasons for not renewing the contract were not included in this copy of the minutes. A letter from Mitchell accompanying the minutes cited state employment procedures in keeping the reasons private.
Mitchell also included a statement in response to Thursday’s story about the executive session:
“I am compelled to point out that there are several glaring errors in Rhonda Dunaway’s article entitled “S. Pike Gunnell vote not recorded” in the Feb. 9, 2012, edition of the Enterprise-Journal,” Mitchell wrote.
“First of all, that headline is false, because the vote is recorded. The executive session minutes are not being revised to reflect each board member’s vote. This vote, as are all votes, is recorded in the minutes. Whatever executive session minutes that the article states were reviewed earlier this month certainly were not the official minutes of the board, because the official minutes were approved by the board and signed by its president and secretary at the Feb. 2, 2012, board meeting.
“I frankly do not know how the executive session minutes could have been reviewed, because they are kept separately from the regular school board minutes and only reflect business occurring in executive session.
“When I was first asked to provide the minutes of the executive session, I indicated that a review of the minutes would be necessary to determine if there were information that needed to be redacted as, of course, is allowed by law. I also later pointed out that the proper procedure to request a document from the South Pike School District was to do so in writing.
“I most certainly did not tell anyone at the newspaper that I was ‘preparing the minutes as requested, showing members’ votes.’ What I said to Rhonda Dunaway was that I was preparing a response to the letter that was sent by the Enterprise-Journal requesting a copy of the executive session minutes.
“She did ask me if there were votes taken in the Jan. 5, 2012, executive session, and I replied that there were. At no time did I indicate that the votes were not in the minutes, because that simply is not true.”
At the Feb. 2 meeting, the January board minutes provided to the Enterprise-Journal did not include the executive session vote concerning Gunnell’s contract. A copy of this version, which the newspaper reviewed before the February meeting, can be viewed online at www.southpike.org, under “District Information: School Board Agenda.”
These minutes show that the board planned to go into executive session concerning a personnel matter but do not include any information or action taken.
