For the second straight year, Lorraine Gayden asked the McComb school board to consider naming its administration building for Dr. Leslie Daniels, a former coach, principal and superintendent.
Gayden, a former school board member, spoke to the board during its work session Tuesday. She told trustees that Daniels should be honored “for his service to this district and to education in general.”
Daniels began his McComb career in 1965, and was principal in 1983 when McComb High School was one of 198 schools around the country to be named a National Model School.
He was superintendent from 1989 to 1996. Gayden said he “helped to eradicate the district’s debt and put the district back on a sound footing.”
She acknowledged that the school board ultimately removed Daniels from his job, but noted that he won a court case that required McComb to pay the remaining part of his contract.
Daniels then was superintendent of Greenwood schools until he retired in 2008. He became a member of McComb schools’ Hall of Fame in 2010 and died in 2018 at age 79.
Board chairman Lynn Martin told Gayden that the proposal will be on the agenda for next week’s school board meeting.
In another matter, trustee Evelle Thomas-Dillon asked the board to consider changes to its guidelines for the public to speak at board meetings.
She said people have told her that they don’t believe their concerns are heard by the school board or district officials “because they are not allowed to voice their opinions” at school board meetings.
Superintendent Dr. Cederick Ellis said, “If I denied a request, the next step is, I meet with the board president, and the board president can make the final determination.”
Dillon said that before she became a trustee, it took her two years to get on the school board’s agenda. The public, she added, “should be able to fill out a form and speak their concerns to the board, and our policy does not allow that. I think we should revisit this policy. Their voices are not coming to this table.”
Ellis responded, “We’re not trying to keep anyone from coming to the board. ... I’ve never denied anybody an attempt to speak to the board. Ever.”
He said some residents have sought to speak to trustees about personal issues like domestic disputes, which the school district can do nothing about. Other requests involve complaints about school employees that the board cannot discuss in public.
Ellis added that Dillon’s request to speak to the board involved a personnel matter.
But she said, “It should not take that long to speak to the board. It took me two years.”
Ellis and board attorney Kashonda Day said trustees should be careful in changing the policy.
“Once an individual speaks, you don’t know what they’ll say,” Ellis said. Day added that with board meetings soon set to be livestreamed, anything said in a meeting cannot be taken offline.
Martin said the school board needs ideas for a new policy, “written as you would like the changes to occur, so we can put it to a vote.”
Day said she, Dillon and assistant superintendent for organizational support James Brown will discuss the matter.
