Dana Ragle and Sue Conway
Beginning in December of 2005, the Burbank Board of Education has been in the process of revising the entire Board Policies and Administrative Regulation Manual with the assistance of the California School Boards Association. The Board has been recently presenting the proposed revisions at the meetings.
At the most recent meeting, held on November 1, Dr. Bowman presented to the Board proposed revisions on various topics including BB9310 – Board Policies and BB9323 – Meeting Conduct.
Changes to BB9310 – Board Policies were routine and dealt with how the Board will review their policies in the future. However, what concerns us and should concern you as well, are the changes being made to BB9323 – Meeting Conduct. The changes proposed by the Board and the District deal with among other topics, the public’s right to address the Board, and would include:
- Shortening an individual’s time to address the board from 5 to 3 minutes
- Limiting the total time for public input on a particular topic to 20 minutes
In an era of collaboration and teamwork, we feel the Board and the District are taking a step in the wrong direction. This time is used not only for us to express our concerns to the Board, but the community of Burbank as well. The district is therefore decreasing our ability to advocate publicly and speak on behalf of teachers in a public forum. BTA is not the only voice at the podium. All members of the community should have a right to express their opinion in a forum that is non-restrictive.
We are asking you to come to the next Board of Education meeting, Thursday, November 15th, and stand with us as we speak out to express our disappointment and disagreement with this move. We are hoping that the Board will hear us and remember that they are elected officers. One of the harder but nonetheless necessary duties of their positions is to listen to any and all members of the community.