BOUNDARIES COMMITTEE DIDN'T ANNOUNCE MEETINGS

Cape Girardeau school officials say an advisory committee to the superintendent doesn't have to comply with Missouri statutes governing open meetings.

Schools superintendent Dr. Dan Tallent said the Attendance Area Study Committee, first convened in 1996 as an ad hoc committee to the Cape Girardeau Board of Education, was not required to post notice of recent meetings because it was reassembled as an advisory committee at his request. Missouri's open meetings law requires advance notification of meetings of public bodies.

The committee has been meeting for two months solely to make sure elementary school boundaries approved in 1997 will provide optimal safety, building use, diversity, transportation and cost effectiveness after the Barbara Blanchard Elementary School opens, said Tallent. Because it was not recalled by the school board and had a very limited capacity, there were no legal requirements to open the meetings to the public, he said.

"These meetings were reconvened by administrators to take a look at numbers in an advisory capacity," Tallent said. "There's not been any secret meetings. I was just trying to be responsive to what was going on and had that committee come back and get me some data."

Jean Maneke, legal counsel to the Missouri Press Association, holds a different opinion. She cited Section 610.010(4e), RSMo, which requires proper notice of all meetings involving governing or quasi-public governmental bodies at which public business is discussed or decided.

"They're a committee that reported to the body," she said. "It doesn't matter if it was appointed by the public entity or by its representative."

The 15-member committee consisted of a principal and parent representative from each of the school district's six elementary schools. The committee has met about six times in the past two months, said assistant superintendent David Giles, who was the administrative liaison to the committee. In addition, principals serving on the committee also have held about three subcommittee meetings to compare enrollment numbers.

Neither Giles nor Tallent would give the names of committee members or what schools they represented, saying only that it included all elementary school principals and the same parents who served on the original committee assembled by the school board.

Parent representatives on that committee were Celester Holley, May Greene; Marie Walker, Washington; Cord Polen, Alma Schrader; Teresa Robinson, Franklin; Steve Trautwein, Jefferson; and Kathy Wolz, Clippard.

Wolz said the committee thought it was serving in an advisory capacity and did not discuss whether the public should be notified about the meetings. She agreed with Tallent that it was necessary for the enrollment projections to be reviewed. Besides, the committee was never intended to go unnoticed by the public, she said.

Said Wolz: "We were stunned (by the population and enrollment changes). We knew the revisions needed to be made, and we also knew some people were not going to be happy with the changes."

Said Tallent: "There will be at least two board meetings for people to make public comment, and we're asking the PTAs to make their meetings available for public comment. There'll be plenty of opportunities for people to get their opinions heard before the board makes it decision in April."

School patrons are invited to send written comments about the proposed changes to attendance area boundaries to the Cape Girardeau Board of Education, 61 N. Clark, Cape Girardeau, Mo., 63701.

Attendance Area Study Committee members:

David Giles, assistant superintendent.

Frank Ellis, Alma Schrader School principal.

Stan Seiler, Clippard School principal.

Julie Davenport, Franklin School principal.

Jim Watkins, former Franklin School principal.

Mark Cook, Jefferson School principal.

Barbara Kohlfield, May Greene School principal.

Pamela Barnes, Washington School principal, who didn't attend any meetings.

Sydney Herbst, Washington School assistant principal.

Celester Holley, May Greene parent, who didn't attend any meetings.

Marie Walker, Washington parent, who didn't attend any meetings.

Cord Polen, Alma Schrader parent.

Teresa Robinson, Franklin parent.

Steve Trautwein, Jefferson parent.

Kathy Wolz, Clippard parent.