After three years of blocking public comment thanks to a one-word change to its public participation policy, Lakota Local Schools voted 3-2 to reinstate the practice in a May 4 board meeting.
But concerns rooted in past public participation “chaos” remain among some board members.
Butler County’s largest district will have its first recorded public comment since 2023 at its upcoming meeting on Wednesday, May 20. Until now, the board has hosted 45-minute, non-recorded “listening sessions” prior to meetings.
The change reflects a shift in a board of education that, in 2022, attempted to scrap the public comment practice altogether after unsubstantiated claims made during a meeting against former Superintendent Matt Miller spurred two investigations, multiple lawsuits, alleged death threats and Miller’s ultimate resignation.
There is no rule requiring public comment sessions at school board meetings, according to the Ohio School Boards Association, though, the association states, “nearly all Ohio school districts have policies in place that provide an opportunity for the community to address the board.”
Ben Nguyen, a recent Lakota West High School graduate elected to the board in November, made reviving public comment a cornerstone of his campaign. And in the May 4 vote, he spearheaded the approval of the public comment policy.
Nguyen said it’s imperative for people to be able to comment during ongoing levy discussions.
“Sometimes it’s just symbolic for people, sometimes it’s just therapeutic for people … to be able to voice an opinion,” he said.
Nguyen met some resistance from fellow member Julie Shaffer and board president Kelley Casper – both of whom voted ‘no’ to reinstating public comment in the 3-2 split.
“At this point I feel like we become complicit if somebody says something disparaging that may or may not be true about a staff member, they cannot defend their name and now it is part of the public record,” Shaffer said.
After joining the board in 2021, Shaffer said “news about our meetings became the theatrics that were happening at the microphone versus the positive work of the board.”
“If you sat on this side of the table during the chaos,” Casper told Nguyen, “you would be also concerned.”
Lakota school board’s public comment controversy, explained
In October 2022, one month after Lakota launched its investigation into claims about its superintendent, the board suspended public participation at its meetings, citing yelling and “lack of respect” from speakers.
But the halt on public comment didn’t last long – at first.
At the helm of the superintendent controversy was board member Darbi Boddy, who was removed from her seat in 2024 after fellow member Isaac Adi secured a civil stalking protection order against her. During her tenure at Lakota Local, Boddy made several accusations during meetings against Miller, including that he posted nefarious things on Craigslist, which investigators later found to be false.
One Butler County Sheriff’s Office investigation, a psychological examination and an independent full forensic examination of Miller’s devices and cloud storage later, no wrongdoing was found. After six years as superintendent, Miller resigned shortly after the investigations in early 2023, citing Boddy’s “outright lies” as the catalyst.
At the time, Lakota’s public participation policy stated that speakers could not make complaints about specific employees. Speakers were also warned against making comments that were “repetitive, obscene, and/or comments that constitute a true threat” and were advised to observe “reasonable decorum.”
Through a September 2022 federal lawsuit suggesting the policy was unconstitutional, Lakota agreed in October to no longer restrict mentions of specific employees in public comment. The agreement came about a week after the board tried to suspend all public participation.
But months later in March 2023, the board voted 4-1 to change the policy’s phrasing from “shall” to “may” in the following: “the Board shall provide a period for public participation at every regular meeting.”
Boddy was the lone vote against the policy change.
The one-word change allowed Lakota to eliminate public comment at any given meeting. And in its place, the board introduced listening sessions, which was the name of the game for three years, until now.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Lakota school board hesitantly reinstates public comment after hiatus
Reporting by Grace Tucker, Cincinnati Enquirer / Cincinnati Enquirer
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