Othello School Board considers new meeting schedule
The Othello School Board may change the time of one of its bimonthly meetings.
FILE PHOTO
OTHELLO — The Othello School Board will consider moving one of its two monthly board meetings to a different time. Board members will be discussing their options March 9.
District superintendent Pete Perez said the idea came out of the school board’s interest in learning more about what Othello city officials are doing.
“Could we be a more consistent presence at city council meetings?” Perez said.
If board members decide to make the change, it would go into effect in April at the earliest.
The school board and Othello City Council meet on the second and fourth Mondays each month at about the same time. That makes it difficult for the board or the council to find out what the other is doing, Perez said. Board members wanted to change that, which was one of the discussions at a board workshop earlier this year.
“Some conversation (focused on) one of your goal areas and continuing to strengthen the partnership particularly with the city of Othello as maybe our first effort to thinking more carefully about partnerships in our community,” Perez told board members during the Feb. 9 meeting.
In addition, new Othello Mayor Ken Johnson is a former school board member and invited his former colleagues to work with the city on issues of interest to both.
“They extended a hand, and we’d like to extend a hand back,” Perez said.
Board members considered moving their meetings to a different day or, if the meeting stayed on Mondays, moving it to a different time. The third option – and the one under consideration – would keep the board meetings on the same days, but the last meeting of the month would be moved to noon.
The board also is considering making some changes to its meeting policies, with the goal of clarifying how board members communicate with each other, along with guidelines for board communication with district administrators.
The idea is to improve communication between board members and establish guidelines for board members and district staff, whether that’s district officials, building administrators or principals, according to a meeting memo.