New Westminster school trustee MaryAnn Mortensen wants the district to post its entire school board agenda package online earlier to give the public better access to information.
Currently, district staff post just a one page agenda on the Friday before the Tuesday board meeting, while trustees receive the entire package to review over the weekend. That package isn't made available to the public - through the district's website - until Monday.
"I really think it's important for people to be able to read the entire package, understand the material in it, to be able to ask the intelligent questions," Mortensen said. "Otherwise people panic sometimes when they see headlines. They panic and they assume things incorrectly, through no fault of their own, and they begin calling and saying 'What's going on with May Day,' or 'What's going on with this policy, and why are you doing this?'"
Mortensen is a first-term trustee who previously served on the district parent advisory council. She would like the board's agenda to be made available to the public on the Thursday before the meeting.
"I think it's only fair that people are provided enough information to understand," she said.
New Westminster school district's past practice was to post agenda package on the district website the Friday before the meeting. Secretary-treasurer Brian Sommerfeldt changed this when he arrived in the school district.
"I felt that that change would be beneficial in terms of how the board works and how individual trustees are able to have the time provided for them to review material and seek any additional information they might need," Sommerfeldt said.
The move is compliant with school board policy, which calls for the board to make the agenda available one working day prior to the meeting, Sommerfeldt said.
"I understand where Brian was coming from when he did that, in essence, to protect staff time and to look after the board's interest, so we weren't being called on a weekend and being asked about an agenda that we hadn't heard all of the information (on)," Mortensen said. "But I think that we all understand our role, and we all understand that it's acceptable for us to say, 'You know, I can't really answer that without hearing all of the information first. I'm not going to make my mind up until I have heard everything, but I can tell you that my personal feeling on the matter is this.'"
Janzen said he is open to talking about changing the current practice.
"If people want to talk about, that's fine," he said.
Mortensen said she planned to take the proposal to change the agenda posting to the board's social responsibility committee meeting (which met Tuesday, after Record deadlines).
Mortensen also wants to look into the board offering a question period. Currently, the district has a visitors' section at the beginning of the meeting.
It's fairly common for the public - usually parents - to ask questions during that time.
