After the joint school board meeting adjourned Thursday, parents from Pembroke Academy’s sending towns formed small huddles and had the discussion that officials from throughout SAU 53 wouldn’t touch.
They lingered in the cafeteria well after the school board members from Allenstown, Chichester, Deerfield, Epsom and Pembroke headed home. They talked about Rekha Luther, the high school’s former dean of students who was arrested and charged with bringing heroin into the building in mid-February, and the district’s failure to notify parents.
Officials from the academy, the school board and the district have said they’re unable to discuss Luther’s arrest, calling it a “personnel issue” and citing an exemption in the state’s right-to-know law. Two people used the public comment period Thursday to call for a change in the district’s policy on notifying parents and to file a complaint against Superintendent Patty Sherman. The board members said nothing.
Most of the people who came to the meeting to submit public comments missed their opportunity. The agenda was posted for 6 p.m. as a “school board member dinner” with the joint board meeting “immediately following.” At 6:10 p.m., David Pearl’s formal complaint against Sherman – saying she either misrepresented or violated the right-to-know law – was under way, while at least one board member continued to chew.
Jason Schoeller, a junior at the academy from Pembroke, attempted to give the school boards a student’s perspective on the news, which the Monitor broke online last week, but he arrived too late. He said it’s “disturbing” that the district didn’t notify the community with at least the basic fact that an administrator was arrested at school on Feb. 17.
“I would like to have a chance, at some point, to make the opinion of the students known,” Schoeller said in an interview after the meeting.
He said the lack of acknowledgement from the district and school board “sends the message that this apparently isn’t a big deal,” at a time when the state is struggling with widespread opioid abuse.
While Schoeller regretted not arriving earlier, the Pembroke mother of a sophomore boy at the academy, Cathy Yanulavich, offered a more pointed criticism of the board, saying it was a “sneaky” dodge to start the meeting before most attendees arrived.
“So we were supposed to be here at 6 and watch them eat dinner?” she said. “It’s ridiculous.”
Even Pearl, who arrived early with handouts of his formal complaint, said his comment was nearly thwarted. The chairman disagreed that the joint board had purview over his complaint until he explained that it was directed at Sherman, who works for the full SAU.
“He tried to shut me down,” Pearl said. “He said, ‘I know where you’re going. It’s a Pembroke issue.’ ”
Pearl, the father of a female student at Pembroke Academy and former member of Hooksett’s school board, said Sherman was mistaken in her understanding of the state’s right-to-know law when she cited it Tuesday as prohibiting her from announcing the arrest. He continued to say that if Sherman’s interpretation was true, then she violated the law by discussing aspects of the investigation at the Pembroke school board’s Tuesday meeting.
“Either they misrepresented it, or they violated it,” he said in an interview.
New Hampshire attorneys who have argued for open records said in phone interviews on Wednesday and Thursday that the right-to-know law doesn’t prohibit the district from announcing the facts of an arrest at school to parents.
The district has no obligation to inform its community, but can “certainly confirm that their teacher was arrested,” said Greg Sullivan, an attorney for the Hingham, Mass.-based law firm Malloy & Sullivan. Sullivan teaches First Amendment and media law and has represented the Union Leader.
Rick Gagliuso, an attorney for the Merrimack-based law firm Gagliuso & Gagliuso, said there’s language within a right-to-know exemption that is sometimes broadly interpreted.
Specifically, exemptions are carved out for “records pertaining to internal personnel practices . . . and other files whose disclosure would constitute invasion of privacy.” Those were cited by the school district’s attorney as the basis for denying the Monitor’s requests to view Luther’s letter of resignation and resume.
“It’s one of a number of exemptions in the right-to-know law that, if they’re broadly interpreted, can swallow the law. If you interpret it broadly enough, you can effectively undo the general rule that says these are public records that should be disclosed,” said Gagliuso, who represents the Telegraph.
Both attorneys agreed, however, that the courts have presented a challenge to those who seek to open personnel records, even in cases that seem to present an important public interest.
“You can make a decent argument that there’s an enormous public interest in finding out at least something more about what’s going on, and that interest outweighs (Luther’s) interest in privacy,” Gagliuso said. “But the current state of the law on this point is not favorable to those seeking disclosure of these records.”
Still unsatisfied with the board’s response to their complaints, some parents said they intend to follow up at the Pembroke school board’s next meeting, which is April 19 at 6:30 p.m. at Pembroke Academy.
(Nick Reid can be reached at 369-3325, nreid@cmonitor.com or on Twitter at @NickBReid.)