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Show How to make public meetings more nice My friend Grump looked disgustingly satisfied with himself as he dipped his french fry in the large puddle of ketchup he'd poured on his plate and stuffed the combination com-bination in his mouth. "Well, you guys in the 'media' finally gotyours. didn't you?" What do you mean, finally? I asked. We're getting ours every day. Some graduate student in journalism jour-nalism figured out for his master thesis that somebody says something bad about the press in this country every 30 seconds. "You can't blame them, can you'.'" Grump responded, shoving in another french fry before he gulped down a large swallow of Cherry Coke. "You guys ask for it. "After all, look at this Gary Hart thing. Who else but a newspaper reporter would slake out a guy's home to see who the poor slob is spending his free time with? Especially when nobody else really cares." Sure, that was a stupid thing to do, although it wasn't as stupid as what Hart was doing, right? (I was on firm ground, here.) And besides, why do you lump me in with those sensationalistic daily guys? 1 1 should know better than to give Grump an opening, since he likes to give me a hard time. But sometimes I just can't help myself.) "Oh sure." Grump said with an inordinate amount of self satisfaction. "I know you don't work for a real newspaper, like those guys. But sometimes you act like vou think you do." Huh? "Well, look at this thing with the the editor's column By MARC HADDOCK Manila Elementary. First of all, you guys assassinate the character of this principal, then you take on the school board for trying to hold an orderly meeting." Wait a minute, I said. I was getting get-ting angry. In the first place, I explained, ex-plained, we just reported what went on in an open meeting -- one to which the public is invited, and one during which the public's business is supposed to be conducted in an open forum. And nobody's character was assassinated. "Save that self-righteous first ammendment crap for your editorial page," Grump said with a grin that bordered on the malicious. "You guys just picked up on a personality conflict and escalated it to a war because it made a good story." Not true, I countered. It was and still is a good story -- and I would handle it the same way again. "Well, you newspaper folks always have a hard time saying you're sorry, but I don't think you will have a chance to make this mistake again." That scared me. What do you mean? I asked. "Well, haven't you heard about the new policy?"What new policy. "The one I've written to help make School Board meetings more productive and less destructive. One that makes it possible for people to feel good about the way the school district does it's business. Here, I have a copy of my draft right here." He pulled out a sheet of white paper with a few paragraphs written on it. It looked innocent enough until I read the proposed policy. It went like this: 1.0 INCREASING N1CENESS IN BOARD MEETINGS 1.1 Students in the Alpine School District are best educated in an atmosphere that is positive in nature, with few distractions and as little controversy as possible. 1 .2 Meetings of the Alpine Board of Education are designed to conduct business matters and develop policies to benefit the youth of the district with as little interference from outside sources (ie., the press) as possible, while still making the media feel like they are just as welcome as anyone else at the board meetings. 1.3 Business of any sort is best carried out in a calm, deliberate fashion, with little controversy and no disagreement displayed before members of the public. 1.4 To increase niceness and set a proper tone in the Alpine Board meetings, each meeting will W with a rendition "Let Us on r Kind Words" by a school group selected at the w2 meeting. F TOj 1.5 No member of the bw employee of the district or scb district patron will be allowed . mention any other individual k name in a School Board mw unless they are going t0 2 recognition for a positive act approved by the board. (All L announcements must be appiw prior to the board meeting.) 1.6 Any negative references m be dealt with in closed me which will be held to discia "Personnel" matters. (After everyone is some kind of personnel This will help keep board meek in tone with the rest of the Valley community. ' I read the policy again andagaii Your not serious, I said. Youdu mean this. This would make : almost impossible for the board do anything in an open meetir; except nice things. "That's right. And I've set up; special closed session just to fa this policy," But that's not covered in b state's closed meeting act. "That's okay. I told them bin: gripe about my kid's teacher u they set up a closed meeting upjj for me. I'll gripe for a minutta then introduce the new policy, te it's implemented, we can keep p guys where you belong - in l!i dark." Somehow, I don't think Grump: my friend any more. |