‘You were warned.’ Emails show tense relationship between SC school board, superintendent
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Lexington-Richland 5 superintendent resigns
Christina Melton, the S.C. superintendent of the year, abruptly stepped down from her leadership role, and a school board member resigned alongside her. How has the district responded and who will take her place? Read the latest.
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Early December was a chaotic time for the Lexington-Richland 5 school district and Superintendent Christina Melton.
The school board met twice in one week to discuss whether a rising number of coronavirus cases should cause the district to scale back its reopening plans. After the board failed to act in the first of those meetings, three high schools were shut down Dec. 1 because of a teacher walkout. The board then met to approve a revised reopening schedule.
On Saturday of that week, a board member sent a text message to Melton about teacher shortage issues, asking how many classes went uncovered the previous two days. The board member also wanted to know about reports that a substitute teacher hit a student during that time.
On Tuesday, three days later, the school board member followed up with an email copied to other board members.
“As far as I can tell, my requests were not responded to in any manner,” wrote Ken Loveless, the board member. “I have not received an acknowledgment that it was received. Nor have I received replies to my inquiries.”
Melton responded later that day with an apology. “I regret your text was overlooked. On Saturday and Sunday, I slept most of both days due to lack of sleep last week,” and her husband didn’t have access to her locked phone. “It is my responsibility to monitor text messages, but looking back I did not respond. My apologies for my lack of response.”
The email exchange is included among hundreds of pages released under the Freedom of Information Act that detail interactions between the school board and Melton — interactions that shed a light on tensions between the two before Melton’s dramatic resignation during a board meeting last week.
They also shed some light on the “hostile and abusive” atmosphere that one board member alleges led to the sudden departure of Melton, who had just been named South Carolina’s superintendent of the year in May. The emails were released and posted to the school district’s website in response to parent requests for board communications.
In response to Loveless’ request of Dec. 8 last year, Melton said the board was already expecting a weekly update on staffing. “If daily reports or reports of ‘high need’ are expected, I ask Chair (Jan) Hammond to lead a discussion and any necessary action to guide our actions.
“I appreciate the emails of ideas and clarification but I remind everyone unless the Board takes action in the public, it is difficult for me to manage changed expectations or additional requests,” she wrote.
Hammond responded to the email thanking Melton for the explanation, but Loveless was not satisfied. He emailed Hammond that night.
“Dr. Melton is telling me she will not answer me. She is looking to you for (sic) tell her if she has to answer??? I don’t understand. I made specific questions known as board vice chair and I expect answers. I view this as insubordination,” he wrote.
Loveless could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
‘You were warned’
In public, tensions rarely flared between Melton and the school board over the rollout of Lexington-Richland 5’s reopening plan during the 2020-21 school year. But in emails subject to public disclosure under S.C. open records law, members bristled at Melton’s approach and responses to some of their questions, and occasionally butted heads.
On the same day Tuesday in December that Loveless emailed about an unanswered text, he sent another email about a COVID-19 outbreak among the Dutch Fork High School football team. The email referred to the second special called meeting the previous week, when board member Catherine Huddle proposed that sports be suspended along with a rollback in the district’s reopening plan. The proposal was voted down at the Dec. 2 meeting.
“Please provide us with a report,” Loveless wrote. “You were warned at the second special called board meeting about this.” Loveless suggested the cases of COVID-19 among the team needed to be investigated.
Melton responded that board members had been informed by email earlier that day.
“I am concerned about the phrase I was ‘warned about this,’” Melton wrote. “Since you have included other board members in this email, I have copied all to include Mr. White to assist with communication.”
Board member Ed White was the only board member not included in the original email. White, who resigned his school board seat last week in protest of how the board handled Melton’s departure, was a supporter of Melton’s on the board.
Loveless said in a follow-up email that a copied message to White “bounced back” and he had emailed him separately.
Dutch Fork won the Class 5A state championship on Dec. 4, two days after the board voted down Huddle’s proposal to suspend sports.
No right to pick and choose
A week later, on Saturday, Dec. 12, Ken Loveless emailed instructions to Melton as the district was considering candidates for filling administrative positions. Normal practice is for the board to vote up or down on the superintendent’s recommendations for a top position, but Loveless wanted more information.
“Dr. Melton, please provide to the full board the logs of all interviews and notes made for all candidate interviews with respect to these positions. We will need those by noon on Monday.”
Board member White wrote back later that day, “Please provide the information in the format that you deem appropriate to inform the board of your recommendations. Your actions are not directed by a single board member but only by a vote of the board in a public (sic).
“To all, Please do not respond. We can discuss in our public meeting if necessary,” White wrote.
On Monday, Melton emailed the board asking for “clarification” on what information the board needed.
“That is not information we have provided to the Board in the past,” she wrote, adding she was concerned about breaching the confidentiality of the interview process, as the names of most candidates would otherwise never become a matter of public record. Under South Carolina’s Freedom of Information law, the names of three finalists for a job must be released to the public.
Board member Rebecca Blackburn Hines wrote back supporting Melton’s position, saying the board’s role is to review the final recommendation, and expressing concern that board members would have to review all potential hires in the same way.
“Furthermore, as discussed in board training, we cannot act individually as board members,” Hines wrote. “If the board needs to discuss or redefine expectations from Dr. Melton, then that needs to occur by the board as a whole.”
Loveless followed up with an email Jan. 5 to fellow board members Nikki Gardner and Huddle, indicating that he only wanted information on the top three candidates. “We are entitled under state statute (I have reviewed it with an attorney) to receive information with respect to hiring of any position (from the superintendent on down) on the three top candidates reviewed for that position.
He added, “I did not receive any information requested of the superintendent for either ... position before the last board meeting. Instead, I wrongly received a statement about FOIA which did not apply and false information regarding statutory requirements, both from a new board member,” an apparent reference to Hines’ email.
“Further, I received a statement from the superintendent reviewing ‘customary actions’ from the previous board. (By-the-way, I was never told by the previous board nor was there any statement of policy given which justifies the new board member’s contention that an individual board member cannot ask for information in writing even though the superintendent considerers (sic) those actions and question beyond the limits of ‘custom’.)”
Loveless then cited a court case that he said determined a district superintendent can’t “arbitrarily decide which board member’s questions he or she wishes to answer nor does he or she have the right to pick and chose which questions she wishes to avoid or public documents he or she wishes to conceal.”
He concluded with, “I would request that each of you request the information that I first requested.”
On Jan. 20, Loveless wrote again to the full board that: “I asked for all available information regarding the top three candidates for each of these positions. My request was not honored and went unanswered.”
“(P)lease provide the resumes and any other information provided by the candidates with the board packet tomorrow or well in advance of the board meeting where the candidate will be presented for approval. Interest has been expressed by more than one board member in studying this information well in advance of the meeting.”
The next day, Melton responded, “You will find in my brief (which will be sent with board packet today) the information for the top three candidates… I hope you will find the forthcoming information satisfactory.”
‘How sad is that?’
It’s not clear when the relationship between Loveless and Melton soured, but an earlier email this school year may shed some light.
The email followed a heated board meeting in September in which Loveless was criticized by White and then-board member Beth Hutchison for the relationship between his company, Loveless Commercial Contracting, and another company hired by the district to oversee construction of Piney Woods Elementary School. Loveless was accused of an ethics violation by his fellow board members because he had won a contract with the construction firm — Contract Construction — after it was selected to build Piney Woods Elementary.the district’s new Piney Woods Elementary School.
Loveless disputed that there was anything unethical about his work with Contract Construction on a separate, non-school-related project. But he later recused himself from board discussion on Piney Woods, and the district obtained an opinion from the S.C. Ethics Commission that Loveless could not visit the site or review the company’s work while he was working with Contract.
After White and Hutchison raised questions about Loveless’ connection to Contract Construction in the September meeting, Loveless directed his ire at the superintendent, whose role at board meetings is largely informational.
“Dr. Melton, I don’t want to waste your time,” Loveless wrote on Sept. 16. “But, I have a hard time believing that you were part of group (sic) that aimed to hurt me on Monday night. How could you let them do that to me without saying anything? How sad is that? At least I know. We will continue on.”
‘A concern about my leadership or integrity’
Other school board members also had tense exchanges with Melton. Huddle emailed Melton on Jan. 5 saying she’d heard from parents that the district office was closed Dec. 21 and Dec. 22. Huddle declined to comment to The State, citing a board policy that only the board chair should speak for the board.
Melton responded that “it’s typical for staff at the district office and at schools to take these days off,” noting the approved calendar for the year listed the office as being closed those days and that in 2020 many district employees had the option of working from home. She added the district’s full-time employees “were working those days, unless they submitted leave.”
Huddle responded that the policy “addresses the need to close a school or district building and work remotely due to ‘limited situations that necessitate’ it. Clearly that policy was not intended to provide for remote work for anything other than an emergency.
“So here are my questions — were district office employees told in writing or verbally that they could work from home on these two particular days? How many district office employees worked remotely those 2 days and how many worked their normal schedule in the office?”
Loveless responded to the email chain, “Are there other (full time) employees not working at the district office who worked from their normal locations and not at home? If there are, please provide a list of those persons. Please reply before the next board meeting.”
Melton responded to board chairwoman Jan Hammond that she would like to coordinate a meeting with her. Loveless responded, “Dr. Melton, I sent you a question about your actions allowing employees at the district office days off with pay. My question was whether other (full time) employees not at the district office also received days off with pay. Are you going to answer my question?”
Melton took exception to that email.
“To address your concern, no, sir, I did not allow employees at the district office days off with pay,” she wrote. “I take my responsibilities very seriously and find it concerning if there is such a concern about my leadership or integrity. Mrs. Hammond, I request to discuss this Monday in Executive Session.”
Huddle sent an email to Hammond about Melton’s response.
“Jan, This is concerning to me. I asked questions that do not put a burden on the superintendent and I think I should receive an answer... While I very much respect your position as chairman, I don’t think it relates to my request — either she answers my questions or we have to get a quorum to get an answer. Obviously you are free to meet with her and if you do, I hope you will encourage her to answer me and avoid this becoming a big deal. I really don’t want to have to make a motion in a board meeting to get my questions answered but if that is the only way to get an answer I will.”
Huddle also responded directly to Melton.
“Your response is extremely concerning to me,” Huddle said. “I am sure that you agree that we should all be working together for the good of our students, staff and community. The questions I asked are not burdensome. As such, according to the workshop we had with (board attorney) Ms. White, I believe you are required to answer them. However, per that workshop, if you do believe a request is burdensome you are supposed to let the requestor know and if a board majority wants the information it is still to be provided. While I very much respect Ms. Hammond and her position as board chair, I do not recall the board chair as having a decision in that process other than their position as a board member.
“Since it appears you are not going to answer the questions I sent, I kindly ask for you to explain why you are not answering them.”
There was no reply in the released email chain. Less than six months later, Melton was gone.
This story was originally published June 22, 2021 at 3:06 PM.
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