Say what now? LR5 officials using taxpayer funds to sue newspaper seeking public information

Hold on just a minute.

The Lexington-Richland 5 school board voted 6-0 to sue this newspaper in response to a lawsuit filed on behalf of The State newspaper by senior editor Paul Osmundson, challenging the board reaching a closed-door settlement with former superintendent Christina Melton.

The newspaper’s lawsuit alleges that the school board approved a settlement agreement with former Superintendent Christina Melton, including a payment of $226,368 on top of Melton’s salary and benefits, without a public vote as required by the South Carolina Freedom of Information Act

The lawsuit also challenged the way school board officers met to set the agenda for board meetings. It was common for several board members to meet privately with the superintendent to decide what would and wouldn’t be on the agenda for the board’s public discussion. The suit alleges these meetings constitute a meeting of a committee of the school board, which by law must also be announced and made open to the public.

Since the lawsuit was filed, the board officers have started holding those meetings in public.

The school board, in a counterclaim, suggests that the lawsuit is moot because it has since publicly voted to approve a settlement agreement with Melton in a public vote on Aug. 9, more than a month after Melton left the district.

But that’s not the point.

News organizations across this country battle every single day on behalf of their readers to obtain and share public information because it holds elected leaders and government officials and organizations accountable.

So if one of those entities breaks the law on Monday and corrects itself on Tuesday, it doesn’t alter Monday’s events.

The school board or any public entity has to recognize that it operates on behalf of the public, the very people the LR5 board sought to keep out of the loop the first time around.

As the South Carolina Press Association notes, “Openness is important because it allows the public to learn about the performance of public officials and the expenditure of public funds.”

The LR5 school board is free to file a counterclaim, but the taxpayers in the district should consider that their school board is paying precious dollars in legal fees to sue a newspaper over the board’s decision to operate behind closed doors.

The people living within LR5 and paying its bills should be offended by the very notion.

This story was originally published August 25, 2021 at 3:00 PM.