The County Line
Why do some public officials try so hard to hide the reasons behind the dismissal of an employee when doing so only fuels the public’s demands for answers? This behavior can bring harmful community gossip that sometimes accompanies these actions.
While Carmel Clay Schools is not the only public entity to deny revealing the reasons for employees’ forced departure from high profile positions, two recent examples are certainly cases in point. Last year Carmel finally got resignations it obviously wanted from its school superintendent and its director of human resources. This came after months of questions and speculation as to why the two administrators had earlier been placed on administrative leave.
The Indianapolis news media had a ‘field day’ reporting the schools’ refusal to tell why the actions were taken, how much money was being spent on continued compensation and a demand to see public records. And, the publicity hasn’t ended.
Then, in recent weeks, the highly successful coach of the girls’ high school basketball team was dismissed for reasons not revealed. This also caused an outcry for reasons including a student protest march through town and more negative publicity which will likely continue. In both these cases there was certainly no misappropriation of funds, no illegal misconduct and no violence alleged. In fact, nothing has been alleged because the school says it doesn’t have to tell anything. Maybe so, maybe not, but it’s not very good public relations.
Why all the secrecy? We can logically assume that attorneys in our sue-happy environment are telling school officials to make “no comment” for fear of a lawsuit. But, we should not live in constant fear of a lawsuit at the expense of the public’s right to know the reasoning behind our public officials’ decisions.
Now Carmel has a new blooming controversy involving the possible closing of two elementary schools. This time, there is a reason given. It’s a predicted decrease in enrollment. The plan is apparently to build a new school in a new location to take the place of Carmel Elementary and Orchard Park schools.
Opponents, now passing petitions against the plans, claim both the schools are operating at more than 90 percent capacity and building an expensive new facility will harm established neighborhoods where the two targeted schools are located.
The matter could be a big issue in the November school board election when three of the five Carmel Clay board members’ terms are up. Hopefully, this time officials will give more detail on their reasons for the closings and cost-effectiveness of building a new facility to take the place of the two affected schools.