Can Jackson County legislators serve on the school board? Judge gives ruling Tuesday
A judge ruled Tuesday that Jackson County legislators cannot simultaneously serve as elected members of local school boards.
Not only is that in violation of the county charter, it would set up a conflict of interest that would not be in the best interest of taxpayers, according to the decision.
The ruling prevents DaRon McGee, the current chairman of the legislature, from reclaiming his seat on the Hickman Mills school board as he had hoped to do as one of the five candidates vying for three seats in the April 4 election.
As a result of the ruling, Judge Louis Angles issued an order granting McGee’s request to have his name removed from the ballot. The deadline for that was also Tuesday.
The decision is the outgrowth of a lawsuit filed in December by fellow county legislator Manny Abarca, who asked that a judge decide whether the county charter forbade legislators from holding other elective office. The county’s legal staff claimed that the charter was clear and required Abarca, McGee and two other newly elected members of the county legislature to resign their membership on local school boards before being sworn in as members of the legislature on Jan. 1.
Abarca’s attorneys claimed the charter’s language was subject to interpretation. All the same, Abarca, McGee, Megan Marshall and Donna Peyton did resign ahead of the swearing in ceremony when Angles refused to grant a temporary order. That order would have allowed them to hold dual memberships on the legislature and their school boards pending the outcome of the case.
The lawsuit continued, despite those resignations. McGee replaced Abarca as the named plaintiff as he pursued reelection to the Hickman Mills board. McGee said he did not learn of the court decision until he was contacted by a reporter Tuesday afternoon. He had no immediate comment.
In his six-page decision, Angles said that the county has two good reasons to prohibit county legislators from serving on school boards, both of them presenting conflicts of interest..
“There is an inherent conflict between school boards and counties regarding property taxes,” he wrote. The county sets the property values on which school taxes are based and then distributes that money.
Second, state law obliges county legislators to fill vacancies on school boards in certain circumstance.s.
“Hence, enabling (McGee) and similarly situated individuals to serve as County Legislators affords them the opportunity to vote on the very individuals who will serve alongside them as school board directors,” Angles wrote.
No matter how hard someone might try to keep those roles separate, such conflicts cannot be permitted “for the sake of the public trust in governing bodies,” he said.
