The entire board of trustees of a Northern California school district resigned after making inappropriate comments about parents during a Zoom call that was unknowingly being broadcast to the public.
Greg Hetrick, Oakley Union Elementary School District Superintendent in a letter in families in the district on Friday announced the resignations of council members after Wednesday’s meeting, some of which was recorded and posted on YouTube.
The Oakley Union School District Board, which serves about 5,000 students in eastern San Francisco, in a Zoom call initially thought the meeting was not yet open to the public, according to ABC News.
In the call, part of which era posted to Twitter by NBC News Bay Area journalist Bigad Shabad, and trustee Kim Beede could be heard saying, “Are we alone?” before adding, “B —- if you call me, I’ll get you.”
1) When officials of the Oakley Union Elem. The school district thought they were meeting privately, using desecration to insult and threaten parents upset by the district’s prolonged school closures.
This is when they realized that their mtg was broadcast to the public.
“Uh oh.” pic.twitter.com/OXbHWq9FMy
– Bigad Shaban (@BigadShaban) February 18, 2021
School board president Lisa Brizendine went on to describe the criticism they have received in letters from parents pushing for schools to return to face-to-face classrooms. The primary school district is currently located it only allows distance learning in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
Brizendine said in the call, “They forget that there are real people on the other side of these letters who are writing,” and then added, “It’s very unfortunate that they want to catch us because they want theirs back. babysitters “. “
Another school board member, Richie Masadas, understood that his brother had a medical marijuana delivery service and that his main clients were parents with school-age children.
“When you have your kids at home, you will no longer smoke,” he added.
Finally, Beede could be heard saying, “Uh-oh. We have the meeting open to the public right now. “
“Nuh-uh,” Brezendine replied, after which the meeting was held in private.
At the end of the meeting, Brezendine apologized for the group’s previous comments, saying, “We had a private conversation because at the time we were really struggling with the presentation of all the board’s comments because we want so badly the best for the kids.”
Herrick also issued a statement apologizing for the incident, calling members’ comments “truly inappropriate” and announcing Friday to the community that the board had resigned.
The letter to families in the school district included a statement from Beede, Masadas and their partner Erica Ippolito, who wrote that they “deeply regret the comments that were made” and that they failed to fulfill their “responsibility to shape the behavior we expect.” of our students and staff “and their” obligation to build trust in the leadership of the district. “