Public Comment dominated the Monday meeting of the Oconee County Board of Education, with 29 people speaking to the Board during the one hour and 40-plus minute session.
Most of those who spoke were concerned with the status of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes at Oconee County Schools, and the overwhelming majority who spoke want the organization present at elementary through high schools in the system.
Board Chair Kim Argo tried to keep the final two speakers at Monday’s meeting, Michael and Amanda Prochaska, co-publishers of The Oconee Enterprise, from speaking and had them forcibly removed from the meeting.
The pair came to the meeting late after being severely criticized by Board Member Tim Burgess for an error in a replacement legal advertisement submitted by the Board to the paper. That advertisement was necessary because the Board incorrectly advertised its July 1 tax hearings.
Chief Financial Officer Peter Adams had told Burgess that the paper had not apologized for the error, but Amanda Prochaska shouted out before she was removed from the meeting that she had made just such an apology that afternoon to Communications Director Steven Colquitt.
The email record shows that Amanda Prochaska had apologized in an exchange with Colquitt.
The Board not only removed the Prochaskas from the room before they could finish their comments, but Oconee County Schools cut off the live feed of the meeting as it was taking place, edited out four minutes from the video released to the public two days after the meeting to remove the Prochaskas, and made no reference to their comments in the official minutes of Monday’s meeting.
Before the Public Comment section of the meeting, Adams gave a series of financial reports, including the first detailed budget for Fiscal Year 2025. Only a budget summary had been available to the public prior to Monday.
That document shows that the Board is budgeting $301,633 for the full compensation package for Superintendent Jason Branch in the current fiscal year, up by 5.9 percent from the $284,810 budgeted last year.
The detailed budget also shows that Oconee County Schools collected $177,779 in investment income in the first month of the current fiscal year, or $127,779 more than the $50,000 the Board had approved in June as expected investment income for the entire Fiscal Year 2025.
Monday’s Agenda
Public Communication, as is usual, was near the end of the agenda for the Board meeting on Monday.
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| Screen Shot Adams At Podium, Colquitt To His Right 8/12/2024 |
Prior to allowing those in the packed Board meeting room in the new Instructional Support Center to speak, the Board recognized a series of student award recipients for 2024..
Included were the Georgia Science and Engineering Fair awardee at Malcom Bridge Middle School, the Georgia High School Association (GHSA) 4A Girls Soccer State Runner-up awardees at North Oconee High School (NOHS), the GHSA 4A Boys Golf and GHSA 4A Girls Golf, both at NOHS, the FFA State awardees at NOHS, and the American Rocketry Challenge National Finalist awardees at Oconee County High School.
The only staff presentations to the Board were those made by Adams as part of the usual Business Services Report.
Included was the first detailed budget for Fiscal Year 2025, which showed the full amount allocated for Superintendent Branch, whose new contract was approved by the Board at its meeting on Aug. 5.
That contract listed Branch’s salary at $267,039 for the current year, up $13,968, or 5.5 percent, from his salary of $253,071 last year.
The contract listed a series of other benefits, such as a monthly travel allowance and payment of insurance premiums, bringing the total amount to the budgeted $301,633.
That same budget report showed that the Fiscal Year 2025 Budget grossly underestimates the amount of total revenue Oconee County Schools will receive this year.
The Budget approved by the Board in June lists only $50,000 for investment income in the Fiscal Year 2025 Budget, yet in only one month the amount received was $177,779.
Citizens at several of the budget and tax hearings questioned this underestimation of revenue in the Fiscal Year 2025 budget.
The final budget for Fiscal Year 2024 showing how much total investment revenue actually was collected has not yet been presented to the Board. As of the end of May, that figure was $2,410,335, though only $50,000 had been budgeted that year as well.
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To fund the Fiscal Year 2025 Budget, the Board on July 8 voted to set the millage rate for the collection of property taxes at 14.25, representing a tax increase of 2.27 percent.
At the Aug. 5 meeting of the Board, Branch said that the Georgia Department of Revenue would not accept the Board’s two hearings on the tax increase held on July 1 because they were only four days after the Board had published advertisements for them in the county’s legal organ, the Enterprise, on June 27.
State law requires a seven-day gap between publication in the legal organ and the first of three required tax hearings.
Branch said on Aug. 5 that the Board would have to re-advertise those hearings in the Enterprise on Aug. 8 and hold the new hearings on Aug. 16.
At the end of his Business Services Report to the Board on Monday, Chief Financial Officer Adams said “we were notified just a couple of hours ago by our Tax Commissioner Jennifer Riddle, after she contacted the Department of Revenue, that the ad for the August 16th hearings that was in The Oconee Enterprise, which is the county's legal organ, is not compliant with the Georgia Code of 30 square inches.”
Adams said “we reached out to The Oconee Enterprise to inquire about our ad and were informed that an employee of The Oconee Enterprise changed the ad size after the proof was approved by the publisher Michael Prochaska.”
Adams said he would seek a waiver from the Department of Revenue but was advised such a waiver would be unlikely to be granted.
Adams said he had “reserved ad space to run in this week's Enterprise. “Mr Colquitt will personally review the advertisement at the legal organ,” Adams said.
New Hearings Scheduled
No waiver was granted, and the Board has scheduled two tax increase hearings for Aug. 23.
The first is at 10 a.m., and the second is at 2 p.m.
The Board has called a meeting for 2:30 p.m. on Aug. 23 to adopt the millage rate of 14.25.
All of these meetings will be in the Board Room of the Instructional Support Center, 71 North Main Street in Watkinsville.
Burgess’s Response
“I want to make sure I understood what you just reported to us because I hadn’t heard this before,” Board Member Burgess said when Adams had finished his presentation.
“When we asked The Oconee Enterprise to run our ad for the public hearings because of the advice that we had gotten from the Department of Revenue previously, did we give them instructions on what the size--the legal size--of that ad needed to be based on Georgia law?” Burgess asked.
“Yes, we gave them that,” Adams said. “We told them we wanted the ad size that was approved for the June 27th publication, which met all the requirements of the Department of Revenue.”
“And because they were unable to follow those instructions and print--and literally print an ad the right size after us asking them the right size to print,” Burgess continued, “Revenue is telling us that we may have to, unless their appeal, unless our appeal, is approved, we'll have to redo the hearings and reset, go through the process of resetting the millage again?”
“We'll have to ratify the millage, yes sir,” Adams said. “We'll have those meetings move back a week and they had, just so you understand it, an ad space is 5 by 6 is the 30 square inches. They ran the ad at 5 by 5. So it was an inch short.”
Burgess laughed in response and then asked: “Did you get any apology from the paper for them being unable to follow that simple instruction?”
“No sir,” Adams said. “No we did not.”
“You know, this paper has been very critical of the Board over the last couple years for a lot of, a lot of issues. Most of them I take issue with.”
“But this seems to be just one where they can't seem to follow a simple instruction to run an ad the right size, and because of that we're going to have to go through a whole separate process to set the millage. Is that correct?”
“That's correct, sir,” Adams responded.
“Okay I just want to make sure I understood what was going on. Thank you,” Burgess said.
Two Mistakes
An email exchange between Communications Director Colquitt and Amanda Prochaska shows that Colquitt had been informed that Amanda Prochaska, not Michael Prochaska, proofed the advertisement in question.
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| First Email Message 8/12/2024 |
Michael Prochaska is editor of the paper in addition to being co-publisher, and Amanda Prochaska is co-publisher and is in charge of advertising for the paper. Both have frequent contact with Colquitt.
The email record also shows that Colquitt had received an apology from Amanda Prochaska regarding the size of the advertisement.
Colquitt was seated just to the right of Adams as Adams responded to the questions from Burgess, but he did not correct the erroneous information provided by Adams about who proofed the advertisement or about an apology.
The email exchange shows that Colquitt sent an email to both Amanda and Michael Prochaska at 3:15 p.m. on Aug. 12, or less than three hours before the Board meeting. In that message, Colquitt referenced a telephone conversation just completed.
“Following up on our phone call from a few minutes ago,” he wrote, “please confirm in writing that the legal organ received the ad order for the Aug. 8, 2024, issue from Oconee County Schools for "the exact sizes for the two previous ads that ran on June 27 on Page A5;" that you submitted that info to your graphic designer; and that he or she made the decision to alter the specs in order to get more of an article.”
“Yes. I sent the ads to our graphic designer to be prepared to run at the same size as the 6/27 and 7/4 newspapers,” Amanda Prochaska wrote back at 3:46 p.m. “He has the flexibility to adjust legal ad sizes to fit pagination unless they are required by law to run at a certain size. I apologize that we adjusted those without knowing they were required to be a certain size by statute. He adjusted them after I proofed the page so I did not catch it. In the future, we will always fall within your provided guidelines as required by code, charter, or any other governing document you fall under.”
Colquitt wrote back at 4:32 p.m. saying “Thank you for emailing me back.”
“We will be submitting the new dates for both ads by the end of the day on Tuesday,” he continued.
“Please make sure the tax digest and 5-year history of levy runs the same as the June 27, 2024, and July 4, 2024, editions,” he continued.
“For the notice of property tax increase, here is the DOR language: The advertisement shall ... be not less than 30 square inches. The June 27 and July 4 ads meet that requirement.” (DOR stands for Department of Revenue.)
Prochaskas Seek To Respond
Michael Prochaska told me that he was in his office on Barnett Shoals Road on Monday when the Board was meeting but that he and Amanda Prochaska were following the meeting as it was being livestreamed. Reporter Nathalee Simoneau was present at the meeting.
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| Second Email 8/12/2024 |
When the Prochaskas heard what Adams had told Burgess and what Burgess said in response, Prochaska said, they immediately went to the Instructional Support Center on North Main Street to address the errors in Adams’s report.
I was out of town and did not attend the meeting on Monday. The video released by the Board on Tuesday has a four-minute gap that begins when Colquitt said that Public Communications was closed.
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| Third Email 8/12/2024 |
I know the size of the gap because someone who did attend gave me an audio recording of that part of the meeting. I know the voices of the participants and could easily transcribe what followed.
Michael Prochaska said “We’d like to address the Board.” A picture by Reporter Simoneau that appears with the front page editorial in the Aug. 15 edition of the Enterprise shows that Prochaska had come forward to the podium.
“Excuse me, you’re out of order,” Board Chair Argo said. “I'm going to have to ask you. Sorry, I’m going to have to ask you.”
Argo then banged the gavel loudly and repeatedly and said, loudly, “You’re out of order.”
Prochaskas Continue
“There was some misinformation about The Oconee Enterprise earlier today that we’d like to address the Board. Thank you,” Michael Prochaska continued.
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| Michael Prochaska At Podium 8/12/2024 Courtesy of Nathalee Simoneau The Oconee Enterprise |
“First of all, the only communication with the person I have communicated with today is Steven Colquitt,” Amanda Prochaska said. “So he is the only person who can speak as to whether there has been lies as to whether.”
Amanda Prochaska was interrupted in the audio recording, and several people shouted “Let them talk. Let them talk. We want to hear them.”
“We’d like to say that being a critic and being a champion of the school system is not mutually exclusive,” Michael Prochaska can be heard saying. “We will not leave. We will not leave, sir.”
The audio picks up people speaking over each other
“Mr. Prochaska, you are not a resident of Oconee County,” Argo said. “You have the power of the pen.”
“You are allowing lies to be perpetuated in this room without allowing us to speak to those lies,” Amanda Prochaska said.
“There was a small technical mistake that was an honest mistake,” Michael Prochaska said. “A graphic design mistake. No, we will not leave. And we apologized when a school representative. No we will not leave. We will not leave. We will defend our First Amendment rights.”
At that point, the audio picks up where the edited video uploaded by Oconee County Schools shows the Board meeting continuing.
Fellowship Of Christian Athletes
The first 13 persons who came forward to speak during the Public Communications section of the meeting on Monday spoke about the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and student organizations in general.
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| Screen Shot Brown At Podium 8/12/2024 |
Randall Brown, the first who spoke, said student organizations are important and “one of those student organizations that I'd like to speak about tonight is our faith-based student organizations, more specifically FCA.”
“The vision of FCA is to see the world transformed by Jesus Christ through the work of their coaches and their athletes, and their mission is to lead every coach and athlete into a growing relationship with Jesus Christ and the Church of Jesus Christ,” he said.
“I am strongly supporting the FCA,” said Stephen Aleshire, who ran unsuccessfully for the Board of Education in the May Republican Party Primary.
‘You're witnessing in real time the long march of the left and their ultimate goals of a Utopia for socialism, Marxism, and, frankly, communism,” Aleshire said.
Craig Moses said he was a coach at Colham Ferry Elementary School and “I watched some of these students in FCA start out and grow over the years to become leaders.”
“We're not only teaching these kids how to play ball but also teamwork, personal skills, and how to become a man, how to become a good a good citizen these are all values that FCA teaches and instills and it would be a shame for that to go away.”
Source Of Concern
The fourth speaker, Caleb Antwine, was the first to give a hint of what led the group to come before the Board to speak on behalf of FCA.
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| Screen Shot Antwine At Podium 8/12/2024 |
“I'm a senior at Oconee County High School,” Antwine said, and “I'd like to begin by, first, thanking the Board for allowing me the opportunity to speak, and, second acknowledging my respect for Mr Lawrence, who has voiced his concerns about FCA.”
“I believe it's not only a right but a responsibility of us to try and improve the institutions around us, and I believe we're all here tonight to do just that regardless of how we think that ought to be done.”
Antwine said he had been involved with FCA since he was in the third grade and that “FCA strives to create better leaders for our future. Every day I've experienced, or every year I've experienced, how FCA does that.”
Antwine was referring to David Lawrence, who taught in Oconee County Schools for 29 years, retiring in 2022. His last 12 years were at High Shoals Elementary School.
Lawrence and his wife were the 14th and 15th speakers, and somehow, his comments had been anticipated by those supporting the FCA at the meeting on Monday.
Lawrence On FCA
“I have absolutely no problem with FCA,” David Lawrence said. “None whatsoever. My mother was a Presbyterian. My father was Southern Baptist.”
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| Screen Shot Lawrence At Podium 8/12/2024 |
David Lawrence said his concern is that “elementary students notice when a group is meeting in their Media Center because it's closed and a faculty member is there supervising a club. They ask questions and think it's unfair that they cannot check in books or check out books like every other morning.”
“Then they ask, what's happening in there? Kids are curious, thankfully,” he continued.
“And who makes the decision about these elementary student clubs being allowed to form? The school building principal does, according to your policy, and that is an extreme amount of pressure on that principle, balancing federal state and local laws and board policies with First Amendments Freedom,” according to David Lawrence.
“First Amendment Freedoms is hard enough for constitutional lawyers especially in these times,” he said.
David Lawrence was followed to the podium by his wife, Amy Lawrence.
Amy Lawrence used her time to read aloud Board policies on student groups.
Other Speakers
Katie Green, who is running as a Democrat for the open Post 5 on the Board of Education in November, said “I believe in the importance of elections at every level, from the local level to the National level.”
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| Screen Shot Green At Podium 8/12/2024 |
“Oconee County schools has hundreds of students who are eligible to vote for the first time this year which is pretty exciting in this November election."
Georgia Code says “principals, assistant principals, and their designees shall inform their students and employees of the availability of voter registration and shall provide reasonable and convenient procedures to enable such persons who are qualified applicants to register.”
“I would just be interested to know what Oconee County High School and North Oconee High School have planned to satisfy the state requirement and assist our newest voters in registering,” she said.
As is usual, no one responded to her.
Green was followed by Pam Hendrix, who ran unsuccessfully in the May Republican Primary for the chair of the Oconee County Board of Commissioners.
“I did not like hearing my local newspaper thrown under the bus earlier,” she said. “I'm very grateful to our local newspaper, because that's how I often learn of things that I need to come speak to this board about.”
“And I just want to remind the Board that if you had not chosen to raise property taxes for the third year in a row we wouldn't be even having to have these public hearings, we wouldn't be arguing about the size of the ad.”
Hendrix next turned to the decision to extend Superintendent Branch’s contracts for a year, saying “I really think the superintendent is preparing his own contract and you're just rubber stamping it.”
Branch On Fellowship Of Christian Athletes
After the Prochaskas had been removed from the room, Board Member Burgess asked Superintendent Branch about Board policies on student organizations. (The full question is not clear because of the editing of the original video.)
“We have spoken with our legal guidance and they assure us that we are within the guidelines to allow student led organizations at our elementary,” Branch said.
“The equal access law applies to 6 through 12 organizations,” he continued. “There is no federal law on K through 5.”
“There is Court precedent that allows student led organizations at all levels, as long as this Board and this community allows all students to have the choice of whatever student led organization that is.”
“You cannot exclude any student led organization,” he said, “but you can allow student organizations.”
“I am not aware of any Authority that suggests that elementary students cannot make reasonable decisions or that an elementary student sponsored club is per se unconstitutional because it's religious in nature,” Branch read, saying “that is the legal guidance we have received.
End Of Meeting Comments By Parrish
When Branch had finished, Board Vice Chair Amy Parrish said “I'd like to make a comment.”
“I have frequently told people that I don't know that I would be in this role in any other county in the state of Georgia because we are so blessed and I think everybody here has spoken to that. The students were phenomenal, and that's why we do what we do--for them,” she said.
“I think we get a lot of complaints sometimes, and we don't always speak up and defend ourselves, defend the superintendent, defend our excellent educators and staff that we have in this county,” she said.
“We are blessed because we have a great leader, and we have a leader who hires other great leaders,” Parrish said. “Everybody in our schools is phenomenal.”
“Just because of the way that this ended,” Parrish said with a laugh, “I wasn't going to say this, but just a few years ago, when I joined the Board, a few years after that, we nominated The Oconee Enterprise for a Georgia School Board Association Award. And they won an award.”
“We did that because of the work that we valued their work,” she said. “Perhaps somewhere that relationship has changed and I do not know why.”
“But I just think it's important that we start to tell our side of the story because all of you all have said it for us,” she said, motioning toward the audience. “And thank you so much for being here.”
Video
The video below is on the YouTube Channel of Oconee County Schools.
Adams made his comments to the Board beginning at 18:00 in the video.
Public Comment begins at 24:44 in the video.
The video is edited at 1:31:59 in the video.
Parrish made her comments at 1:33:32 in the video.
3 comments:
Thank you, Lee. The Oconee Enterprise has had ups and downs with OCS that predated Steven Colquitt, Dr. Branch, this board and even myself.
With all due respect to Amy Parrish, I've done enough research of county history through the OE archives to know that the OE has not changed. Miss Vinnie's no-holds-barred attitude is alive and well in 2024, as well as her love of community.
This honestly felt like a betrayal to have the CFO lie and for the person we spoke to earlier in the day not correct the record or defend our right to speak. I don't know why that didn't happen and it saddens me
I'm sure that person has felt betrayed by some of our actions, too. I don't want to litigate that here.
Steven Colquitt is a former OE sports editor and a gifted writer. We don't always see eye to eye on what should be printed or how to report on the school board. In fact, I'd say our relationship has been quite rocky largely because of those philosophical differences and the lengths the OE goes to to uphold our mission (whether that's through stories, editorials, investigative inquires, pushing back when needed, filing complaints with the State Attorney Generals Offices and even the civil disobedience we practiced last Monday)
Regardless of how heated things get, we will continue to do our job, which will include stories that OCS appreciates and stories and editorials that OCS would rather us not print.
Michael Prochaska
Shameful unprofessionalism by the School Board. To cut the video feed and have OC sheriffs deputies remove the reporters from a public meeting is 3rd world authoritarianism.
Wow! It can happen here. Great job of crushing the First Amendment.
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