Parents and teachers are outraged as a school board member is accused of saying, “F yourselves” ahead of a vote to extend the collective bargaining agreement for teachers and employees.
WDSU obtained a portion of the original video from community members who caught it on the live stream of last week’s meeting.
As we looked at the video, it is not clear enough to tell which board member made the comment.
“It’s a little disappointing, the aftermath, but we don’t want that to overshadow the victory,” said Brant Osborn, president of the St. Tammany Federation of Teachers and School Employees.
He told WDSU Wednesday, the unanimous vote to extend the collective bargaining agreement is a win for the teachers and school employees. It’s partly used to improve salary and working environments.
“Financial negotiations are May 4 and 5, so it would have been pointless to negotiate something without securing the one-year agreement,” Osborn said.
One board member did express opposition ahead of the vote as several families watched online. Many sent us screenshots of the closed captioning that shows the line through the profanity. When you go to the video, now that is all cut out.
Parents tell WDSU they are frustrated by the lack of transparency.
“Moving forward, we just need to make sure we’re accountable,” one parent said.
Several others took to social media.
WDSU reached out to the division to get some answers.
After asking them why they edited the original recording, the school division sent over this statement:
“The school board meeting was broadcast live in its entirety on our YouTube channel, and no portion of the official proceedings was omitted. After the meeting, we identified an off-mic remark containing inappropriate language that was not part of the Board’s deliberations.
Because our public access broadcast is subject to FCC regulations and our YouTube channel is designated as ‘made for kids’, we removed that brief portion of the recording to ensure compliance with those standards. Our platform does not have the ability to “bleep” audio, so the only way to ensure compliance was to remove the segment.
The remark did not occur during official discussion or deliberation, and the board member involved consented to the edit. This edit did not alter any official action or discussion of the board.”
There were also concerns about the legality of editing the school board meeting recording. WDSU reached out to several lawmakers and attorneys, one of them responding, saying that because the YouTube version of the meeting is considered a rebroadcast, the edited version does not violate any open meeting laws.
On Wednesday afternoon, the school board scheduled a special meeting for Tuesday, April 28, at 6 p.m. to address the concerns of the meeting.
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