Richland 1 sued over vote after closed-door meeting on controversial learning center

Richland 1 school board members broke a state law that protects the public’s right to know when they recently voted on actions concerning a controversial learning center project, a new lawsuit alleges.

The Columbia-area school district is accused of violating the S.C. Freedom of Information Act in a lawsuit filed by county resident Clint Wallace on Wednesday, Feb. 7.

Wallace accuses the school board of “taking secret government action” on Feb. 1 when the board retreated from the public’s view into an executive session for a “potentially valid, but not specific, reason ... held an hour-long discussion behind closed doors, and then came back into public session and voted to approve what was discussed during the secret meeting,” the lawsuit says.

The closed-door meeting concerned the district’s Vince Ford Early Learning Center, construction of which was halted last month after the state Education Department said the building couldn’t be considered a school and the district had not secured the proper approval for the $31 million project. The Education Department based its decision on the district’s plans to serve children as young as infants, which the department said meant the center would not be a K-12 school.

The district has said it will change the center’s focus. The project has been stalled for three weeks now, costing the school district some $2,300 each day the site sits untouched, the district has said.

The learning center project is now under investigation by the State Inspector General.

After the board’s closed-door session Feb. 1, members voted publicly to approve “recommendations as outlined” in the executive session regarding the Vince Ford center. The board then adjourned without specifying what those recommendations were.

Board Chairman Aaron Bishop said the recommendations involved taking the “necessary steps” to bring resolution to the Vince Ford Early Learning Center, and district Superintendent Craig Witherspoon said, “We can’t divulge what was talked about in executive session.”

A district spokesperson said the board’s action was protected under attorney-client privilege.

But the S.C. Freedom of Information Act declares that public bodies, such as a school board, must conduct the public’s business in public. Wallace’s lawsuit cites numerous provisions of the law that he says were broken by the Richland 1 board:

▪ Before going into executive session, the law requires the presiding officer of a board to “announce the specific purpose of the executive session,” which means “a description of the matter to be discussed.” The Richland 1 board failed to describe “any valid specific purpose” for its closed-door meeting, the lawsuit says.

▪ Further, the law says that “no action may be taken in executive session except to (a) adjourn or (b) return to public session” and “members of a public body may not commit the public body to a course of action by a polling of members in executive session.” But, the lawsuit says, the Richland 1 board “took secret action by holding a private discussion in executive session, agreeing to a course of action, and then returning to public session to ‘approve’ the decision reached in secret and never stated in public.”

The board’s action was “precisely the sort of secret government action the (S.C. Freedom of Information Act) prohibits,” Wallace’s lawsuit says.

Richland 1 spokesperson Karen York declined to comment on the lawsuit, saying the district does not comment on pending litigation.

School board member Robert Lominack, in a post written on his blog three days after the Feb. 1 vote, said he believed the board appropriately handled its executive session but “fell short upon returning to the public portion of the meeting. I thought the administration recommendations on which we were voting would be described with some specificity during the public portion. That did not happen. I believe this is a clear violation of FOIA.”

Lominack, who voted in unison with the rest of the board to approve the recommendations out of executive session, continued in his post, “I will spare you my excuses for not catching the issue. I clearly should have said something, and I take full responsibility for my role in screwing this up.

“I have suggested that the board call a meeting this week to own up to the mistake, do what we can to correct it, and provide the information about our vote that FOIA requires and the public deserves.”

Prior to Wallace’s lawsuit, longtime South Carolina media attorney Jay Bender told The State that the Richland 1 board’s actions likely were illegal.

“How is the board ever going to be able to justify what action was taken?” said Bender, who has represented The State and the S.C. Press Association on open meetings and open records issues. “Under that motion, somebody could do almost anything.”

Wallace is asking the court to invalidate the Richland 1 board’s “unlawful vote” and instruct the school district not to take action on executive session issues “unless a lawful public meeting and vote of the School Board occurs.” Wallace has asked for an initial court hearing within 10 days of the lawsuit being served to the school district.

This lawsuit is not the first time in recent years that Richland 1 has been sued over issues regarding the state’s open-meetings law.

In 2019, a court ruled that Richland 1 had unlawfully conducted public business behind closed doors when the board was sued for deciding how to respond to a letter from a parent in executive session.

A second lawsuit, brought by Richland 1 resident George Bowie, said the district was not giving the public proper notice of its closed-door meetings and was violating the state Freedom of Information Act. The case was settled in October 2022.

Alexa Jurado contributed reporting.