GM school board to hold special meeting to revisit board appointment, complaint

By Cynthia Prairie
©2025 Telegraph Publishing LLC

The Board of Directors of the Green Mountain Unified School District will hold a special meeting next Wednesday in part to cure violations of Vermont’s Open Meeting Law regarding executive sessions that occurred at its May 15 meeting and – in effect – to rescind its request that the Chester Select Board arrange for the town to hold a special election to fill a school board seat. According to an agenda put out on May 23, it appears the board will be making the appointment.

The board is scheduled to again hear from the two candidates for the open Chester seat and to take a vote on filling the position, which is left open with the departure of Chester representative Tuckerman Wunderle. Wunderle was elected just last year,  but is resigning to attend grad school.

These school board actions come after three Chester residents filed, on May 16, a complaint with the school board, saying that it had violated the state Open Meeting Law by going into executive session for an unacceptable reason and for not making an appointment as is required by law.

You can read that complaint here. The Chester Telegraph also pointed out the same violations in an article on May 20 and in an editorial the following day. 

According to the complaint, signed by Chester residents Marilyn Mahusky, Heather Chase and Robert Nied, “the Board violated 1 V.S.A. § 313(a), when the school board went into executive session for an impermissible purpose. No exception to the open meeting requirement exists for the purpose of establishing the procedure for … (of conducting) candidate interviews. …

“However, the Board violated 1 V.S.A. § 313(a) a second time, and § 313(a)(3), when they made a final decision in executive session and announced their decision in open session after exiting the executive session.”

The complaint refers to the fact that when the board came out of executive session the second time, it issued a prepared statement with the intent of sending the issue back to the town of Chester to hold a special election to fill the board seat. The decision to seek the town vote, to issue the statement and the statement itself apparently were all made behind closed doors. And while the decisions were impermissible, so was sending the issue back to the town, since state law requires that the school board make an appointment to fill vacancies and does not give any “outs,” such as seeking a special election.

State statute offers a narrow list of reasons for public bodies to enter into executive session. The applicable ones include:

1. contracts, grievances and issues of attorney-client privilege;
2. issues of real estate purchases;
3. appointment or employment or evaluation of a public officer or employee;
4. disciplinary or dismissal action against a public officer or employee;
5. a clear and imminent peril to the public safety;
6. records exempt from the access to public records provisions;
7. academic records or suspension or discipline of students;
8.  security or emergency response measures, the disclosure of which could jeopardize public safety.

The actions come after a tumultuous few weeks in Chester politics in which social media blew up with court documents that one candidate — Chester business owner John R. Keller — was charged with domestic assault last summer. He plead guilty on Tuesday, April 28.  Then on Wednesday, May 7, the Chester Select Board was scheduled to make a recommendation to fill the empty seat, but decided to send the names of both Keller and candidate Patricia Benelli on to the school board without comment, to the shock of many. Benelli is a longtime family attorney who recently retired and has experience as an educator.

At that May 7 meeting, Select Board member Arne Jonynas was the lone member of the five-person board to urge discussion of the issue. Since then, member Tim Roper said he only learned of the charges shortly before the May 7 meeting and was not made aware of the guilty plea until after that meeting.

When told of the GM board’s decision to revisit the appointment issues, Heather Chase, who was a party to the complaint, said on Friday,  “I’m pleased that the school board has decided to cure the violations by revisiting the process and hopefully appointing an appropriate and competent school board member to represent Chester.” Mahusky said, “I am pleased the board has acknowledged they made mistakes and are taking steps to cure by holding a special meeting next week to repeat the process. Going forward, I hope the board will be mindful of their obligations for openness and embrace both the literal requirements of the OML as well as the spirit of the law. More than ever, we need leaders who are accountable to the public who elected them.”

Layne Millington, superintendent of Two Rivers Supervisory Union, in an email to The Telegraph, wrote, “The district recognizes that a procedural error occurred, and the appropriate course of action is to correct it.  In this case, the board intends to void the candidate review process conducted on May 15 and restart it from the beginning.  This is the primary objective of the special meeting scheduled for May 28.”

When asked if more candidates would be included, he wrote, “Since this is a procedural reset, it will only include the original two candidates who were considered on May 15.”

He added that both John Keller and Patricia Benelli have been sent invitations to the meeting.

When asked, “Does the board definitely intend to choose a candidate at the May 28th meeting?” Millington replied, “The board’s responsibility is to review the candidates and appoint one deemed suitable. Whether a candidate is selected will depend on the board’s evaluation and subsequent voting.”

The special meeting is scheduled for 6 p.m. on Wednesday, May 28, at the GMUHS library,  716 Route 103 South. You can also access the meeting via Zoom by clicking here: https://trsu.zoom.us/j/85816774056

For the full agenda, click here.