Merced City School District Board members violated Brown Act, according to grand jury report

The Merced City School District Board of Education committed multiple Brown Act violations, according to a Merced County Civil Grand Jury Report released this week.

The grand jury also stated the school board failed to adhere to the district’s own norms and procedures outlined in the MCSD Governance Team Handbook.

“The Merced City School District Administration along with the Merced City School District Board of Trustees have lost respect and trust from some of those they serve,” the grand jury report states.

The complaints received by the grand jury against the school board originated from the unauthorized release of a “Stakeholder Input Report” for the Merced City School District, which was compiled by the recruitment firm McPherson & Jacobson. The firm was hired by the district to aide in the search for a new superintendent candidate, but fired when the school board deemed the report submitted by McPherson & Jacobson was not a high-level report.

The majority of the board felt the report contained unvetted claims from anonymous sources. The board voted not to accept the report and fired McPherson & Jacobson in September 2023.

Complaint filed by board trustee

Merced City School Board member Jessee Espinosa admitted to filing complaints to the grand jury about fellow board member Priya Lakireddy.

Espinosa believed Lakireddy violated the Brown Act, which is California’s open meeting law, by discussing topics that were brought up during closed session portions of board meetings.

Espinosa pointed to text messages Lakireddy sent to McPherson & Jacobson consultants. The text messages were revealed through public information requests.

Espinoa also suspects that Lakireddy that Lakideddy shared the McPherson & Jacobson report with district personnel after receiving a copy of the report from Merced County Office of Education Superintendent Steve Tietjen.

The grand jury doesn’t name the board members who violated the Brown Act or disclose whose complaints they investigated. It’s unclear if Espinosa’s complaints initiated the investigation.

“It’s disappointing that the civil grand jury confirmed these violations, but it chose not to take significant actions or measures of accountability, or revealing the names of who did what for transparency,” Espinosa said. “I think that this leads the responsibility of transparency and accountability, unfortunately on the board.”

Lakireddy says she did receive a copy of the report and read it, but denies disseminating the report to others in the district.

Lakireddy said she was blindsided by Espinosa’s complaints.

“I did not release the report,” Lakireddy said. “I am really shocked that instead of having a conversation with me or bringing this up during our governance training, that he’s decided to go to the press and make it an issue. I would have appreciated a conversation with me, but he’s entitled to do what he wants. That’s his right.”

Focus on issues

Lakireddy feels the focus should be on some of issues that appeared in the report and again showed up as concerns in the grand jury report.

In the McPherson & Jacobson report, stakeholders complained abut a fear of retaliation for speaking up, a lack of fairness to all employees and a poor moral compass by some district leaders.

Multiple sources expressed concern to the grand jury that sexual harassment, intimidation, and fear of retaliation exist within the district.

“Through the McPherson & Jacobson report and this report now, they all point to the same thing, so you can’t gaslight any of us into believing that it’s not happening,” Lakireddy said.

“Why is it so concerning who released the report versus what the report is actually saying? I would really urge our board to look at what the report is saying, because there’s a lot of valid points,” Lakireddy added.

The grand jury discovered four sexual harassment lawsuits filed against district since 2005 and also found six complaints to the district of bullying, gender discrimination or sexual harassment in the past three years.

Espinosa says he filed his complaint to the grand jury back in November of 2023. Board president Allen Brooks says the grand jury report paints a picture of how the board was at that time.

Brooks points to multiple governance training and workshops the board members have attended since then. He says the board has also come together recently to hire a new superintendent Julianna Stocking in June with a unanimous 5-0 vote.

“I do appreciate the report coming out, but a lot of that we are already working on as a board,” Brooks said. “We’ve had board retreats, board workshops, to strengthen the board and bring the board together as one, and it’s been working.”

Brooks doesn’t believe issues raised in the grand jury report will affect the board’s ability to work together in the future.

“Maybe a trustee was caught off guard by another trustees statements,” Brooks said. “That’s easily fixed with a conversation. And once again, we’re individuals, it’s okay to have your own opinion and your own feelings and your own beliefs. That’s fine, but when we come together as a board, that’s when we need to think as a whole board, and not individuals.”

Other grand jury findings

The grand jury report included other Brown Act and California Education Code violations, including the disclosure of closed session information, serial meetings, and failure to approve board minutes.

With evidence of text messages and emails, the grand report stated, “multiple board trustees violated the Brown Act by conducting serial meetings in which more than two trustees were involved in emails and/or texting other trustees.”

There were also multiple board meetings where no minutes were put to a vote and the minutes were never uploaded to the district website.

The grand jury visited the district office in May of 2024 and requested copies of the minutes for board meetings held on Oct. 24, 2023 and February 13, 2024.

“District personnel attempted to demonstrate how to access the minutes online through the district website,” the grand jury report states. “They were unsuccessful in locating those minutes on the website. District personnel attempted unsuccessfully to connect the grand jury with the staff member responsible for board minutes.”

The school district also doesn’t have clear policies and procedures for people to file complaints with the district. According to the grand jury report it’s unclear which forms need to be filled out, and all the complaint forms are accessible on the district website.

Brooks said the issue of the minutes not being available was brought up by the board and they are working to resolve the issue. He also added the complaint form issue has also been addressed.

“We have a couple forms that you can fill out on our website,” Brooks said. “We have the universal complaint form, which you fill out if it’s a parent or something like that. There’s a different form to fill out when it’s an employee-to-employee complaint. But even if you fill out a universal complaint form, we get that and we’re going to get that complaint and make sure that the person fills out the right complaint form and walk them through the process. So there’s never been a difficulty of filling out a complaint.”

The grand jury also heard public comment and received copies of emails calling into question the actions and behaviors exhibited by the board and district administrative staff.

A Merced City School District Board of Education Protocols document adopted in 2021 outlines expectations for board members. Part of the list of protocals states, “We will be open-minded and willing to listen to all speakers/presenters. We agree that we can disagree and will do so using common courtesy and respect for others.”

The grand jury reviewed a recording of a board meeting in September of 2023, and the grand jury observed board members “shaking their heads, rolling their eyes, laughing and interrupting each other.

“After viewing several board meeting videos and attending in person, actions of the board do not reflect their own adopted norms and the public,” the grand jury report stated.

Espinosa says he has watched other school board meetings and it’s very rare for him to see what he would define as perfectly professional behaviors of all the members at all times.

Espinosa says that during a four-hour board meeting there may be moments when people are overcome with emotion.

“I think in the same way that our board has made some of those common errors and maybe certain board members have gone too much into their motions at times,” he said. ”I think that those times really then blur the whole picture. It makes it seem like that’s that’s how it always is.”

“I will acknowledge that at times, we’ve not acted with perfect professionalism, and the board has since then undergone multiple training (sessions),” Espinosa added.

Moving forward

Espinosa said he’s happy the grand jury investigated the complaints.

“I am extremely happy that they took the complaint seriously,” Espinosa said. “They may not have gone the extent that I think the community needed to really hold those violated accountable, but at least it shows that our local governance system is strong and they will investigate when there’s crimes committed.”

The district now hopes to stabilize itself after going through a revolving door of leadership in recent years. Stocking, whose first day was July 1, will be the fifth person to fill the role of superintendent since January of 2020.

The school district — which includes 11,500 students and about 1,400 staff and 18 schools — has been operating without a permanent leader in place since the board fired former superintendent Diana Jimenez during a special board meeting on April 25, 2023.

The school board and district have 60 days to respond to the request for response from the grand jury.

Brooks says the board has been able to do some positive things for the district, including the hiring of Stockings. He says they’ve given certificated and uncertificated staff an opportunity to speak at board meetings. He added the board has been able to pass resolutions to help low-performing students and a new literacy teaching approach called “The Science of Reading.”

“We’ve been able to pick our next leader and our district,” Brooks said. “We’ve been able to do a lot of things. We’ve been able to set history when it comes to this board, but a lot of times, people already only are going to focus on the negative and not all of the positive things this board has been able to do.”