DAUPHIN COUNTY, Pa. — The Central Dauphin School Board (CDSB) came face-to-face with people demanding answers following the release of a 2016 school bus altercation video.
The release came at the end of a seven-year legal battle in which the district tried to stop the video from being made public. FOX43 made a Right-To-Know request for a redacted version of the video in 2016 that was granted by the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records.
"Is it true that only the president of the board saw the video at this time?" current school board candidate Jeff Gordon asked. "Why was there a 5 to 4 vote for the rest of the board not to see the video, and then the same 5 to 4 vote to continue going to court with the case?"
It all stems from a legal battle to keep this video- sought out by legal action by FOX43- hidden.
"Just curious, does the action of this board show transparency?" Gordon asked.
In their efforts to stop the video from being made public, CDSD likely paid a pretty penny in legal fees. While the district has remained silent on the matter, former school board member Eric Epstein says the figure was between $200,000 and $250,000.
That former member, Eric Epstein, filed his own Right-to-Know request to get the exact dollar amount spent which the District must respond to by Thursday, April 20.
At Monday night’s meeting, the district superintendent referred to what he says are false reports.
"Inaccurate media reports have claimed that the district spent $200,000 to keep a single school bus video from public access," CDSD Superintendent Dr. Norman Miller said. "That's wrong."
However, a definitive answer on whether that estimate is accurate hasn't been provided.
Prior to Monday's meeting, FOX43 asked for clarity, specifically about the legal fees, who authorized them, and why school board members could not view the video.
Their reply outlined the same claims of students' privacy that were brought up throughout the seven-year court battle over the videotape.
Below is the full statement provided by Dr. Miller:
This case is important because the District was obligated to protect the rights of families to the privacy of their students’ education records not only in this District but throughout the Commonwealth. The original ruling in this case unilaterally stripped all students’ education records of the protections afforded to them under federal law, not just this single video.
Prior to the lower courts’ rulings in this case, every student had a degree of privacy attached to images recorded of them within the school building and on school buses, their disciplinary records, their academic records, and other various records about students held by the District. The lower courts, however, erroneously removed these protections except as it related to academic records, thereby opening up public access to all other student records for almost anyone.
The privacy concerns for all Pennsylvania students were so significant that the Pennsylvania School Boards Association joined the District’s case to fight to restore privacy protections for all students across the Commonwealth. In addition, the Supreme Court granted review of this case—which it does in only about 3% of the cases before it—twice. It was an issue that even the Supreme Court wanted to review.
The District was successful, in part, in restoring some privacy rights to Pennsylvania students by securing a reversal by the PA Supreme Court of the fundamental holding of the lower courts and a recognition that the records at issue were education records that contain personally identifiable information protected by federal law. This was a critical victory for families and the Supreme Court’s decision was vital to restoring, at least in part, privacy to all students’ records.
Now, even the Office of Open Records recognizes that videos and other educational records kept by a school district, are educational records protected by FERPA and that they are not automatically subject to disclosure at the whim of any requester.