Bayou Black and Gibson communities discuss recall of school board members

Just under 50 people rallied in the backroom of the Donner Community Center to form their own committee after the Terrebonne Parish School Board's decision to close their elementary schools. Now they plan to recall their school board members for what they see as a betrayal.

"This is taxation without representation," Lloyd Gibson said.

There was a discussion of protesting the school board office and getting permits from the Terrebonne Sheriff's Office.

"You don't need the police permission to protest your government," Gibson said. "Your constitutional right says that you can have a disagreement with your government."

The two communities are dissatisfied and feel they weren't represented earlier this month when school officials voted to close their elementary schools. In the back room of the community center, the community members created their own representative committee, took votes to name it and began discussions about how to combat the school board's decision.

The now-named Save Our Children Committee kept minutes, broadcast their meeting live via Facebook to 30 viewers and organized themselves to recall their school board members. One in particular, they said, broke her promise to them.

"I'm so happy that they did this vote the way that they did, because it brought us together and made us understand our rights," Chairwoman Stephanie Wriborg said. "This is about our whole community in general… so we need to make sure that not only our district understands that, but we are going to make sure the other districts understand that and follow suit."

The Terrebonne Parish School Board voted Dec. 5 to close Gibson, Bayou Black and Honduras elementary schools as part of Terrebonne Parish Superintendent Bubba Orgeron's plan to overhaul the School District and give teachers a raise. Orgeron held three public hearings, and the communities voiced their displeasure at each.

Community members said teachers deserved the pay raise, but said it was only offered to sweeten the deal and get their schools closed. They also argued each school should have been a separate vote, and they felt cheated that the three schools were lumped together as they were.

Deanna Cunningham argued that the vote was more than the closure of three schools. It was also the closure of two communities.

"Bayou Black and Gibson should have been on a separate vote from Honduras," Cunningham said. "We should have not have all been on the same proposal. They should have been separate votes."

At the first public hearing, Nov. 6 in Gibson, School Board Member Debi Benoit said she was touched by the response of the community and would vote against the closure of the schools. When it came time to vote, she voted to close the schools.

The community has not forgotten.

Wriborg already has sent a request to the Louisiana Secretary of State's office for the paperwork to recall Benoit, and the community is planning a group-wide effort to gather the signatures necessary to remove her from the school board.

Once Wriborg receives a response, she told attendees that they will have 180 days to collect 2,060 signatures from registered voters in the voting district. The community responded that they should do the same for School Board Member Matthew LaGarde. They then discussed who would have to file the paperwork to do so.

"First we need to get Lagarde and Benoit out and get people in that are going to be on our side," Wriborg said. "We've got to keep everything above board. We have to do it the right way… Doing this recall will make a statement that we mean business."

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She said just because the board members voted to close the schools did not mean the battle was over. Just as the board voted to close it, they can vote again to reopen the schools. By replacing their two board members, the community can get the outcome they desired, she said.

The community then got a lawyer on the phone who spoke to the entire community via speaker. Attorney Shytishia Flugence explained the ways they could challenge the ruling and also recommended that they reach out to the law firm that already had fought a similar battle for the Point Aux Chenes Elementary School.

Point Aux Chenes Elementary was closed April 2021 in a similar vote, and for similar reasons: dwindling population and cost-savings. Koerner Law Firm of New Orleans represented the community in a lawsuit and argued that then-Superintendent Philip Martin and the school board made "calculated" decisions concerning the school that were "intended to and did negatively impact Native American children."

Ultimately, State Rep. Tanner Magee passed a law that changed the former local school into a state-run school focused on French language immersion.

This article originally appeared on The Courier: Bayou Black and Gibson communities plan recall of school board members