Laguna Beach School Board Votes To Form Secret Subcommittee

LAGUNA BEACH, CA -- The Unified School District Board of Trustees will be forming a committee to discuss confidential matters, and that committee will be comprised of all board members -- except one.

On a 4-1 vote, the Board on Tuesday, June 11 agreed to form the committee at the exclusion of member Dee Perry. The subcommittee's role will be to discuss confidential issues, including personnel decisions and lawsuits, on a case-by-case basis.

Perry will not be a member of the subcommittee, but she's a direct cause of it's formation. Board members Jan Vickers and Carol Normandin proposed the idea after a public records search of Perry's email's found that she had forwarded an email marked "confidential" to a person unauthorized to see or receive it.

Perry was the trustee who cast the sole vote against the subcommittee's formation, calling it "shameful" and "a disgrace" during the proceedings, adding that it impedes citizens' right to representation.

"This is harming the citizens of Laguna Beach," she said.

The trustees set a one-year time limit for the subcommittee's work, but that time period could be shortened or extended by majority vote by the trustees. Perry is serving her second four-year term on the board. She was re-elected in November 2018; her term expires in late 2022.