Letter: The Medicine Hat Public School Division also needs a lesson in transparency

By Letter to the Editor on April 16, 2024.

Dear editor,

Alex McCuaig’s April 11 letter cuts to the heart of the matter concerning transparency in local government. Medicine Hat city council is not the only body that deserves attention. The board of the Medicine Hat Public School Division could also be doing more to make its operations visibly accountable.

At one time I considered taking concerns to the MHPSD board at a meeting so they could be made public. When I realized the only people who would see and hear my presentation were the half dozen trustees and their employees present, I said to myself, “What’s the point?”

Only a tiny inadequate summary would have appeared in the board minutes. It is time that the Medicine Hat Public School Division board televised its proceedings, as the Lethbridge public school board has been doing for years. MHPSD already has the facilities to televise their meetings.

But then, who would want to watch the last 30 minutes of a three-hour meeting, the first two-and-a-half hours of which were behind closed doors?