Wednesday, December 21, 2011

PLACENTIA SCHOOL DISTRICT ALLOWS NON-CITIZENS TO ADDRESS BOARD + smf’s 2¢

LA Times/LA Now | http://lat.ms/t8OR2u

December 20, 2011 |  2:49 pm - The Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District has updated its bylaws to make clear that everyone has the right to publicly criticize or commend the board -- whether they are U.S. citizens or not.

The school board recently voted to change the language describing people who address the board at meetings from "citizens of the United States" to "members of the public," the Orange County Register reported.

The change came after John Briscoe, a trustee for Ocean View School District in Huntington Beach, who frequently attends school board meetings around Orange County, noticed the language and demanded that it be changed.

School district officials said despite the wording, they had not restricted anyone from speaking, even non-U.S. citizens. The wording change requires a second vote to take effect.

 

●●smf’s 2¢: 4LAKids welcomes Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District, birthplace of Richard M. Nixon, to the 20th Century – only 12 years after it ended.

We’ve included this obvious left-wing liberal media announcement to the newsmix to compensate for the rant of Rush Limbaugh in the previous story – though we wonder if the PVLUSD Board of Ed considers undocumented parents as fully qualified “members of the public”.

The Teachable Moment: from that font of knowledge+authority, Wikipedia:

Over 40 states or territories, including colonies before the Declaration of Independence, have at some time admitted aliens voting rights for some or all elections In 1874, the Supreme Court in Minor v. Happersett noted that "citizenship has not in all cases been made a condition precedent to the enjoyment of the right of suffrage. Thus, in Missouri, persons of foreign birth, who have declared their intention to become citizens of the United States, may under certain circumstances vote."

By 1900, nearly one-half of the states and territories had some experience with voting by aliens, and for some the experience lasted more than half a century.  http://bit.ly/teRslQ

4LAKids advocates that non-citizen parents of students in LAUSD (and all school districts in CA) should be allowed to vote in school board elections as they are in the City and County of San Francisco and in Baltimore, MD.  Non-citizen property owners should be allowed to vote in bond elections where property taxes are impacted.

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