Central Bucks school board elects new president amid criticism of past leadership

The Central Bucks school board elected a new president on Monday as critics continued to hammer the board over the actions of its former solicitor.

The board voted 8-1 to elect Susan Gibson, a lawyer who won a seat on the board in November 2023 as part of a Democratic slate that swept the school board elections. She replaces Karen Smith, a Democrat who has served as president for the last year but was part of the minority on the former GOP-controlled board.

The board’s lone Republican, Jim Pepper, nominated Gibson, saying she had been the only member besides himself who “took a firm stand” against the former solicitor, David Conn, who has been accused of supplying the board with faulty legal advice. Board member Rob Dugger voted against Gibson.

Democrats did not comment during the meeting on their reason for electing Gibson, who was the only person nominated. (The board also elected Heather Reynolds, another Democrat who won a seat on the board in November 2023, vice president.)

But supporters of the former GOP majority attacked Smith during public comment, accusing her of operating without transparency and backing a solicitor whose representation resulted in a court sanction against the district.

“The current leadership of this board is harming the district and costing us money,” Christy Callaghan, a resident, told the board. “The community needs to know what role the board president played in getting Mr. Conn hired, and allowing him free range to make terrible decisions that harmed this community.”

Conn was replaced by the board last month after a Bucks County judge this summer issued a $1,500 sanction to the district as part of a lawsuit brought by residents against the board, which flipped to Democratic control in November 2023. Conn missed a deadline for providing documents to the residents, who had sued alleging the new board violated the Sunshine Act. He then provided incomplete responses, and invoked an “executive session privilege” to wrongly deny other requests, according to a lawyer for the plaintiffs.

The district said Conn’s firm, Sweet Stevens, agreed to pay the fine.

Smith did not respond to the criticism Monday, including assertions from some residents that she had used an encrypted app, Signal, to communicate about school board business, rather than using official accounts that would be subject to public records requests.

Smith said Tuesday that the board had used Signal for “casual conversations” and scheduling questions, “not agency business.” She said the app routinely deletes messages, and when she has received Right-to-Know requests for messages, she has responded that she had none relevant to the request.

The leadership change comes as the board continues to confront opposition a year after intensely fought school board elections that featured hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign spending and bitter partisan battles.

In the lawsuit in which the district was sanctioned, residents accused the board of violating Pennsylvania’s Sunshine Act during its first meeting in December 2023. After the outgoing GOP board leaders refused to place the newly elected Democrats’ priorities on the meeting agenda, the board, led by Smith, amended the agenda mid-meeting. Democrats then voted to suspend the former board’s controversial policies, including its ban on “sexualized content” in library books and participation of transgender athletes on sports teams matching their gender identities.

» READ MORE: Central Bucks’ new school board president was sworn in on a stack of frequently banned books

The board also authorized an investigation into the legality of the $700,000 payout the former board gave Superintendent Abram Lucabaugh, who resigned upon the Democrats’ victory. And it approved the hiring of Conn, who represented three of the Democrats against unsuccessful recount challenges.

Conn advised the new board that it could amend the agenda despite the Sunshine Act’s requirement that the public receive 24 hours’ notice of meeting agenda items — calling them “almost like de minimus,” invoking an exception to the act. The lawsuit is ongoing.

In February, two Republican board members resigned, accusing the board of picking Conn as solicitor for political reasons, including in its efforts to recoup money from Lucabaugh.

A lawyer for Lucabaugh contended that Conn had illegally opened a Title IX investigation into whether the superintendent “violated Title IX in his dealings with female employees under his direct supervision” and had threatened to subpoena Lucabaugh, “potentially for unethical leverage.” In an email shared with The Inquirer, then-acting Superintendent Jim Scanlon told a Republican board member in February that there were no Title IX complaints against Lucabaugh.

Conn said the lawyer had mischaracterized the board’s actions, which was “exploring whether there could be a Title IX complaint.” In June, the board announced it had dropped its pursuit to overturn Lucabaugh’s payout.

Voting in August to issue requests for proposals for a new solicitor, Gibson said that the board makes decisions based on “the best information we have at the time.”

But “part of our fiduciary obligation is to revisit those decisions if we think we did not make the correct decision the first time,” Gibson said.