Robelia voted to fill role

By Melissa Thorud

SPRING VALLEY – At the Monday, Nov. 29 special Spring Valley School Board meeting, the board discussed current vacancies following the president’s resignation as well as a COVID-19 status report update from the Superintendent.

The meeting started with filling the current vacancy left by Board President Cristy Peavey, who recently submitted her resignation after applying for a school district position.

The board nominated April Robelia for board president and the vote was unanimous, Robelia had held the vice president position, so the board also needed to fill that role during the special meeting. A unanimous voted granted Jenelle Wolf the board vice president position.

After voting to fill the open presidency, an open board member position remains vacant. The board has posted information on how community members can apply if interested on the district's website as well as social media pages.

“Individuals interested in filling the vacancy can send a letter of interest to the president of the board,” said Superintendent John Groh when reading the current policy.

The board discussed at length the process it will follow to fill the vacant spot. The open board member seat will only need to be filled for four to five months until the April election due to the timing of Peavey’s resignation.

To apply for the open position, there are specific criteria that need to be met. Applications must come from someone who lives within the district and a letter of interest needs to be submitted. The letter must include the name, address, phone number of the applicant and a statement of qualities they will bring to the board, as well as a statement of any other relevant information.

Following current policies, the board decided they will review applications in a three-person committee and make a recommendation to the rest of the board at another special school board meeting before the holiday break.

The committee meeting for reviewing applications will be an open meeting for transparency to the community.

“I think we should make sure that the meeting is available for the public for transparency,” Groh said. “I know that the committee will do a great job at choosing but for the community’s sake this should be available to them.”

Once this position is filled the board will have no more vacant positions. In April, the election will have three positions up for election. One will be for the remaining one year of the school board presidency term and the other two will be for regular board members, serving three-year terms.

After discussion, voting and plans of notice in regard to the board vacancies, Groh gave a brief update on COVID-19 in the district.

“Our numbers are not trending exactly how we would want them to right now and I think that is true for much of the county and the state as well, but as of last week our numbers have been the highest that they have been all school year with 16 active cases in the district,” he said.

The district is waiting for the county to allow rapid testing rather than PCR testing in hopes more people will continue to get tested for more accurate numbers on positive cases.

For more information on the application process to fill the current board vacancy, visit the district website or the district’s Facebook page.