Robbinsville – The Graham County Board of Education seated newly-elected member Debra “Hank” Dinschel and newly re-elected, two-term member Clark “Chip” Carringer during a special called meeting on Tuesday evening.
Graham County Clerk of Superior Court Tammy Holloway administered the oaths of office at the meeting, which started at 5 p.m. – instead of the usual starting time of 10 a.m.
Dinschel, who ran on a platform aimed at disrupting the status quo in Graham County Schools, made her presence known during the short (15 minutes) but eventful meeting, but with little impact.
The board has the same chairman – Rodney Nelson – and the same vice chairman – Carringer – and will continue to meet at the same time and place as before: the first Tuesday of the month at 10 a.m. at the Graham County Schools headquarters.
The organizational portion of the meeting was chaired by Graham County Schools Superintendent Angie Knight.
During that period, Carringer nominated Nelson to be chair, the only nomination. Nelson stepped out of the room while remaining members voted 4-0 to keep him as chairman.
Dinschel then nominated Pam Knott to be vice chair, with Jonathan Allison nominating Carringer. With Knott and Carringer out of the room, the remaining members voted 2-1 for Carringer, with Dinschel casting the lone no vote. Because Carringer won in the first round, Knott’s name did not come to a vote.
Next up was to set the time and place for the meetings.
Knott has long advocated evening meetings so that parents and off-duty staff could attend, but found no support from the previous board. Knott made a motion to hold meetings at 4:30 p.m. Dinschel proposed that the meetings be held at 5:30 p.m. and did not second Knott’s motion, which then died for lack of a second.
On the second round, Nelson made a motion to keep the meetings at 10 a.m., with Carringer seconding it. The motion carried on a 3-2 vote, with Knott and Dinschel voting in the minority.
As if to prove the point, Tuesday’s evening meeting went unattended by members of the public, although the livestream of the meeting by The Graham Star had more than 40 people watching live, which could be because of the 5 p.m. meeting time or because two members were being sworn in.
“Our main job is to listen, and to make fair and impartial judgments on everything we hear,” Nelson said in his opening remarks, that he said were mainly for Dinschel. “And we are responsible for over 225 staff members, we’re responsible for over 1,200 kids, so it’s very serious what we’re doing and we take our job very seriously.
“We appreciate you all and we’re glad to have you.”
In another matter, Knight said that work is nearly complete on the Robbinsville Middle School expansion, which she described as beautiful. Furnishings have arrived and she expects that classes will start in the new wing after Jan. 1, with an open house to be held around Jan. 4.
More details will be released later.