The Vermont Statutes Online

Title 16 : Education

Chapter 011 : Union School Districts

Subchapter 004 : Union Elementary School Districts and Union High School Districts

• § 755. Warnings of union elementary and union high school district meetings

  (a) The board of a union elementary or union high school district shall have the same authority and obligation to warn or call meetings of the district as a town school board has to warn or call town school district meetings.

  (b) Except as provided in subsection (f) of this section, not less than 30 nor more than 40 days before the meeting, the union district clerk shall warn a union elementary or union high school district meeting by posting a warning and notice to voters, signed by the chair of the union district board or the chair’s designee, specifying the date, time, location, and business of the meeting, in the district clerk’s office and at least one public place in each town within the union elementary or union high school district, and causing the same to be published once in a newspaper circulating in the union district at least five days before the meeting. In the district clerk’s absence, the chair of the board or the chair’s designee shall warn the meeting pursuant to the provisions of this section.

  (c) The warning shall, by separate articles, specifically indicate the business to be transacted, including the offices and the questions upon which the electorate shall vote. The warning shall also contain any article or articles requested by a petition signed by at least five percent of the voters of the district and filed with the district clerk pursuant to 17 V.S.A. § 2642 (town meetings and local elections; warning and notice contents).

  (d) The posted notice that accompanies the warning shall include information on voter registration, early and absentee voting, the time and location at which the ballots will be counted, and other applicable information.

  (e) The warning shall be recorded in the office of the district clerk and shall be provided to the town clerk of each town in the unified elementary or union high school district before being posted.

  (f) This subsection shall apply if a union elementary or union high school district elects school board members under the “proportional to town population” model and if it elects those members by a floor vote rather than by Australian ballot.

  (1) The election shall be warned as follows:

  (A) The district clerk shall transmit the signed warning to each town clerk.

  (B) The district clerk shall assist each town clerk to incorporate the warning into the warning for the annual or special meeting of each member district.

  (C) Each town clerk, rather than the union district clerk, shall post and publish the warning pursuant to the provisions of subsection (b) of this section.

  (2) Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary, if any member district elects its own board members by Australian ballot, then the warning, nomination, ballot preparation, and election of union school district board members shall proceed pursuant to the same laws that govern the member district.

  (3) If an annual meeting of a member district at which the union district board members are elected under this subsection is more than 30 days prior to the annual meeting of the union school district, then notwithstanding subsection 747(a) (board members of union elementary and union high school districts) of this chapter, the newly elected board members shall assume office at the conclusion of the union school district’s annual meeting.

  (g) Notwithstanding any provision of this section to the contrary, a union elementary or union high school district:

  (1) shall warn a meeting called for the purpose of considering a bond issue in accordance with the provisions of 24 V.S.A. § 1755; and

  (2) shall warn a meeting to consider a revised proposed budget pursuant to the provisions of subsection 750(b) (union elementary or union high school district revised proposed budget) of this chapter. (Added 2021, No. 176 (Adj. Sess.), § 3, eff. June 7, 2022.)