With Tuesday night’s statement by school board member Danielle Miller (Dist. 2), the issue of SACS – their attempt at investigating the district and the board’s decision to not cooperate – was once again brought to the fore.

What has not been mentioned, however, is exactly how much the board’s efforts to thwart SACS have cost the district so far.

According to an Oct. 9 legal invoice from the office of Boykin and Davis, LLC, the school board’s legal counsel, the district was charged a total of $12,925.74 in legal fees for the month of September. Nearly half of that – $6,040 – was devoted to SACS.

That money, said board member Polly Parker (Dist. 7), is not being spent wisely.

“All the chairperson had to do was talk to SACS,” Parker said.

Instead, Parker said, the majority of the board and their legal counsel opted to go on the offensive.

The line items contained in the September bill appear to confirm that.

For example, on Sept. 23, staff of the Boykin and Davis office conducted “research on Federal due process clause” and how it might apply to the SACS investigation.

Also on Sept. 23, the staff discussed the options of filing a lawsuit against SACS in federal court. Research was also performed on Sept. 28 on a potential civil conspiracy claim.

And the list goes on.

Board member Annie McDaniel (Dist. 4) denies the board went on the offensive, and both she and vice chairman Rickey Johnson (Dist. 5) said they were disturbed by the size of the legal bill.

Boykin’s justification, McDaniel said, was the amount of research into what the board’s legal rights are in the face of an investigation by a private entity susch as SACS.

“We don’t feel we have anything to hide,” Johnson said.

But, he added, the board didn’t want to open itself up to a potential case that would cost far more than $6,000.

His sentiments echoed McDaniel’s statement during Tuesday night’s meeting.

“This audience needs to know very clearly that the decision we made not to speak to SACS was solely based on the fact that there was litigation pending among certain board members and this district,” she said, “and for us to have stepped out and made a statement to SACS that would later be utilized against us . . . and cost us even more money to defend ourselves . . . would be poor fiscal and feduciary responsibility.”

Yet, according to Jennifer Oliver, vice president of communications with SACS, their “concerns were not tied to the litigation, but rather the team was asked to take a comprehensive look at the school system.

“Additionally, the school system was notified that the team would not ask questions regarding the litigation. Therefore, the visit in no way interferes with the outstanding litigation and we proceeded with our visit.

“Meetings with individuals who were not involved in the litigation were denied and questions related to the schools’ accreditation were not answered due to the school system’s refusal to allow anyone to meet with the SACS CASI team.”