About the recent letter claiming that Ocean Beach School Board refused to allow State Sen. Jeff Wilson to speak:

I was present and that is a completely false statement. I reached out to Sen. Wilson, and he confirmed it was not accurate or how he felt and he told letter writer Diane Gruber as much.

The meeting in question was a budget hearing — and advertised in accordance with the Washington State Public Meetings Rules. The only business was a hearing (including public comment) regarding the Transportation Budget to purchase a school bus. The regular school board meeting took place the next week.

At regular school board meetings — there are two public comment times for people to comment. We hold hybrid board meetings on zoom and in person to enable more public input, participation and comment.

That evening, Sen. Wilson did introduce himself and said he had no comment on the Budget Hearing. He expressed his support for the school board and said he looks forward to attending an official meeting in the future. Absolutely no one stopped him from speaking. Wilson confirmed this.

The continued misinformation from Ms. Gruber is based on political agenda and has nothing to do with what actually happened. She was not present at the meeting — in person or on Zoom. Here is the thing — we do not all have to agree on issues or candidates. However, we should rise to to occasion to not spread lies. We need to set aside petty politics full of false accusations and focus on what matters.

What matters are the students, parents, families, teachers, staff and the greater community. I have been on the school board for 10 months now and I can state with great certainty — each and every board member values public input and welcomes all comments. We do need to abide by public meeting rules for public comment during meetings — but you are also welcome to reach out to any of us, individually, with your comments. If you feel shy, please send us letters via email or snail mail. We really do care and want to hear from you.

We have some tough issues to solve and community input is an important part of the process.

NANSEN MALIN

Seaview