School district refutes accusations by LPOHS Coalition

By Soncirey Mitchell
Reader Staff

Following a tumultuous July meeting, the Lake Pend Oreille School District Board of Trustees held its monthly meeting Aug. 11, where Superintendent Becky Meyer presented legal findings refuting allegations made by the Concerned Citizens for LPOHS Coalition. The group previously submitted a 31-page formal grievance and 8-page conditional settlement offer in an attempt to stop the relocation of Lake Pend Oreille High School from its historic campus.

The school board unanimously voted July 14 to relocate the alternative school from its 117-year-old building at 1005 North Boyer Ave. to the portables behind Sandpoint Middle School, citing rising maintenance and renovation costs, declining enrollment and potential student benefits. LPOHS will remain at its current location for the coming year, but as the school no longer offers electives, students will either bus to Sandpoint High School and the new Career Technical Education Building or attend online classes for anything outside of the core curriculum. Following improvements to the portables, students will move to the new campus for the 2027-’28 school year and maintain the same arrangement for electives.

The coalition opposed the move, demanding that the district cease all relocation efforts, and leveling allegations of misuse of public funds, attendance and graduation data fraud, and violations of Idaho Code and Idaho Administrative Procedure Act rules, among other complaints. The group further submitted official complaints to the Idaho Department of Education, the Bonner County Prosecutor’s Office and the Idaho Attorney General’s Office.

“There are real-world consequences to believing and sharing misinformation,” stated Community Relations Coordinator Shelby Struhs in an official letter posted to the district’s Facebook page Aug. 11. “In this instance, false legal allegations have contributed to division within our community and required the expenditure of taxpayer resources to respond to claims that ultimately lacked legal support.”

In her regular Superintendent Report Aug. 11, Meyer presented legal findings from the various governmental entities, as well as responses from the district, that addressed and contradicted the coalition’s claims, beginning with allegations of Idaho Open Meeting Law violations.

The coalition argued that by utilizing “unitemized, bulk consent agenda attachments,” the district had intentionally hidden personnel changes, school calendar approvals and decisions regarding LPOHS’s future relocation from public scrutiny. After multiple investigations, Bonner County Civil Deputy Attorney Robert Abel concluded that the district had not violated open meeting law.

“Both allegations arising from Meeting #814 fail on the merits,” stated Abel in his findings. “The agenda was timely posted, the action item was properly identified, and the resolution text was publicly available well within the 48-hour window.

“No cognizable Open Meeting Law violation is established. …” he continued. “This office has twice investigated OML complaints arising from this dispute and found no actionable violation in either instance. Absent new evidence of a procedural defect not addressed herein, this office considers the matter concluded.”

Further, LPOSD Clerk Kelly Fisher compiled and published records of each calendar vote from 2022 to 2026, showing that they were not approved via consent agenda.

The coalition also cited Idaho Code 33-511, which outlines school boards’ powers over the maintenance of schools, arguing that the district was required to hold a public hearing — not simply a regular public meeting — before voting to relocate LPOHS.

“Our attorney has also gone through this [code]. There is no mention of a statutory public hearing,” said Meyer.

“This is why I’m saying either it’s incompetence for not going through and looking at the code, or there is blatant lying and accusing the school board and district administration for things that are not true,” she later added.

The grievance also references I.C. 33-1002 and IDAPA 08.02.03.110, claiming that the district violated “the separate-site mandates” by locating the new LPOHS facilities next to Sandpoint High School, and so students will no longer qualify for the alternative school attendance divisor. For secondary education, the state awards funding based on units, which are 18.5 students per instructor; however, alternative schools are based on a 12-1 divisor, meaning they receive the same amount of funding with fewer students.

Neither code cited makes mention of “separate-site mandates,” Meyer said.

“In fact, when you talk to the Idaho Department of Education, there are several districts that do not even have enough students to be able to have a separate site [for the alternative school] … Oftentimes they have to be on the campus and share the site,” she added.

The coalition further drew on IDAPA’s mandated “designated differences,” which require that alternative schools “include course offerings, teacher/pupil ratios and evidence of teaching strategies that are clearly designed to serve at-risk youth.” Because of this, the group claimed that relocating LPOHS and giving students the option to take electives at SHS demoted the school to an alternative program, reduced funding and violated at-risk students’ Individualized Education Programs.

“Our teachers care so much about students that they automatically differentiate and figure out what strategies work for all kids,” said Meyer. “There’s not just at-risk kids at LPOHS. There’s at-risk kids throughout our entire district, K-12. …

“As long as 50% of their classes are not beyond Lake Pend Oreille High School, then they’re funded as at-risk students,” she later added.

IDE dismissed the coalition’s claims, further finding that moving the school did not violate the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

“We have been through audits and our attendance has been through audits, and according to the Idaho Department of Education we’re following the letter of the law and IDAPA language for how to get funded for at-risk students,” said Meyer.

A large portion of the original grievance centered on allegations that the school district artificially inflates daily attendance and graduation rates in order to secure additional state funding. The school district utilizes Flex Fridays — days when students with a C average or higher can work from home. The coalition alleged that schools automatically mark students present on those days, regardless of the reality; however, the district maintains that students who do not contact their teachers during class are marked absent. Multiple districts throughout the state utilize the system, which is allowed under I.C. 33-1619.

The grievance also claims that the district transfers failing students from SHS to LPOHS directly before graduation to maintain SHS’s graduation rate. Citing I.C. 33-1001, Meyer clarified that the district “can’t just transfer students because they’re not on track to graduate.” To qualify as at-risk, students must meet multiple criteria, including having repeated a grade, having “documented substance abuse,” being a teenage parent or having “personal, emotional or medical issues” that necessitate the transfer to an alternative school.

“LPOHS’s graduation rate has gone up from about 50% up to 80%. That wouldn’t happen if we were just putting students there that couldn’t graduate,” added Meyer.

The grievance further states that LPOHS “students are routinely directed or coerced by administration to sign an undated, standardized state ‘Intent to Homeschool’ withdrawal form to be held on file.” This, according to the coalition, inflates graduation rates by mislabeling dropouts.

“Often when alternative families — when they would leave, we had trouble locating them … so we did have a paper form that said, ‘If Johnny was to leave, how would you continue their education?’” said Meyer.

“It was only on file if a family was unable to be located and had said they were going to homeschool,” she later added. “Otherwise, there were dropouts, there were GEDs, there were people going to the military and other places.”

Though the form has been approved by the state, given the allegations, Meyer stated that it might not have “the best public perception,” and will discontinue the practice in the coming year.

Meyer refuted additional allegations outlined in the grievance, including claims that the district had participated in an unsanctioned reduction of force, that it had improperly combined LPOHS’s principal and counselor positions and that it had improperly used money from the School Modernization Facility Fund to renovate the alternative high school’s future location.

For a comprehensive breakdown of the grievance, the district’s findings and the relocation, see lp.lposd.org under the “Relocation Information” tab.

“I know at this new location, with the leadership of Chris Davis and her staff, they’re going to create something very special and magical with students’ voices,” said Meyer. “And I know, if people could just trust and wait, this is going to be very great for kids and for our community for the future.”