POLAND – After making charges of improper conduct against the Poland Regional High School Committee chairman, the Mechanic Falls representative has changed his mind about pursuing his claims at the next scheduled meeting.

In an e-mail message dated Thursday, Oct. 21, and sent at 6:19 a.m., School Committee member David Griffiths stated he would not place his complaints on the next agenda, as urged by fellow board members Ike Levine and Jack Conway.

“I don’t intend to bring up my complaints as an agenda item in November,” stated Griffiths. “The satisfaction that would give me may be outweighed by the harm that would come from extending the argument.”

Levine, committee chairman and target of most of Griffiths’ charges made during Wednesday’s regular meeting, commented on Thursday’s missive.

“Funny how he can conduct business via e-mail’ so I just thought I would pass along his declaration of non action via the medium he was railing against us for using,” stated Levine in a 12:26 p.m. Thursday e-mail. “If we are doing everything as bad as he charged yesterday, why is he dropping the matter prior to it being fully and openly discussed?”

Griffiths made a point at Wednesday’s meeting that conducting official business through e-mail messages violates open-meeting laws. He cited Conway as giving the same opinion during an August 2002 School Union 29 workshop.

Conway, who is an attorney at an Auburn firm, said emphatically Thursday that he offers comments as a committee member during discussions and not as the committee’s attorney. Conway said he does not represent the committee, nor does he advise it on legal matters.

School Union 29, which is the umbrella administrative organization for Poland Regional High School, uses the law firm Brann & Isaacson of Lewiston, said Assistant Superintendent Bill Doughty.

Doughty said he and Superintendent Nina Schlikin usually are included in the electronic mail circuit when messages go out among committee members. However, there are times when administration is left out of conversations among the elected officials, he said.

“It’s clear that board members can’t conduct business by e-mail, and we haven’t seen any evidence of that,” Doughty said. “We can use it for certain things. For example we can use it to set up a meeting. I don’t think the proper use of e-mail has been reviewed recently. It’s easy to step over that line.”

Conway said he found the message, forwarded to him at 8:02 a.m. by committee member Norm Davis at Griffiths’ request, ironic.

“I think people’s personal agendas get in the way of the important work of the School Committee,” Conway said. “If this is as important as he said it was, then it should be on the agenda for an open discussion in an open meeting.”

Conway countered that Griffiths, as a former editor of the Sun Journal, was merely seeking publicity. Levine responded likewise.

“This is just another example of him using your newspaper to throw wild charges out to the public and make personal attacks then retreats and hides prior to any fair hearing of the facts,” stated Levine in a 12:26 p.m. Thursday e-mail.

“What I said stands,” said Griffiths. “I said what I wanted to say. I don’t want to extend this controversy into November. We have important business to do.”

Griffiths added that all ties between him and the Sun Journal have been completely severed for the past 5 years and that he intends to read his own e-mail messages in public.

Griffiths attended the Maine School Boards Association conference in Augusta Thursday and said that he spoke to several attending attorneys about e-mail communication.

“They all said it’s best to keep e-mail traffic to routine matters such as, when do we meet,” Griffiths said by telephone Thursday evening.