School board slated to elect chair, vice chair at meeting Wednesday

LACONIA — After city elections bring in at least one new member Tuesday, the Laconia School Board is slated to reappoint its current leadership for another year at a meeting Wednesday evening. 

The seven members of the school board are elected to three-year terms on a rotating basis, with two or three seats on the ballot each fall. This year, Ward 5 member Nick Grenon, first appointed to the board to fill a vacancy in May 2020 and elected that fall, is running unopposed for reelection. Dawn Johnson, who has represented Ward 4 on the board since 2017, decided not to run for another term this year, and Latoya Beck, an active athletics volunteer and district parent, is unopposed in the race to fill that seat.

Unlike other municipal offices, school board members are seated immediately following city elections, and the two newly elected members will be sworn in at the outset of Wednesday’s meeting. The first meeting of the term also sees the election of the board’s chair and vice chair.

Both the current Chair Jennifer Anderson and Grenon, the vice chair, told The Daily Sun that, if nominated and supported by the rest of the board, they intend to continue their current leadership team for a second one-year term. 

“The past year, we’ve had a really good flow,” Grenon said. “Hopefully we can keep that going.”

Last November, Anderson and Grenon were both unanimously elected by their fellow board members.

“I hope they’ll have me back,” Anderson said. She was optimistic they would, saying that recent expressions she’d made to board members about continuing as chair were warmly received and that it would be a “surprise” if anyone else were seeking the position. District policy states that no chair can “serve more than two consecutive terms.”

The meeting is also scheduled to include discussion and a vote on a federal grant aimed at reducing violence in and around schools and on approving funding for an expanded playground at Pleasant Street School. A string of policies related to employee conduct and recruiting will be up for discussion only.