Letter: Concerning that LTUSD staff doesn't feel safe in reporting potential threats to safety

Dear Community, With a very heavy heart, I feel it is my responsibility to share the statement I gave yesterday at the Public Comment portion of the special School Board meeting that focused on the events of Sierra House’s 11/11 fire and clean-up. We are all deeply grateful for the success of Lake Valley Fire and all the specialists and District staff that have bent heaven and earth to help remediate all aspects of this situation. I write with deep respect and gratitude for all that LTUSD leadership has done for our family and community as well. My motivation is to ensure we move quickly toward a safer district, and I am grateful we have this window of time to get our house in order in advance of other emergencies which are bound to come.

Respectfully submitted,
Annie Davidson

Statement to the LTUSD School Board, 12/6/18

The fire event at Sierra House on 11/11 has necessitated a careful look at various different kinds of evidence in order to understand the situation and evaluate risk to people, and much of this evidence is described by other people here today.
I want to talk about evidence that this event has revealed about the culture of LTUSD, especially in light of the danger that this culture created in the hours, days, and weeks after the fire.

It appears likely to me that the school district does not have a culture in which staff members across the levels of the organization are empowered to voice concern in a situation of potential risk to people.

On November 14, the first day back after the fire, I heard anecdotally from multiple parents and staff members that they were deeply concerned but that the principal couldn’t shut school down because she “would lose her job.”
On November 15, a staff member told me “I have expressed my concerns” to leadership.

Another staff member told me after the November 28 PTA meeting she had more questions than answers especially about the ozone use for cleaning.

The simple fact that any staff would feel unsafe for any reason to voice a moral conviction concerns me.

What concerns me about these interactions is the fact that there appears to be a culture in which staff do not feel able speak up about a potential threat above the school level. The moral dimensions of this are dangerous and bring to light another significant threat, if unremediated. That threat is the cultural dimensions of an organization do not allow for its members to identify and take action in timely fashion. Further, the idea that there is a threat to one’s job by voice disagreement is concerning as it is in contrast to human resource management policy.

When you extrapolate this cultural characteristic into other scenarios, the outcomes could be concerning. Organizational literature highlights the negative consequences of corporate cultures that do not prioritize moral integrity over operational, logistic, legal, or political pressures. For example, harassment and live shooter incidents are likely to have more negative outcomes if staff do not feel empowered to question or raise concerns in a timely fashion.

In this light, it seems imperative to me that LTUSD leadership take on this issue of organizational culture head on and ensure management strategies and practices are conducive to correcting this tendency.