A previous Visalia Unified School District Board meeting.

On October 23, 2025, the Visalia Unified School District held a special joint meeting with the Visalia City Council. This was the second such meeting held in 2025, and was held in the District’s Board room.

The following is a part of the posted agenda for that meeting:

Members of the public may address the Board on any agenda item when the item comes to the Board for consideration. At regular meetings of the Board, members of the public may also address the Board regarding non-agenda items that are nonetheless within the Board’s jurisdiction during the general public comment portion of the agenda. Pursuant to Board Bylaw 9323, the Board will limit individual comments to no more than 3 minutes and individual topics to 20 minutes.

The District reserves the right to not hear comments, or portions of comments, that violate meeting guidelines.

I was the only member of the public to take advantage of the public comments section of the meeting. In it, I updated the School Board and the City Council on the recent Pride Visalia festival, held on October 11, 2025. During the remarks, I reminded and invited both the City Council members and the Board of Directors for the school district that The Source LGBT+ Center was available to consult with them on LGBTQ+ issues, and provide resources and information they might find useful in both their professional and personal lives.

The Visalia Unified School District takes video and audio recordings of the meetings, and posts them to a YouTube channel for the public to view. No post of this special meeting occurred.

I waited several days for the video to appear, as sometimes delays in posting can occur, sometimes the posters fault, sometimes YouTube’s. No recording of the meeting appeared.

I sent an email to the school district, asking if a recording was made, and when it would be available.

From: Jim Reeves jim.visalia@gmail.com
Date: October 28, 2025 at 5:32:34 PM PDT
To: cgutierrez04@vusd.org
Subject: Board special meeting video

Hi,
Does a video recording of the October 23, 2025 joint meeting between the School Board and the Visalia City Council exist? I’ve checked the YouTube channel, and found no video. I’ve noticed in the listing of meetings that special meetings don’t show a video.
Is there a video available that I can get a copy of? Or an audio recording?
Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Jim Reeves
Jim.visalia@gmail.com
Sent from my iPad

After several days, I received the following response:

“After conducting a reasonable search, the District determines that it has no public records that are subject to disclosure under the PRA and responsive to the request. Accordingly, no records will be produced.”

That’s a strange way to phrase it, at least to us non-lawyers.

I’ve followed up with the following email to the Board President, and the Board member for my area:

President Naylor, Boardmember DeJong,

I attended the Special Meeting of October 23, 2025. On October 28, I emailed a request for a copy of the video, or an audio recording, of the meeting since it had not been posted on YouTube. On November 4, I received the attached email, indicating “that it has no public records that are subject to disclosure under the PRA and responsive to the request”.
I have noticed in the listing of prior meetings, that ‘Special Meetings’ often do not have a video recording. Is this a formal policy of the District? If so, can I be directed to that policy?
It seems odd that no recording is made of the meeting, despite it being held in the Board room, and utilizing the audio/video equipment there.
I would like to understand why the District does not record these meetings, and I hope you can clear this up for me.
Mr. DeJong, I’m CCing you on this because I reside in your area.

Jim Reeves
jim.visalia@gmail.com

Board President Naylor responded:

Jim,
Thank you for your email regarding the recording of the special board session with the city. I have forwarded your email to the district office to look into this matter.
Again, thank you for bringing this to our attention.

Joy

We’ll see what the next week brings, and if the District responds further.

My goal now is to find out if a recording was not made of the special meeting, why not? Is there a District policy prohibiting it? If so, I want to see that policy, and when and how it was implemented. If it’s just a “we just don’t do that”, I want to know the reasoning why, and under whose authority.

Stay tuned.