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The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

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Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

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Seeing Through Effort to Make School Board Meetings More "Transparent"

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Monday, September 29, 2014   

DENVER - Proposition 104, one of four propositions on the November ballot in Colorado, would require public meetings of school boards during contract negotiations for school employees. Bruce Caughey, executive director of Colorado Association of School Executives, explains why his organization is against Proposition 104.

"One of the things that people fear is it could cover strategic sessions that school boards might want to have to talk about negotiations before they get into the negotiating room," says Caughey.

Supporters gathered more than 86,000 signatures to place the measure on the ballot. Caughey says local school boards already have the option of making salary negotiations public. The League of Women Voters of Colorado, local school boards, and the Colorado Education Association have also spoken out against the ballot initiative.

Nancy Crow, vice president of programs with the League of Women Voters of Colorado and a former teacher, says it could make it difficult for teachers to secure fair salaries when it comes time to negotiate their contract.

"It could tie the hands of the unions," she says. "When they're making strategies and having it out there in public, I would think it would limit their options."

Caughey says Proposition 104 is unnecessary since school boards can already choose to make negotiations public, and if put in place, the measure would prevent school leadership from making the best decision for their own community.

"It takes away that element of local control and it puts it into a 'one size fits all' state mandate," he says. "The idea that local communities can already do this under state law is true - and many do."

Proposition 104 is backed by the Independence Institute, a Denver-based think tank which also supports a flat tax and debt-free government. The Institute has ties to the American Legislative Exchange Council, also known as ALEC.


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