From boardroom foes to lunchtime friends, these Pa. school board members build trust one meal at a time

A York County school board may be the last group that comes to mind when thinking of people who can find common ground on tough issues. 3 board members from York Suburban School District are changing that — one lunch at a time.

• Sam Dunklau
  BioRecent Stories

  

  Sam Dunklau was WITF’s Capitol Bureau Chief from 2020 – 2023.

 

WITF’s Sam Dunklau produced this story as part of the America Amplified initiative, using community engagement to inform and strengthen local, regional, and national journalism. America Amplified is a public media initiative funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Rich Robinson had only heard rumors about Joel Sears – none of them good.

“I knew of Joel by reputation before I actually met him in person, and [his] reputation was that he was the Prince of Darkness,” Robinson said.

Listen to the story:

 

But that didn’t stop Sears, a semi-retired computer software developer, from reaching out to Robinson, a retired non-profit worker, once they began serving together on the nine-member York Suburban School District board in York, Pa., their hometown. In the not-so-distant past, their kids had attended school there.

The two started getting coffee on the regular, then switched to lunch: first at one watering hole, then another. They had a mutual friend, school board president John Posenau, who joined them at the table after a while. Posenau is a vice president of a food service company that works with schools around the country.

“We must have had an epiphany after a [board] meeting,” Sears said. “[We] just decided that it’d be a good idea to have some discussions outside the bounds of the school.”

So began their unofficial rendezvous. They agreed to leave nothing off the table: their conversations flow from federal politics, to classic cars, to what’s bothering them about the school district. 

If it weren’t for the fact that the three are politically opposite from one another, the lunches wouldn’t be all that exciting. Each person is going out of his way to get together in a time when school boards are on the frontlines of our political battlefields – York Suburban schools included.

Sears is a Republican who said he ran for school board after he disagreed with the superintendent about property tax rates. Robinson, a Democrat, explained he was dissatisfied with the way the district was handling student mental health concerns. Posenau, an independent, said he “watched from the sidelines” before getting involved.

They disagree about everything. They’ve sparred over how York Suburban schools should be funded, even how the kids that attend them should be kept safe from danger. When I met up with the group for an afternoon meal in York last month, they even disagreed about what to order. 

Robinson and Sears had burgers stacked high with condiments, while Posenau (citing his health) ordered a salad – amid a few snickers from the other two. 

But the group uses those differences to spark conversation, rather than snuff it out. A lunch table, as it turns out, is an ideal place to practice their efforts. 

“This gives us a chance to share perspectives without specifically arguing about topics,” Posenau said before digging in. He added “constraints” in the school board bylaws mean the group has to keep their lunches small and unofficial. If at least five of the nine board members meet together and talk about policy, the public technically has to be notified. 

Sears said the three can be more candid with each other outside school walls anyway.

“We’re not deliberating. We’re not trying to convince each other. We’re just trying to understand each other,” Sears added.

Understanding goes a long way these days. The group explained some people in and around York have been “raising the temperature” when discussing public problems lately – a key reason why the three started getting lunch with each other in the first place.

“You don’t have to raise the temperature to make a point,” Sears said. “[And] there are some in the community who get a little higher up on the temperature scale to make their points.”

The temperature at York Suburban board meetings spiked last August. The district was trying to iron out a problem that schools across the country were grappling with: mask mandates for elementary school kids, who could not get vaccinated against COVID-19 at the time. 

At issue was how long those students should wear masks. Most of the board, including Rich Robinson, wanted to require masks until at least six weeks after the Centers for Disease Control allowed kids under 12 years old to get their shots. 

Some public commenters and even a school board member said they thought the number was arbitrary. 

“Where’d you get six weeks?” board member James Sanders repeatedly asked Steven Sullivan, a fellow board member who crafted the policy.

“You can ask me that question all night!” Sullivan replied. 

“But you don’t have an answer, and that’s my point!” retorted Sanders. 

It went on like that for more than three hours. When it came time to vote, Joel Sears joined two other Republicans in opposing the mask mandate. He wanted kids older than 12 to have to wear masks too. 

Rich Robinson and John Posenau voted in favor of a 12-and-under mandate. But when the Board revisited the policy later that month, Joel and Rich voted for a new proposal to expand the mask mandate to all kids. But that ended up failing.

“We both agreed that each of us had good reasons for our position,” Robinson recalled at last month’s lunch meeting. “It just came down to a question of the vote being taken, and the majority of viewpoints holding sway.”

It’s been almost a year since the mask wars ended – but Robinson says if it hadn’t been for the regular meetups with Sears and Posenau, he might not have felt comfortable crossing the aisle last year.

“When I leave these sessions, I start thinking about questions in a whole different light,” Robinson said. 

He’s even been able to look past Sears’ “prince of darkness” reputation, realizing others had described him that way just because he’s a Republican.

“I don’t see any horns,” Robinson said. “I’ve come to appreciate him as a man of deeply-held convictions, and a very strong sense of integrity. That counts for me.”

Though Posenau didn’t agree with Robinson and Sears’ idea to change the district’s masking policy, their friendship remained intact.

“I would never question the integrity of either of them. They both have a position that they can speak to,” Posenau said.

“We can scream at each other in board meetings, and walk out and have dinner,” he added.

“Sometimes we are diametrically opposed on a particular issue,” Sears chimed in. “It’s the integrity and the argument that carries the day.”

In a small way, that’s the model the group is demonstrating: one bit of understanding at a lunch meeting can lead to more, which can lead to better decisions for the kids of York Suburban.

“Think of how much worse it would be if we didn’t have a common framework and understanding,” Posenau said. “Suppose we were just sitting across from each other at a table, arguing over whether to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no’… derI think it’s important.”

The group says anyone can do what they’re doing. All it takes is being willing to share with each other, to ask questions when there are disagreements, and to spend some time getting to know one another.