Keith Knauss is sending a letter to the Lower Merion School Board, calling attention to what he claims are three recent occurrences of the Board violating the Sunshine Act.
But First, Who is Keith Knauss?
For many years he was a member of the Unionville-Chadds Ford School Board. When he resigned from that board in October of 2015, Dailylocal.com wrote Knauss said the recent teacher contract vote, in which he was outvoted 8 to 1, was a factor, but not a determining one. In voting no to the four-year contract, Knauss said with the cost of living index up just 0.2 percent last year, and the Social Security cost of living adjustment up 1.7 percent, the pay raise for teachers is not justified. He said salary and benefit increases for teachers may be unsustainable under Act 1 tax limits.
Knauss provided expert testimony on behalf of Arthur Wolk at a June 14, 2016, Common Pleas Court hearing. The result of that hearing was that Judge Joseph A. Smyth ruled in favor of Wolk, and against the Lower Merion School District.
Over the five years during which the School District has unsuccessfully appealed Smyth’s ruling, in the both Commonwealth Court and the State Supreme Court, Knauss has often called been critical of the district’s taxing and spending policies, especially its expenditures for legal fees.
He is not without his critics.
His motives have often been questioned. On several occasions, it was suggested (without evidence) that Knauss is somehow reaping financial benefit from the criticism that he heaps on the School District. But the worst charge against him that comes even close to sticking, is that he lacks standing (some would say he’s a busybody) to weigh in on the governmental inner-workings of a community in which he does not reside.
Or are his critics just shooting the messenger?
The slings and arrows that Knauss sends in the direction of the School District and the School Board, usually carry the weight of well-researched, and well-documented facts and figures (often accompanied by charts and graphs) – which is not to say that his facts and figures are not sometimes carefully selected (cherry-picked?) to support his own approach to governing, which tends to lean libertarian. However, whenever his critics resort to citing Knauss’s Non-Lower Merion residency, that’s usually a good indicator that they are unable to rebut his well-constructed arguments with anything other than an ad-hominem attack.
In Knauss’s latest missive – directed to members of the School Board
He accuses Solicitor Ken Roos of offering mere “fluff,” rather than an appropriate description of an executive session (behind closed doors), during which the board discussed “land development litigation.”
Knauss also takes the board to task because they took official action to employ the services of two outside firms (Chester Valley Engineers and the law firm Fromhold, Jaffe, Adams and Jun), without a formal vote, in violation of the Sunshine Act.
And finally, he notes that The three appeals filed in Common Pleas Court on October 13, 2021, required the expenditure of thousands of
dollars for the legal services of Fromhold Jaffe Adams & Jun. A close examination of school board minutes shows no public discussion of an appeal nor any contract with Fromhold, Jaffe, Adams & Jun.