A lawless board: the district won't comply

     As you know, yesterday, I reported that Tod Burnett, President of Saddleback College, has ordered that there will be a prayer at Saddleback College’s commencement next week, despite the unanimous decision of the college's commencement planning committee to forgo a prayer in favor of a moment of silence—and despite the recent settlement of “Westphal v. Wagner,” which seems plainly to indicate that the committee and the committee alone is to make the decision regarding whether to have a prayer. (See settlement agreement (including resolution).)
     Yesterday, attorneys for plaintiffs filed an emergency motion to enforce the settlement agreement.
     According to plaintiffs’ motion,

     The settlement agreement provides that the decision at issue—whether to have an invocation at Defendants’ commencement ceremony—rests with the event planners’ “sole discretion.” The event planners for the Saddleback College commencement are the members of the Saddleback College Commencement Committee; that Committee voted unanimously to have a moment of silence but no invocation. After the Committee made its unanimous decision, Defendant Tod Burnett, the President of Saddleback College—and not a member of the Committee—unilaterally overruled the Committee and ordered the presentation of an invocation at the May 20, 2011 commencement.

     Defendants are standing by Burnett’s actions. (Burnett is among defendants, a group comprising mostly trustees.)
     (Meanwhile, Irvine Valley College appears to be complying with the settlement agreement. IVC's committee evidently decided in favor of a prayer but without involvement of outsiders, including the college president.)
     Defendants are claiming that President Burnett is the “chief event planner” who is the ultimate decision-maker as to whether there is an invocation at commencement.
     And so, having already spent over one and a quarter million dollars defending their arrogant actions, they will now spend more taxpayer money. (The district is using pricey lawyers from Jones Day.)
     And they will lose.
     Stay tuned.