Board votes to abandon district’s social-media claim after staff review

MSD Wabash County Schools trustees voted to abandon a proposed social-media claim after administrators and district counsel raised concerns about the time and staff resources required to preserve and produce documents.

A district representative said the board has participated for years in a civil suit involving a vaping company (referred to in the meeting as the vaping-related litigation) and that settlement payments in that earlier case have been delayed. The board considered a separate “social media” claim; district staff and counsel advised that complying with document preservation and extraction demands for the social-media matter would be labor intensive for central office and schools.

Following that advice, the board recorded a motion and second to abandon the social-media claim. Trustees approved the recommendation by voice vote; no roll-call tally was recorded in the meeting minutes.

District counsel observed that the social-media claim appeared to be the same set of private law firms that pursued earlier vaping litigation and that per-school monetary figures had been difficult to confirm. The meeting record indicates the board accepted the staff recommendation—abandoning the social-media claim—so the district will no longer pursue that case on the district’s behalf.

The meeting did not specify whether abandoning the claim releases the district from any preservation obligations already undertaken or whether counsel will file a formal notice to the court; the board’s motion concerned the district’s participation in the claim rather than any settlement in the vaping-related litigation.