A South Bend school board meeting erupted in tension Monday night over a failed attempt to void a controversial appointment to the St. Joseph County Public Library Board.
The board considered a resolution that would have declared null the appointment of Ruth Warren, who was selected in December by then-board president Dr. Stuart Greene. The room was packed with Warren supporters, some of whom praised her qualifications and questioned the motives behind the effort to remove her. Others argued the appointment was not legally valid.
The public comment period grew heated when board member Bill Sniadecki repeatedly interrupted speaker Mike McManus, calling him a liar. Later, during board discussion, Sniadecki also interrupted fellow trustee Marcus Ellison.
“I don’t understand why the lieutenant governor should, at all, be telling the South Bend Community School Corporation who they should appoint,” Ellison said, before being cut off by Sniadecki. He continued, “And if the lieutenant governor does have an opinion on that, the lieutenant governor should come to one of our board meetings.”
Board attorney Pete Agostino said the issue at hand was not Warren’s qualifications, but the timing of her appointment.
“The question here is not about Ruth Warren’s abilities. Really, the issue here was a matter of timing,” Agostino told board members.
According to Agostino, Greene appointed Warren in December to a seat that had not yet been vacated. Under Indiana law and legal precedent, he said, appointments made before an actual vacancy are considered void.
“Dr. Greene made that appointment in December,” Agostino said. “In December, the position that he was filling was not yet vacant — and that is a critical fact.”
He cited a 1930 Indiana Supreme Court decision that prohibits such appointments, noting that one cannot “forestall the rights of a successor by making an appointment to fill an office which would be vacated during the term of the appointing officer's successor.”
The vote to declare the appointment void failed in a 3–3 tie. Dr. Greene, who made the appointment, was absent from the meeting. Sniadecki, visibly frustrated by the outcome, abstained from the board’s final vote of the evening and left before the meeting adjourned.
