Virginia Beach deserves better

When Sandra Smith-Jones announced to her colleagues on the Virginia Beach School Board last month that she had taken a job on the other side of the world, she submitted her resignation - the only appropriate action given the impossibility of keeping up with school and constituent issues from nearly 7,000 miles away.

This week, Smith-Jones rescinded her resignation in a terse letter to Board Chairman Dan Edwards. She said her job with a Saudi Arabia-based education company would be flexible enough to allow her to return home every couple of months for a few weeks. According to reporting by The Pilot's Mike Hixenbaugh, Smith-Jones left Wednesday and said she'd be back for November's School Board meeting.

Her district, Kempsville, now will have to rely on email to communicate with her on school issues. And the School Board will have to divvy up her committee assignments - including student discipline and building utilization - and the eight schools for which she was liaison.

It's incomprehensible that a public servant elected to be a voice for Virginia Beach's parents, children and teachers believes she can represent them effectively from seven time zones away.

She told Edwards she changed her mind because her community had asked her to stay on the board. Sadly, she didn't elaborate on who her "community" is or how she would manage both her new job in the Middle East and her public service work in Virginia Beach.

Some have suggested Smith-Jones changed her mind because she didn't like the politicking to replace her. Even if that's true, her decision to remain is a poor way to lodge a protest.

Service on the School Board - and the City Council - is a part-time job requiring full-time attention to Virginia Beach. Rita Sweet Bellitto, appointed to the council last year and then elected in November, resigned this summer, appropriately, because her husband's job required her family to move to Seattle.

Smith-Jones, who makes $12,000 a year as a School Board member and is eligible for health care coverage through the schools, was elected to the board in 2000 and reelected in 2008 to the current four-year term. School Board members say they don't have the power to oust their colleague; that power rests with the voters.

In this case, that hurdle is extremely high. A recall petition would need 12,500 signatures of Beach voters - 10 percent of the votes cast in her most recent election - to merit removal from office.

Last month, Smith-Jones' colleagues feted her with a party, resolutions of appreciation and good wishes. Her resignation indicated she understood Virginia Beach's need for 11 engaged and present School Board members, who must figure out state funding issues, work to repair damaged relations with the City Council, determine whether school boundaries must change and monitor student and staff performance.

It's not possible to do all that from afar. Smith-Jones should rethink this - again - and resign.