A judge will soon decide whether an Atlantic City school board member has the right to vote on matters while there are questions about his residency.
Farook Hossain remains on the Board of Education, but has not had his vote counted since the solicitor barred the board secretary from recording it at the Jan. 11 reorganization meeting.
At that time, solicitor Tracy Riley told the board that there were questions about Hossain's residency.
Hossain filed a complaint last month after Riley continued to ban his vote.
Administrative Law Judge John S. Kennedy heard arguments Wednesday on why Hossain should have his vote immediately reinstated back to the first meeting of the year.
Only the commissioner of education or the Ethics Board can remove a sitting member, attorney William Koy Sr. told Kennedy during the hearing held via Zoom.
Instead, he said Riley wrote a letter to his client on Dec. 31, telling him that an Atlantic County chief assistant prosecutor had evidence suggesting he no longer lived at his Raleigh Avenue home. She then reminded him that he had to be a resident to serve on the board.
At that time, Riley told Hossain she was reaching out to him "to allow you the opportunity to resign from the board to avoid any embarrassment" and if she did not hear from him she would advise the board that "action will have to be taken."
But the only action Riley took was to continue "to raise (Hossain's) level of discomfort and get him to resign," Koy told the judge. "He sat through meetings as a seated member but couldn't vote. What an embarrassing endeavor."
Koy said this was done because Riley never intended to file a petition to the commissioner of education to have Hossain legally removed.
Riley said that was untrue, saying the board meetings that followed all lacked a quorum to go forward. She also noted that the missing board members at those meetings were those whose voting aligns with Hossain's.
She noted that Hossain was on the executive session agenda for those canceled meetings, along with a meeting that had a quorum until the closed session, when several members left.
But the vote on filing the petition was never on any agenda until the Feb. 23 special meeting held after Koy filed Hossain's complaint.
Riley backed her decision to bar Hossain's vote by citing the statute governing school boards that notes that when a member ceases to be a bona fide resident of the district "his membership in the board shall immediately cease."
She, however, did not mention the procedure when a member contends they are still a resident, as Hossain has.
"In a situation in which the individual’s residency is challenged but he or she disputes the matter, a petition could be filed with the state commissioner of education who would then issue a decision," a state School Boards Association spokeswoman previously told BreakingAC.
Despite the board voting last week to file that petition, Riley told the judge she had not done so due to the pending case before him. But, she said, she did copy her 116-page filing for this hearing to the commissioner.
The questions of Hossain's residency were first raised after an investigation by the Atlantic County Prosecutor's Office indicated Hossain may not be living at the North Raleigh Avenue address he has on file.
That investigation was sparked by a letter Riley
That investigation was sparked by an email Riley sent to Atlantic County Prosecutor Damon Tyner on behalf of Superintendent Barry Caldwell.
In it, she said the superintendent claimed Hossain filed false information to get free lunch for his children. She included clips from new coverage of a 2012 case in which an Elizabeth school board president was criminally charged for similar actions.
No criminal charges have been announced. But the board is now suing Hossain and his wife civilly for that and for tuition it claims the district is owed for the children attending school there while not residents.
Hossain has denied he no longer lives in the district.
He has said that friends were staying in his home on a month-to-month lease to help them out during COVID. At times, he said, he stays at a home on North Bartram Avenue.
But Riley said that residence was to "purely hide the ball" that Hossain is living in Egg Harbor Township, where his wife owns a property.
The judge said he will issue a written decision before the next board meeting, which is scheduled for March 23.
