Iconic High School Symbol Flies Again
By Helen Marsh
David Bell was elected president of the Board of Trustees of the Sonoma Valley Unified School District in December 2025. He was elected by a vote of his fellow board members. In January, Bell ran into a buzz saw of negative public opinion when he unilaterally instructed Sonoma Valley High School to remove the Pride Flag that had flown in place on campus since 2019.
While Bell reversed this decision within a few days – with a public letter of apology – it has left many community members with concerns about what he did and how he did it. The most critical observation is that Bell acted without authority to direct any District employee to take any particular action. He quite certainly did not have the authority to have the Pride Flag taken down. This is clear from the Board’s own bylaws, which specify the limited role of school board presidents.
“The president has a leadership role but is not the leader of the district; the superintendent is,” says Dan Gustafson, a three-time board president in this district, who served as a trustee from 2006 to 2018. “The superintendent manages the district,” Gustafson explains, “while the board provides oversight. The board’s governance job is to hire the superintendent, help make them successful, or replace them.” No District employee works for the Board president, as the Superintendent reports to the entire Board.
Indeed, the most visible aspect of the president’s duties relates to chairing the meetings. According to the bylaws, the president has the responsibility to, “ensure that Board meetings are conducted in an efficient, transparent, and orderly manner.” In addition, the president presides over and conducts the meetings, and rules on issues of parliamentary procedure.
“The president recognizes speakers, protects them from interruption or cross-conversation, and keeps the focus on the agenda item at hand,” explains Gustafson. “He or she should conduct the meeting with courtesy and respect. This is not a legislative body. Five trustees should not devote valuable time to parliamentary debate. As for time, nothing good happens after 10 p.m. District office staff is just exhausted the next day.”
The Board president also works with the superintendent to prepare agendas for Board meetings. However, even here, the power is limited. Many agenda items, such as budget updates and approvals, appear on the board agendas on a regular and predictable basis. Other items appear on the agenda after the Board reaches a consensus about including them. Finally, each trustee has the ability to place an item on the agenda.
The president is also authorized to be the Board’s media spokesperson, says Gustafson “in conjunction with the Superintendent.” Even here, where the president is the only Board member who can speak to the press on behalf of the Board, he or she is not to act alone. Further, the bylaws do not prevent other Board members, as individual members of the Board, from speaking to the press regarding their personal opinions or observations.
Finally, the president has statutory and administrative requirements, such as signing documents where required, and, according to the bylaws, to “carry out the will of the Board.” The president can appoint and dissolve committees, “subject to Board approval.”
“The president has no power as an individual,” Gustafson notes. “The board position on an issue is what the majority of trustees vote for, and the president represents that position. The president does have several tasks to facilitate board governance, so in one sense, he or she is ‘first among equals,’ but presidents often stay mostly above the fray while facilitating it, more like ‘last among equals.’”
Most critical to the Pride Flag issue, the bylaws charge the Board president with leading “the Board’s advocacy efforts to build support within the local community,” and to “provide leadership on behalf of the governance team and the educational community it serves.” Yet Bell took unilateral steps that have had the effect of galvanizing widespread and vocal disapproval.
Although Bell may or may not be sensitive to public opinion, he is only immediately answerable to his fellow trustees. While official censure may be an option, the more likely outcome of this incident is that those other trustees, and the incoming superintendent, will help Bell understand the very narrow limits of his authority.
Helen Marsh is a Sonoma attorney who was a SVUSD Board member from 2004-2014. She currently focuses her legal practice on employment, business and special education.
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