SCHOOL DISTRICT WANTS APPLICANTS' DRUG HISTORIES

Critics Call Bill Draft an Invasion of Privacy

Clark County School District officials want Nevada lawmakers to grant
them more access to job applicants' criminal histories of drug-related
offenses -- a demand critics call an invasion of privacy for people
who have already completed their court-ordered punishment.

Certain state licensing boards in Nevada are now granted full access
to an applicant's history, including expunged drug offenses, but
school districts are not. A bill draft proposed for the 2003
legislative session by the school district would change that.

Critics of the bill, including the state teachers' union and the
American Civil Liberties Union, say such access to sealed records
would be an invasion of privacy and would undercut the value of
rehabilitation for first-time offenders.

"In the wisdom of the court some records are properly sealed," said Al
Bellister, researcher of the Nevada Education Association, the state
teachers' union. "A person who has completed their punishment or gone
through treatment shouldn't be exposed to public scrutiny. They should
be able to salvage their careers and go on with their lives."

Two prior versions of the bill have been proposed, but neither made it
out of committee, Bellister said. If the current bill does move
forward, it will find vigorous opposition from the teachers' union, he
said.

"It's ludicrous that the school district would expect, or even want,
to totally negate the court process in this way," said Bellister, who
has testified against the earlier versions of the bill.

First-time drug offenders in many states -- including Nevada -- may
have their record expunged by completing court-ordered penalties such
as community service or a treatment program. In Nevada, people may
withhold such information on job applications without perjuring
themselves, according to state statute. However, state licensing
boards must be told, and may consider the offense when evaluating an
application for a license.

"We're saying we have a right to that information, too," said George
Ann Rice, school district associate superintendent of human resources.
"We're talking about people who will be working with children, and
it's our job to maintain the trust and confidence of the public in our
employees."

Knowing about a potential employee's prior drug convictions does not
guarantee the person won't be hired, said Barbara Belak, director of
employee labor management relations for the school district.

"We have had some occasions in the past when a person disclosed a
prior drug arrest, sometimes as much as 25 years old, and we've gone
ahead and hired them," Belak said. "But the way the current law is
written, we're being robbed of the opportunity to make that judgment
call for ourselves."

Rice said only a handful of teachers have been fired for drug-related
offenses in recent years.

JoNell Thomas, a member of the board of directors of the Nevada
American Civil Liberties Union, questioned the need for the proposed
bill. There are professions where expunged or sealed records for drug
offenses should be opened to licensing boards but teaching is not one
of them, Thomas said.

"If we're talking about airplane pilots or train conductors, those are
circumstances that could involve mass casualties and catastrophe,"
said Thomas, a criminal defense attorney practicing in Las Vegas. "But
if we're talking about a teacher who's successfully been through a
drug treatment program, what's the worst that could happen here?"

Keith Rheault, deputy superintendent of the Nevada Education
Department, said the state's teaching licensing division sees fewer
than 100 applicants out of 1,000 with drug-related offenses on their
records.

In most of those instances, applicants checked "no" when asked on the
application if they have drug-related convictions or cases pending,
because a judge has told them their records have been wiped clean,
Rheault said. However, the case still shows up on fingerprint reports
from the FBI, Rheault said. When that happens, the superintendent has
the discretion to grant or deny the individual's license. By law, the
information cannot be shared with school districts, Rheault said.

"If we could, we would be happy to tell them everything we know,"
Rheault said.

Thomas said if someone must have access to the expunged records, it is
better to have it be at the state, rather than the district, level.
State officials would be more likely to view the information
objectively, Thomas said.

Rheault said he knew of fewer than 10 cases of Nevada teachers being
arrested for drug-related offenses, either here or out of state.

For the Nevada Board of Education, stemming the tide of sex-related
offenses by teachers is a more immediate priority than investigating
past drug records, Rheault said. During the past 24 months, 15 Clark
County School District employees have been prosecuted on sexual
crimes, ranging from possession of child pornography to child
molestation to having sex with a student.

"It's the sexual offenses, not drug cases, that have really hit at
this point," Rheault said. "We're looking at requiring full background
checks, not just fingerprints."