MANCHESTER — A ConVal School Board member who was censured for speaking out against a proposed school bond that the board had endorsed has been chosen as this year’s recipient of the Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment Award.
Gail Pierson Cromwell, Temple’s representative on the regional school board, voted against the $4.9 million proposal and opposed it in letters to newspapers and public meetings in her town. As a result, the board voted last spring to censure her. Voters narrowly defeated the proposal.
“When you join the board, you do not leave your First Amendment rights at the door,” Cromwell said at the time. “You have a duty to inform the people.”
Cromwell will be recognized at the non-profit school’s First Amendment Awards event on Oct. 22 at the Capitol Center for the Arts, featuring Fox News commentator, columnist and author Bill O’Reilly.
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