ST. LOUIS — The St. Louis Board of Education voted in closed session to approve a contract giving a redevelopment board the right to purchase a shuttered school but the board minutes of that meeting “incorrectly omitted the vote,” Matt Davis, the board vice president, said Tuesday.

Davis’ explanation was prompted by questions raised about the board’s handling of a contract giving the St. Louis Development Corp., the city’s lead development agency, a three-year option to purchase the closed Marshall School in the city’s Ville neighborhood.

SLDC is supposed to solicit developers for the school, which closed over 20 years ago, or it can buy the site itself. Meanwhile, it is responsible for maintenance and security on the property.

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The contract itself says the board took action on Aug. 27, and board president Antionette “Toni” Cousins signed it two days later. Cousins initially pointed to the real estate committee’s approval of the contract on Aug. 12 and the board’s approval of the committee minutes on Aug. 27.

But those minutes didn’t contain a vote on the actual contract, and the district’s custodian of records, in response to an open records request for the vote tally, said the contract had not been presented to the board for a final vote.

The full board needs to vote on real estate contracts.

Board member Emily Hubbard said though Cousins had kept the board updated on the project, she did not recall voting on the contract and didn’t know Cousins had signed it. Cousins on Monday made Hubbard chair of the real estate committee and said she would step down to remove “distractions.”

But on Tuesday, Davis said Hubbard was wrong and he provided emails showing the contract had been provided to the full board on Aug. 13. Davis said he remembered voting and telling Cousins to announce it in open session that evening.

During that meeting, Cousins referenced the contract and the real estate committee’s vote on it.

“We also talked about approving and I’m proud to say, we have officially, the board has approved... the real estate committee has approved doing a co-development venture, we’ll see how it works out, with SLDC,” Cousins said Aug. 13.

Davis said the meeting Aug. 13 was in the midst of an incredibly tumultuous time. The board had just put former Superintendent Keisha Scarlett on leave and the district was “all hands on deck” days before school started trying to manage a transportation crisis caused by the termination of the district’s busing contract.

The district’s attorney has advised the district to correct the minutes, Davis said, and it did so Tuesday.

“P eople make mistakes when they are stressed and distracted,” Davis said. “It’s a mistake that is easily correctable.”

Post-Dispatch photographers capture hundreds of thousands of images each year. Take a look at some from from just one week. Video edited by Jenna Jones.

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