Two residents of Whitehall Township spoke at the Whitehall-Coplay School Board meeting Monday night about their disdain for how Whitehall-Coplay School District handled the resignation of former Whitehall High School teacher David A. Borghesani.

When WCSB President Wayne Grim asked if there was any public participation at the meeting, Whitehall resident Michael McCloud stood to speak.

Before McCloud started, district solicitor Jeffrey Sultanik said, “This part of the meeting is for the public to address the board, but it must be limited to a two-minute time period.”

McCloud turned to a group sitting in the meeting room and said others could go before him because he needed to gather his thoughts in order to meet the two-minute limitation.

Whitehall resident Mary Paul Smith then stood up and addressed the board.

“I want to speak about the resignation of Mr. Borghesani,” Smith said. “He was a very good teacher. I have two sons, active participants in the music program, who enjoyed working with Mr. Borghesani. I understand reporting it to the church, and other school districts, but I think you overstepped. The investigation was not completed.”

Whitehall-Coplay School Board Feb. 13 approved the resignation of Borghesani, a WHS music teacher.

After that meeting, Sultanik told The Press Borghesani’s resignation was due to “inappropriate communications using emails, texts and Snapchat.”

According to Sultanik, the allegations were brought to the district in October 2016, and Borghesani was suspended with pay while the Lehigh County District Attorney’s office conducted an investigation. Once the district began its own investigation, Borghesani was suspended without pay, Sultanik said.

He also confirmed the inappropriate communications happened both “during and after school time.”

Borghesani has not been charged.

After Smith spoke, Sultanik responded, “We are not bound by the rules of criminal authorities,” he said. “Based on the information we collected during our investigation, Borghesani made the decision to resign. We are required to report investigations to other entities and districts. We did a thorough investigation.”

Smith asked, “What if there’s no evidence?”

Sultanik replied, “My firm conducted the investigation, along with the district, and as a result of what was collected, we moved forward.”

After Smith completed her statement, McCloud approached the board again.

“The fact that you had a meeting to not sensationalize the story makes me have a concern that it could lead to a lawsuit due to slander. You cannot have an investigation with no criminality and then mention criminality (to the media). I’m disgusted with the procedure from start to finish. You have taken away a gift from our children,” McCloud said.

“We’re proud of a lot of our administrators and teachers, but to take away someone that inspires ... Social media makes him look like the worst sexual predator right now. I don’t like agenda-driven things, and there’s a lot more going on here,” he said.