There doesn’t appear to be any grounds to recall members of the Lawrence school board.

At least a small contingent of local residents, unhappy with recent actions by the Lawrence school board, continues to fuel rumblings of a recall effort to unseat board members who voted in favor of closing three elementary schools after this year.

Before such a movement gains any momentum, it would be good for Lawrence residents to be aware of action taken by the Kansas Legislature this year to tighten the statutes that spell out the grounds for recalling elected officials.

Two board members who supported the school closings — Scott Morgan and Mary Loveland — were turned out by voters in April and will leave the board on July 1, the end of their current terms. Four others — Sue Morgan, Linda Robinson, Leni Salkind and Austin Turney — will continue on the board. By law, a recall election can’t target a majority of a sitting body, so a recall petition could be directed at no more than three members of the seven-member school board. Sue Morgan, who was re-elected in April, couldn’t be targeted within the first 120 days of her new term, so her other three colleagues would be the most likely targets.

However, even if such an effort were launched, it’s unlikely the petitioners could show sufficient grounds for recall, especially under the revisions to the statute approved this year. The statute currently states: “Grounds for recall are conviction of a felony, misconduct in office, incompetence or failure to perform duties prescribed by law.”

The 2003 Legislature amended that statement by removing “incompetence” as a grounds for recall and defining “misconduct in office” as “a violation of law by the officer that impacts the officer’s ability to perform the official duties of the office.”

It’s hard to see what any member of the Lawrence school board has done that would justify a recall even under the existing statute, let alone the revised statute, which has been signed by the governor.

The purpose of the recall law is to allow the public to remove from office people who have either broken the law or clearly are not doing the job they were elected to do. It’s not a way for voters to remove officials simply because they disagree with an action they have taken.

The recall of elected officials is an important protection against those who fail to perform their duties or act illegally. Unless those making recall noises in Lawrence can make that case against sitting school board members, they should put the recall idea to rest.