School Administrative District 6 is reviewing the nepotism policies of six nearby school districts to inform its own policy, following feedback that an earlier rewrite of its nepotism code didn’t go far enough.

In a separate but related issue, SAD 6 officials also have agreed to look into relationships between existing district staff members that could fall under the nepotism policy. While two board members have said in public meetings that there are employees who are supervised by a family member, several other board members have said such situations do not exist, and, if they do, there are policies in place to correct the situation.

Nepotism is a touchy issue in SAD 6, following a breach of the policy in February, when the district hired then-Superintendent Frank Sherburne’s son, 23-year-old Zachariah Sherburne. Shortly after the son’s employment with the district ended, he was arrested on charges of gross sexual assault and sexual abuse of a minor in a case involving a 16-year-old girl in another school district where he had previously worked. All charges against Zachariah Sherburne were later dropped.

The school board determined in May that the superintendent had violated the district’s nepotism policy in hiring his son, who had not first cleared a background check. The School Board did not move to discipline Frank Sherburne, who later resigned following public outrage. Former Bonny Eagle High School Principal Paul Penna is the interim superintendent.

At the policy committee meeting Dec. 6, board member and committee chairman Alan Dube asked the board to review the policies of six abutting school districts and then propose changes to Bonny Eagle’s existing policy at the upcoming committee meeting on Dec. 19.

Tuesday’s meeting followed a Nov. 22 first-reading of a revised nepotism policy, whern School Board members Rebecca Bowley and Cynthia Meserve said they thought the two updates to the policy were insufficient.

The committee will review policies from Cape Elizabeth, Scarborough, Gorham, Portland and Windham-Raymond schools as well as that of RSU 57, which covers Alfred, Limerick, Lyman, Newfield, Shapleigh and Waterboro.

Scarborough and Cape Elizabeth have identical policies.

Across all six districts, policies on nepotism are one- to two-pages long, and include more or less the same language, largely preventing the School Board or superintendent from hiring family members into the district.

Bonny Eagle’s policy, which is roughly one page, states that it is against policy to employ a spouse or child of a board member or superintendent. It also states that no employee will be assigned to a position that is within the administrative supervision of a member of his or her family.

The policy includes a clause for dealing with previously existing nepotism violations and another for exceptions to the policy.

The policies from the other six districts vary only slightly from Bonny Eagle’s policy.

Scarborough and Cape Elizabeth’s policies prevent not only immediate but extended family members (including grandparents, uncles and aunts) of the superintendent or board members from being employed by the school department. They also include a clause that the board “shall be notified if an employee has an immediate or extended family relationship with any other School Department employee or board member before the board takes any employment action affecting that employee.”

At the Nov. 22 meeting, Bowley said there are instances in the district where an employee is supervised by a member of his or her family. At the Dec. 6 meeting, Meserve echoed similar claims.

Several other school board members have said there are no such issues of nepotism. School Board Chairman Lester Harmon said in an email Wednesday that the differences of opinion amongst board members stem from their diverging interpretations of a list of possible nepotism violations.

The list was requested by a board member following Bowley’s comments at the Nov. 22 meeting. It documents all of the relatives working at schools in the district. Because the list is an employment issue, it may be kept confidential.

“I have inspected the list of relatives, and to the best of my knowledge there isn’t any nepotism,” Harmon wrote. “There is one case that could possibly fall under the exception clause in our current policy.”

Members of the same family working in the district do not necessarily violate the nepotism policy unless one family member is in supervisory capacity over another. Even then, an exception can be made whereby the subordinate, a teacher, for example, reports to the superintendent on matters including pay raises and disciplinary action, as opposed to the person’s regular supervisor, if reporting to the regular supervisor would create a possible situation of nepotism.

Harmon said he has directed the Penna to review the list.

In this May file photo, Frank Sherburne, center, sits in a meeting of School Administrative District 6 Board of Directors. Sherburne later renounced his resignation following a nepotism violation, prompting the district to review and revise its policy on the matter.