A Monday teleconference between all parties in the Gardendale City Schools separation case has resulted in additional information being requested from the new system.

In a prepared statement read at Tuesday’s monthly meeting of the Gardendale Board of Education, President Chris Segroves said that a “small amount” of information had been requested during the conference, which also attorneys from included the U.S. Department of Justice, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund (which represents the original plaintiffs in the decades-old Stout vs. Jefferson County Board of Education desegregation case), and the Jefferson County Schools.

The teleconference was part of a timeline approved weeks ago by U.S. District Judge Madeline Haikala, who presides over the case. It was the last item in a timeline that was intended to move the case along and assist Gardendale in staying on course to take over the city’s schools on July 1. The breakaway from JefCoEd may affect the county system’s lengthy effort to achieve “unitary status” — a legal term which means that all vestiges of segregation have been eliminated, and that the system no longer needs court supervision.

Segroves didn’t comment on the nature of the information, citing a gag order put in place by Haikala.

Once the other parties have had a chance to review the new information, one or more of the parties will then request a hearing before Haikala,

Tuesday marked the first anniversary of the board’s first official meeting. The board re-elected Segroves as president and Karen White as vice president, and Mayor Othell Phillips swore in Chris Lucas for a full five-year term of office.