Coeur d’Alene school trustees found solid common ground when they embraced a policy that gives parents the right to prevent their children from joining high school clubs.

Wisely, the school board put the onus on parents to ban their children from certain clubs, such as Lake City High’s Gay-Straight Alliance, rather than follow a suggestion from state Rep. Bob Nonini, R-Post Falls, that would create a paperwork nightmare. In April, Nonini asked the board to adopt a policy that would force teens to get parental permission before joining any club. He sponsored legislation with similar intent this year that barely passed the Idaho House before dying in the Senate Education Committee.

John Goedde, chairman of the Senate Education Committee, explained at the time that he wouldn’t hold a hearing on the matter unless Nonini obtained the attorney general’s opinion about the legality of the proposed legislation. Goedde didn’t want to be rushed into a bad decision during the closing days of the 2006 Legislature. Fortunately, school trustees took a deliberate approach, too.

The policy they adopted June 19 is far better than the one proposed by Nonini.

Rather than force every child in every school district in the state to obtain parental permission for every high school club, the Coeur d’Alene School Board policy focuses on the few families that might be at odds over a club, like the Gay-Straight Alliance. The policy supported by Nonini, the Mica Flats Grange and some local Republicans would have required busy administrators, teachers and counselors to keep track of permission slips for extracurricular activities from the art club to the yearbook club. Now, objecting parents will be responsible to jump through the administrative hoop to block their children’s participation.

This hubbub isn’t about the poetry club or the international club or the Youth Volunteers in Action at Lake City High. Nor is it about getting parents more involved in their children’s school activities. Despite mixed messages from Nonini, it’s about denying a group of students who have met the criteria for the right to form a club that makes some adults uncomfortable. But not others. Adviser Mark Woolcott says that most alliance members have their parents’ support.

If anything, the community commotion over the Gay-Straight Alliance has boosted the club’s membership and participation.

Adults never seem to learn the lesson that misguided crusades to ban books or clubs often make them more attractive to teenagers.

In this instance, the Coeur d’Alene School Board has provided a workable solution to a bad idea and an opportunity for Nonini and Republican allies to appear less than intolerant of a high school club that unsettles them. At a time when laws are being passed in cities and states across the nation to prevent discrimination against gays, including a new Washington state law, Kootenai County Republicans should realize that gays are an intricate part of our culture.

Local Republicans should thank the school board for doing its homework and providing an escape valve for this tempest in a teapot.