A lawsuit filed Friday against the Butler School District and its board seeks an injunction to halt the sale of four recently-closed elementary schools until newly-elected board members take office in December.

The suit was filed in Butler County Court by school board member Bill Halle and attorney Leland Clark.

Both Halle and Clark are among the five school board candidates who are on both the Republican and Democratic ballots in the Nov. 3 election.

The new board members will take office early in December. Those five members would be in the majority on the nine-member board.

Clark said in a statement that the suit seeks to stop the sale of the schools until the new board can reconsider the district’s consolidation plan.

“First, it will prevent the outgoing school board from recklessly selling the closed schools to the highest bidder with no input from the community,” the statement said. “Second, it will keep the closed schools in the possession of the district so that if the incoming board needs to make any tweaks or adjustments to the consolidation plan, it will have options.”

The school district and seven board members are listed as the defendants in the suit. Those members are: David Korn, Donald Pringle, Alvin Vavro, Carmen Bianco, James Keffalas, Karen Callihan and Neil Convery.

The board on Thursday night voted 7-2 to begin a sealed bid process to sell the closed schools. The bids will be accepted until Sept. 18, and the board may vote on Sept. 21 to sell them, the lawsuit says.

“The current board is attempting to push the sale process ahead hastily, recklessly attempting to sell the schools to the highest bidder,” the suit says. “They are leaving almost no time for the community to have any input on the sale of the schools.”

The suit claims the attempted sale is a “strategic attempt” to prevent the board nominees from reconsidering the school closing and reconfiguration plans.

“It’s truly unfortunate we were forced to do this,” Halle said. “But during the consolidation process promises were made to the public that are not being fulfilled. One of those promises was the community would have the opportunity to be part of the sale of the buildings.”

Halle said there has been almost no involvement from the community in determining what to do with the closed schools.

“There has been no comprehensive plan from the school district,” he said. “And the community hasn’t been involved.”

Halle said the schools can legally be sold as long as the bids meet the undisclosed appraisal values set on the buildings this summer.

The school board voted in May to close the four elementary schools and reconfigure the Center Avenue school. The four school buildings are Broad Street, Meridian, Oakland and Clearfield elementaries.

The final vote for the plan occurred a few weeks before the May primary election.

The suit says that the five candidates who were the most outspoken against the district’s consolidation plan each received the five nominations from both the Republican and Democrat parties in the primary. Those nominees include: Halle, Clark, Jennifer Cummings, Suzie Hammonds Bradrick and Nina Teff.

Tom King, solicitor for the district, said he was aware of the suit and expects to speak to the board about it.

“We were aware this was something that might happen,” he said.

King declined further comment.

Both Clark and Halle said the lawsuit will not affect this school year.

“The most important message to the community is this: don’t panic,” Clark said. “This lawsuit will not affect the 2015-16 school year in any way.”

Clark said it would be difficult to return to the kindergarten through sixth grade neighborhood school format due to “all the changes that are happening,” but said he intends to present a plan to the incoming board that would create two regional middle schools out of the closed Oakland and Meridian elementary schools.

“I have a feeling that the community will be very excited over that possibility,” he said.