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| "If I only had a brain ..." |
The first hour of tonight's School Committee meeting resembled a Kindergarten play. It opened with Sherry Marshall thanking Nancy Crossman for checking with the Town Clerk to see if out-of-town people could speak at forum.
Huh? Why?
I would have assumed that anybody chairing a Committee (or who was an elected member of a committee for two decades) would know that the Chair controls a meeting --- not the Town Clerk! AND, the policies and procedures for Public Forum are detailed in the School Committee's Policy Manual (aka The Big Blue Book). These two should be embarrassed that they are so unfamiliar with either State Law -- or their own Procedures Manual!
So, of course the Committee can allow anybody they want to speak -- although if the policy manual does specify Town residents (I don't remember!) I would have expected a vote to suspend the policy.
From a practical perspective, why? non-residents don't pay taxes here. They don't pay salaries, they didn't pay for the building. In fact, in the case of non-resident pool users, not only did they not pay to build the pool, they don't even cover the costs of operating it. In 2009, according to an independent audit, the cost of operating the pool exceeded revenue by almost $130,000. This shortfall was funded with transfers from the revenue generated by other "profitable" Community School programs. Why delay the Committee's official business? Are non-resident opinions more important than those of the Sandwich residents who elected the board --- AND pay the bills?
As expected, numerous pool supporters from area towns flocked to the microphone to insist that their swimming not be disrupted. One person suggested that the Committee consider changing the High School block schedule to better accomodate the swimming schedule. Maybe they could send a big yellow bus out to pick her up also?
All of the safety arguments have been made. The only issue is whether or not the Committee is willing to make a decision one way or the other. Given the number of satellite news trucks parked around town today --- I am sure there are more than a few people curious about the outcome.
The decision? No decision -- tabled for future meeting. Does anybody think its strange that it takes less time to hire a new Superintendent than it does to determine if it is a good idea to allow naked strangers into the kids' locker room?
A few other "amusing" moments:
Lenihands tried to play "Gotcha!" with the Superintendent over the timing of the documentation for the school roof project. Unfortunately, Jess forgot that the project wasn't approved by the State until December and the local BOS & Fincom until later in the Winter.
Lenihands also tried to take a second shot when she began second-guessing the second draft of the Superintendent's proposed school calender for next year. Jess, in her infinite wisdom, thought that there were an insufficient number of snow days planned ... and that perhap school should start around August 31. Unfortunately, she apparently never read the SEA contract which prohibits the District from starting the School year before Labor Day.
The best exchange, however, happened at the end of the meeting (when most folks had clicked off, or fallen asleep!). Andrea Killion raised the issue of the work that hasn't been done -- including the 2009 Community School audit which has been waiting for the Committee's response since last August. Sherry turned to the Supt and (with a straight face) said "have you signed off on that yet?" followed by several comments about waiting for input from the Community School, or the Audit Firm, (or somebody ... anybody !). She did agree to put it on a future agenda. That was probably the same comment that was made last August when she received a draft from the auditors who requested a response from the Committee which would be incorporated into the Final Audit Report. To date, the Committee has still not responded so the report has not been issued.
If the audit report said the Community School had been run correctly -- you could be damn sure it would have been finalized and released last August!
On the Bright Side, there's probably only one more meeting until the election! (And then we will immediately re-start the countdown clock for the NEXT election!)
