Oh, What A Tangled Web We Weave...
Interesting agenda item at the BOS meeting last night: "Action on selecting an Advisory Board member for NRSD Budget Subcommittee". As backup for this agenda item the following letter was included:
This letter is dated January 21, 2015. "Due to a change in District policy, this year the School Committee asks that each Town appoint one member from their Advisory Board to serve as a voting participant on the Budget Sub-Committee. While they encourage attendance by Selectmen and other Advisory Board members, only the single appointed member will sit with the Sub-Committee, and act in a voting capacity."
Some questions that arose during this agenda item: why aren't there any selectmen on this sub-committee from neither Templeton nor Phillipston? Selectman Haley Brooks pointed out that Advisory Board members are appointed; selectmen are elected to represent their townspeople. I, Julie Farrell, mentioned that I was the Templeton selectman appointed on the Budget Subcommittee, not that I think this is in any way directed at me personally. The crowds that line up to attend these budget sub-committee meetings are miles long. Something had be done to limit public participation in this process. All kidding aside, budget sub-committee meetings are usually deadly dull and boring BUT EXTREMELY VITAL!
To the boards' credit there are a few questions that need to be answered before anyone from the Templeton Advisory Board is appointed to this committee. When was this "District policy" changed? Where is the copy of the vote taken by the school committee to change this policy? Were "District policies" followed to change this policy i.e: it is believed that the NRSD policies include a policy on the procedures to change their policies. It is believed that a change to a District policy can be introduced at one meeting, but must be voted on at a later, subsequent meeting. Where is the record of these votes taken by the Narragansett Regional School Committee on this issue?
Reviewing the minutes from the January 12, 2015 Templeton BOS meeting, Supt. Miller was present to discuss the Elementary School Project. At the end of that meeting, I again asked for a copy of the end of the year report for the school district and the budget to actuals, so I could prepare for the NRSD budget sub-committee meetings. I also asked for the dates of the budget sub-committee meetings. I was told on January 12th that the dates were still "up in the air" with the new governor and all. I also got the impression that it would be a cold day in hell before I got the End of the Year Report. Not sure if the concept of a budget to actual got through. Nine days later, the Templeton BOS receive the letter above from Supt. Miller. It really makes you wonder what's in that End of the Year Report! I'm not a math major, but something doesn't add up! Maybe it's me!
My opinions...supported by FACTS ! ! !
Julie Farrell
I think you are right, things do not add up. So much for open and transparent dealings with this Superintendent. The number of blunders that have occurred, on her watch, just keep piling up, and will in the end cost all of us money.I do not understand how the people on the School Committee can sit back and let this keep happening ?? As a good number of people have said, DO YOUR JOB !!! Bev.
ReplyDeletewell it looks like to me that the advisory board member can not serve on this committee unless there is a bylaw change ??
ReplyDeleteArticle IV – Advisory Committee
Section 1. There shall be an Advisory Committee
consisting of seven legal voters of the town
who shall be appointed by the Moderator as hereinafter
provided. No elective or
appointive town officer or town employee shall be
eligible to serve on said
committee, except that a representative from the
advisory Committee shall be
entitled to serve as a member of the Capital Planning
Committee and the Insurance
Committee.
Amended 5-13-03 & 5-11-11
Normally that would be correct, except that the NRSD is a separate entity and not directly part of the town. That allows the Advisory Board to have a member on this committee.
DeleteI am also perplexed by this change in the make up of the NRSD budget sub-committee. The TAB did NOT receive this letter from the superintendents office.
The end-of-year school financial report seems to be right next to the records of the money spent on a school feasibility study and the powers that be don't seem to want anyone to see how your money was spent and what it was spent on. The district probably does not want to share the balance of the excess & deficiency account with you. Why is it so hard to get this information if that is not the case? CMR 10,05 states each school district shall retain the financial data recorded during each school year for seven years after the date of submission to the department (DESE) of the end-of-year financial report. MGL chapter 71 section 16A says in part the school committee shall solicit proposals and contract with an independent certified public accountant to perform an annual financial audit & make management recommendations & shall receive the audit report in public session. Has this been done for FY 14 already? What of FY13? Copies of said audit shall be provided within 10 days to the director of accounts & to the board of selectmen....MGL chapter 71 section 68 says in part that whenever a town shall undertake to provide a school house, the town shall appoint at least one member of school committee (only one is required) or its designee to the committee, board or agency charged with planning and construction of said school. So in my logical world, if the district is suppose to provide an audit to the selectmen and selectmen appoint members to school building committee and selectmen are charged with putting the school assessment on the town meeting warrant, it stands to reason that a selectmen should serve on the district budget sub committee. Personally, I would want to see the agenda, the minutes and vote records of that meeting that supposedly changed a policy. It is my opinion, the district does not want selectmen Farrell on the sub-committee because of her insistence of the presentation in public of the end-of-year financial report as well as her much publicized out spookiness towards the whole school budget process and particularly in Templeton. That is my observation and opinion. Oh, I am still waiting to see a written contract for wood chips at $26.00 - $28.00 per ton!
ReplyDelete