Webutuck BOE gets hammered with criticism

AMENIA – One week before the town votes on the school budget, the Board of Education was heavily criticized by residents Monday night for playing "shell games" with voters.

The criticism came at a two-hour business meeting which began with a hearing on the proposed 2007-2008 school budget.

The meeting began with resident Steven Packard criticizing the board for taking very little time to consider and pass school policies.

"The board is in bigger trouble than just with the school budget," Packard said. "Just think before you approve policies. I hope I don’t have to come back, but I may come back and visit to speak my mind, so just take that into consideration."

After Packard stormed out of the room, resident Peter Judge questioned the board about the town’s contingency budget.

In literature handed out by the district, contingent budget numbers are listed as being $19,246,492, an increase of $1,147,189 from the previous year.

However, board president Bernadette Coniglio said the board had not yet voted on a contingency budget, an answer that was not satisfactory to Judge,who kept questioning the board about the budget.

"If the voters haven’t voted on it yet and you don’t know how meaningful these numbers are, then why is it listed?" Judge asked. "If the public is looking at total numbers, then it doesn’t mean anything? Why is the contingent budget number higher thasn the adopted budget number?"

Business Administrator Kevin Geoghan said that the debt service budget line item was staying the same.

"The current budget line item calls for debt service to be $1.2 million, and the actual debt service for next year is $1.5 million," Geoghan said. "Three-hundred-thousand dollars is coming out of the debt services fund, and the district is bound to fund $1.5 million of debt services."

Judge accused the board of playing a shell game with voters over both the contingency budget and the general budget.

"It seems like a scam to get the voters to pass the regular budget because the contingency budget is higher," he said. "I have never seen a district in this county where the contingency budget is higher than the regular budget. Do you even know how much it costs to run Millerton Elementary School?"

When questioned, all of the members of the board looked confused. Superintendent Richard Johns eventually admitted to Judge that the board did not know how much money it took to run the school.

After Judge was cut off by Coniglio, resident David Shufelt criticized the board for similar reasons.

"It’s sort of nonsense to go to vote for a budget when we don’t know what’s going on," Shufelt said.

The vote on the school budget will be held on Tuesday, June 19, from noon to 9 p.m. at Webutuck High School.

In other business: The board tabled a revised alcohol, drug and tobacco policy.

Board members debated for some time whether the new policy was too weak or too strong, and whether the school district should be required to pay for any drug or alcohol counseling for students.

The board passed 13 revised policies, including policies on dangerous weapons in schools, internal board policy on self evaluation, legal duties of officers, and family medical leave act.

Board member John Perroti said that the board should table passing any policies until the new school board takes over in a month.

Coniglio said that she saw no problems with the board passing new policies.

"These are all third readings, and it’s not like we haven’t worked on it before," she said.

The board debated whether to hire Jay Girvin from the law firm of Girvin and Ferlazzo as the district’s negotiator for the Webutuck Teachers Association contract.

Johns, who previously acted as negotiator for the district, said that the negotiations were at an impasse, and that it was necessary for Girvin to be hired so contract negotiations could continue.

Board member John Perotti disagreed, and said a lawyer getting involved in the negotiations would be counterproductive.

"I would like to sit down with teachers and discuss the issues and keep lawyers out of it," Perotti said. "An impasse is never a good thing, and a collaborative style would be best."

Johns proposed that the board talk about the situation in an executive session due to collective bargaining and contract issues, which was approved unanimously by the board.

After the meeting, he said that the board approved hiring Girvin.

The board accepted the resignations of first grade teacher Gail Gamble and health teacher John Merwin, both effective at the end of this month.

The next Board of Education meeting is scheduled for Monday, June 25, at 7:30 p.m. at the Webutuck High School library.