On Wednesday January 11, 2012, at 3:30PM there was a Special meeting of the Newburgh School District Board of Education.
Eight of nine BOE members attended: Fucheck, McAfee, Levinstein, Lewis, Prokosch, Resch, Vesely, and Woodhull. Superintendent of Schools Pizzo and Clerk of the Board Botsford were also present. Board member Giudice was absent.
The BOE adopted revised policy 5200 Comprehensive Student Attendance and 6653 Audit Committee on two readings. The attendance policy change allows building principals to recognize "valid exceptional circumstances" that qualify as an excused absence. The BOE also awarded a contract for plumbing in connection with the GAMS Science rooms' alterations.
The meeting was over in about three minutes. Here's the video:
Following this meeting the BOE had another meeting, a "retreat" with two NYSSBA consultants, which was not open to the public. The Board chose not to provide any information to the public about this event or its purpose.
The people from NYSSBA were Barry Entwistle, Director of Leadership Development (who wrote an article about the usefulness of retreats in 2008) and Jay Worona, NYSSBA General Counsel.
Budgets??
I do not know if you know when the district is going to start its struggle with next years budget meetings. Looking into other districts many of them have already started looking into thier budget for the 12-13 year. In the last few years they have started around this time, but I have yet to see any mention on the districts website for these meetings.
Have you (or others) heard when the district plans to start looking into this?
Contracts - Benefits vs student programs and the Tax Cap
Along with the budget planning details the BOE should be addressing the current rising costs of the one year teacher contract that expires June, 2012?
Two very important budget increasing factors need to be addressed; increasing health insurance costs and pension costs.
Pensions - Estimates for the 2012-13 year are that taxpayer pension contributions will be close to 12-13% of a teacher's salary. For a teacher earning $70,000 that is about another $9000 paid by the taxpayer. Some newly hired teachers may have to contribute a small portion of that amount due to changes in the pension laws.
Health Insurance - district teachers currently contribute about 9% toward their health insurance premiums; retirees contribute 0%. Current premiums have risen from 5-9% this past year.
If the district is to maintain the 2% tax cap mandated by law cuts are going to have to be made somewhere - student programs, salaries, benefits and or jobs.
Budgets
Thanks for asking. I haven't seen any schedule yet, but there was a finance committee meeting last week--will post notes soon.
Fyi, for the 2010-11 budget there were ten meetings and they began January 21, 2010. And for the 2011-12 budget there were five meetings starting on February 17, 2011.
Giudice was absent
Memo to Mr Giudice
Please resign. Be honorable and step aside. Your poor record of attendance is not doing the students and district any good. This is not what boardsmanship is all about.
Memo to Board President
Say something, do something, be a leader not an enabler!
Policy? Who listens to Policy in Newburgh?
Quoted from the NECSD policy manual,
"A vacancy may also be declared by the Board when a member has failed to attend three successive regular monthly meetings without sufficient excuse."
What about Mr Giudice's attendance? There are no minutes posted yet for Nov (why not?) and Dec of 2011, but Mr Giudice was absent at the regular meetings in Aug, Sept and Oct of 2011. That adds up to" three successive regular monthly meetings?" In addition he was also absent for the Nov 14, 15 and 22 special meetings? So why hasn't the BOE president, Ms Fucheck, taken the responsible action of removing Mr Giudice from the board?
This is not just a one time problem. Mr Giudice has had a chronic problem with attendance at regular board meetings. He was also absent from the reg meetings of (June 2010 minutes missing) July, Nov, Dec, 2010, Jan, Feb and April of 2011. Once again, Nov, Dec, 2010, Jan and Feb of 2011 adds up to and exceeds the board's policy of abcences for board members. What about it, Ms Fucheck what is the "sufficient excuse?" each time!
Why the fuss? It's called accountability. Mr Giudice choose to run and was elected to dedicate himself and the time to be responsible overseeing and actively participating in the education of our children with taxpayer monies. To do so, attendance at board meetings matter as noted by the board's own policy.
This district recently was found guilty of failure to enforce its own policies and regulations regarding student school and classroom attendance. In part, some of those students involved failed to graduate. It now appears that the board is also guilty of failure to enforce, once again, it's own policy of attendance regarding its own members. What makes this failure to enforce this policy any different?
Good Question. Is anyone listening?
Hopefully the representatives from the NYSSBA who met with the BOE spoke directly to the importance of boards to write, review and enforce school board policy as well as what defines ethical boardsmanship and leadership of every board member.