BOF Chair Clarifies 'Query,' Requests In Budget Memo To School Officials
Apparently prompted by a December 31 memo to various town officials from Board of Education Chairman Keith Alexander regarding his board’s planned budget season plans and proposed meeting schedule, Board of Finance Chairman James Gaston, Sr responded with a memo of his own.
That memo, also circulated to several board chairs, resulted in a strongly worded response from Legislative Council Chair Mary Ann Jacob requesting she not be sent “e-mails indicating discussing things that should be held in public.”
Referring to Mr Gaston’s memo, Councilman George Ferguson said he reviewed finance board minutes, and it appeared that there was no endorsement by or discussion of the questions expressed by the finance chairman on behalf of at least some members of his board.
“I didn’t see any notice that it did,” Mr Ferguson said. “I then inquired a colleague on the [finance] board, and he said it didn’t reflect an action or request from the entire board, but rather, I guess, the personal desire of the chair. It gives the impression that it is the board of finance making the request, when in fact it was a member or members, but not the whole board.”
Ms Jacob told the council during a January 6 meeting that, “when you put something in writing regarding board business, it becomes a matter of public record. So by receiving that letter, and you were copied my response to it, it becomes public record which is why I wanted it in our minutes. Regardless of the intent of the sender, once you start engaging in that kind of thing over e-mail it’s considered a public meeting, so it’s important you be more clear.”
Ms Jacob said anything put in writing reflecting board business should be a matter of public record, so it should either be done in public or brought up as a matter of communication during board meetings.
The text of Mr Gaston’s note is as follows:
Hi Keith,
The Board of Finance would like to invite you, the BoE, and Dr Erardi to present the school budget to the BoF on February 10, 2016, at the municipal center. Some BoF members have asked you to be prepared to defend the budget request not only on the actuals, but on the scenario should budget requests be depreciated, and should budget requests be increased particular to increasing academic achievements. Query, what would it take to get us back to the previous elementary levels of ten years ago, and of the previous Blue Ribbon High School level. Of note, Ridgefield recently ranked 111 of national high schools, Newtown was in the low 300s. What would be the specific loss of academics upon budgetary deductions. We welcome these discussions with all of you.
Please let me know whether this date is available.
Thank you,
Regards,
Jim Gaston
Chairperson, Board of Finance
Reviewing Content, Comments
Responding to a request from The Newtown Bee to discuss the letter further, Mr Gaston called January 8 and spent about 15 minutes reviewing the points and questions he said were articulated not only by himself, but on behalf of fellow finance board Democrats Kelley Johnson and Aaron Carlson.
Mr Gaston admitted that he did not identify them by name in the note, and further stated that it was not unusual and was a frequent occurrence under the finance board’s previous leadership to send such memos to other town officials through the chair when those questions were asked by other nonranking board members.
“There is nothing unusual about that,” he said. “John Kortze did the same thing,” he added referring to the former finance chairman.
Mr Gaston formerly served several terms as the vice chair of the Board of Finance before successfully seeking and winning a term on the Board of Selectmen. He is also the current elected Warden of the Borough of Newtown.
“Even when I was on the Board of Finance in the past, I always wanted to know what would be the potential consequences if…well, first of all I would want to know where the school was headed and what their goals are in respect to the funding,” Mr Gaston said.
Walking through the memo point by point, Mr Gaston first clarified that the date requested of the school board to present their budget did not work with other related officials, so the district would instead present their budget request to the finance board on February 8 instead of the 10th.
He said that he shared similar concerns expressed to him by his Democratic board colleagues Mr Carlson and Ms Johnson, regarding what would be lost if “we cut certain amounts of money” from the district proposal or what would be postponed.
“Likewise, if there are things you believe you need and are important, what are you leaving out,” Mr Gaston said.
Turning to the comments about the high school’s former Blue Ribbon status, Mr Gaston said if the school board is already examining ways to work toward reestablishing that status, would the allocation of funding to other priorities in the budget request jeopardize that effort.
“That’s important for the public to know, and for the Board of Finance members, too,” he said. “What’s the objective of this budget.”
‘Previous Elementary Levels’
On the subject of returning to the “previous elementary levels,” mentioned in the note, Mr Gaston said he was referring to test scores.
“This is only one aspect, of course, but if you look across three of the four elementary school rankings, you notice that the average scores across the grades,” Mr Gaston said. “If you look at where those three schools were ten years ago, Middle Gate was ranked 83 out of 555 schools, and in 2014-15, Middle Gate is ranked 121. Sandy Hook was 86, and now it’s ranked 144, which is a significant drop. Hawley was 102, now its 146. The only school that went up is Head ‘O Meadow.”
Mr Gaston said a conversation needs to occur, not just for the finance board’s sake, but for the public as well.
“If there’s going to be a tax increase or an increase in the Board of Education budget, the public may be more agreeable if they know what the objective is — and this is the means by which to get it,” he said. “If they want [a Blue Ribbon high school] it may be we can’t afford it. The public will have to weigh that.”
Regarding the comparison to Ridgefield, Mr Gaston said he wanted to know if there are budgetary implications that could have some affect on that.
“It’s great that Newtown made the top 500 [list of best high schools], but we’re competing against surrounding towns,” Mr Gaston said. “I’m interested, and I think the public and the board would be, in knowing if we’re going to reduce part of the budget that was requested — if that is going to affect the high school and that national ranking that we have that could cause us to fall out of the 500.”
Mr Gaston said according to the charter, the finance board is the only body permitted to increase a budget request. With that in mind, he said he was interested in analyzing the budget with certain issues in mind like improving elementary test scores, and possibly regaining a Blue Ribbon high school ranking.
“It’s more important to understand the goals and what is needed to obtain [them] — and then getting that information out to the boards making decisions and getting the facts out to the public,” Mr Gaston said, adding that certain taxpayers may not want to vote for a school budget that is going after a Blue Ribbon high school because they “think the high school is good where it is.”
“Being able to present an overall picture, I think, is important,” Mr Gaston concluded, “that way everybody is well served.”