As predicted, money and override solved nothing. The Superintendent is up to her old tricks. Now they have the money, they will use it for whatever without any oversight. Here is an overview by Liz DeSelm:
I need your help.
The School Committee is set to vote on an incomplete budget document. I need a concurrent push and vocal support from the public, to counter it.
At the last School Committee meeting, I asked for a complete Melrose Public Schools FY20 budget document, similar to what we have seen in previous years:
Watch as I ask the Chair of Finance and Facilities and the Superintendent for a complete budget document.
My reasoning was simple: Melrose just passed an override with a primary focus on school spending. The School Committee and the public usually has 2-3 months to review a near complete budget document, but the Finance and Facilities Chair and the Superintendent gave us an incomplete document, and only a week to review it before we are expected to vote on it.
Yes, the School Committee has discussed and debated Budget A (with the override) and Budget B (without the override) for months. Yes, we now know the broad spending categories of the FY20 budget.
However, we do not specifically know where the override funds will be spent. We do not which schools will receive what amount of new funds. We do not have a single cohesive document with a narrative, a written reference of the needs of the district or the vaguest of plans to address them.
Do not take my word for it. Here is the budget document we are asked to vote on. See for yourself.
Compare that to last year’s budget documents.
This is what I need- I need you to email the School Committee.
I need you to request that we do not vote to approve an incomplete budget document.
I need you to request the MPS administration produce a more complete budget document by April 30th and that we hold a special budget only meeting on the 30th to vote on it.
I need you to recognize when you email the School Committee that there are uncertainties, like teacher salaries due to perspective contract negotiations, whether to re-open the Beebe, or what curriculum and technology needs but that there are options to be considered, and that it is okay to acknowledge this uncertainty in the budget document.
I need you to email the whole of the School Committee asking these things, and then I need you to ask your friends to email the whole of the School Committee.
My voice alone here will not move the needle. Our collective voices will.
My ask, simply, is that you share in my call for a complete budget document- one reflective of past year's budgets with an eye towards future budgets. One that shows we are good stewards of the Override funds. A budget that recognizes we do not have all the solutions, but we are working for the greater good of our student populations.
Thank you for your support! I cannot do what I do without it!
Sincerely,
Liz
No surprise here😱
No surprise but I appreciate her reaching out. Where is she asking this?
This may give her new perspective on CKK. It's only been 3 weeks and already the money is set to disappear. We haven't even started paying it yet.
Nor am I the least bit surprised. The smirk on Taymore's face says it all. And McAndrew is McAndrew. What else would you expect from her? Between the two of them, I wanted to throw a brick through the screen.
We have a rogue school committee and an indifferent BOA - who only rubber stamp what the Mayor wants.
Don't you worry. Margaret won't be on school committee too much longer. Once Farrell retires from the now 134k per year business manager position, earning her "highest three year's average salary to max out her retirement computation, it will be Margaret's turn to slip into the position. After all, Margaret has been a good foot soldier for the mayor and the superintendent, covering up all the sordid scandals, denying access to critical public documents from committee members and the general public, not that this is a violation of the Commonwealth's public records laws.
So where is One Melrose? Aren't they the group that is supposed to care about the children? The MTA are supposed to be the anti education child haters but 3 weeks after the override, the One Melrose is MIA and it's up to the NO voters to stand up for a real school budget. No voters and a few others who actually care.
Do the One Melrose people know what they voted for? Or they don't care about accountability? Most of them were USED to enrich those who do not deserve further enrichment. They were led by some pied pipers.
Do you think it's a coincidence that McAndrew was appointed chair of Finance and Facilities? All you have to do is look at her to see what a sneaky manipulative untrustworthy witch she is.
I don't care a whole lot for DeSelm, either, but in this instance she's displaying some character, especially after the way CKK was treated. We need to have her back on this one.
When will the substitute Teachers get paid a living wage comparable to other districts and when will all the teacher absences stop being covered by warehousing the students of absent teachers in the Learning commons or sub room. Pay and hire adequate subs to cover.
April 30, 2019. There is currently $1.46million in reserves in the water & sewer enterprise funds.
Is the person posting and reposting old and or irrelevant garbage everywhere being intentionally clueless or just clueless? Anyone know what happened at the meeting last night?
Agreed. Shift/enter allows you to properly paragraph, and makes for a more digestible presentation. I didn't read it either, for exactly the same reason, and quoting it multiple times doesn't help a whole lot.
Apparently the message board is doing the job it's supposed to be doing. That's the freedom of speech
This superintendent needs to be fire or This superintendent needs to resignation .Super tries to get incomplete Budget 2020 approved.
Real question for the board. Are these bots or just very lightly trollish posters?
This happens all the time where basically non sequitur or copy/pasted comments are splashed across multiple threads at the same time using subpar English.
Is there anything that can be done to curtail this? It is starting to get a bit annoying. I imagine that others feel similar about these posts.
Proper usage of the English language would be an excellent baseline expectation. Unfortunately it is not realistic, especially in social media posting. Many melrosemessages posters do not have basic understanding of good online etiquette, and a few are actual trolls who just seek to disrupt the conversations. This is a mostly unmonitored board where only those posting that cross lines of legality, decency, space, obvious spamming will be removed.
Note to posters: Please try to limit your re-posting, especially of long posts. Otherwise we may be forced to remove this feature.
Forget the "details", just vote the bottom line, we'll decide where to spend it, including our new $5 million present, as the year goes on and people aren't watching. What a system!