Welcome to the May 28th, 2025 School Committee meeting.

This meeting will be conducted remotely over Zoom.

Attendance by board and commission members will be remote. Remote attendance shall count towards the quorum.

The meeting will be broadcast live and recorded by Sharon TV.

If you elect to enable your webcam, your image and background may be broadcast with or without sound.

And a note on that, Sharon TV has discovered that if you keep your camera off, then it like the camera goes to a member of the committee.

So if you want you to be on the TV, you should keep your camera on.

Before we start, a couple housekeeping before we start.

So first, I'd like to welcome Georgianne.

As we say, farewell to Shauna.

Welcome, Georgianne Lewis.

And here we are this evening.

So we're going to get started.

Another note is that both Alan and I have recently had some surgery.

And so both of us may at different points be turning our cameras off. So it's really just to deal with with that.

So do not take it as a lack of interest or otherwise.

So tonight's agenda is not starting with community updates.

We are going to be starting with the reorganization of the school committee.

It's going to be a discussion and a possible vote.

So I hope everybody had a chance to review policy BDA, which is the school committee organizational meeting.

I'll just read a couple sentences for the public.

At its first regular meeting following the town's annual elections, the school committee will discuss the election of new officers, including a chair, a vice chair and a secretary.

If it is the consensus of the committee, a vote may also be taken at the meeting.

And then there's some other stuff.

And it said the election will proceed as follows.

Nominations for the office of chair will be made from the floor.

The chair will be elected by a majority roll call vote of the members present and voting.

And then upon election, the new chair will preside, calling for the election of vice chair and secretary in that order.

Any vacancy among the officers occurring between organizational meetings will be filled by a member elected by the school committee.

Following election of officers at its organizational meeting, the school committee may proceed into such regular or special business as scheduled on the agenda.

So we are going to start to see if I'll throw it out to everyone.

I would like to know what kind of interest the committee has in the offices.

So I see Avi's hand is up.

So I will.

Oh, you're already.

Go ahead.

Go ahead, Avi.

Thanks.

I'll start off by saying I don't think it'll surprise anybody that I'm interested in being chair. In addition to being interested in being chair, I wanted to throw out there that, you know, throughout this election season, I heard whether right or wrong from a lot of people who felt like this committee had a divide on it. For me, I will say I felt like Dan and I worked really well together this past year.

I hope Dan would say the same. And so I don't know that there's a divide on the committee quite as deep as maybe some folks feel. But in the interest of working collaboratively and trying to present a committee that's working well together, whether we agree or don't, it is my interest if I were chair to.

And I did offer offline this to Jeremy.

He declined at the time, but I'm hoping perhaps maybe he changed his mind. I would be interested in nominating Jeremy as vice chair.

And, you know, I'm open to secretary suggestions in that grouping.

If Jeremy still hasn't changed his mind, I also think Dan as vice chair would have a very similar effect for the public to feel like, you know, folks that are in the room setting agendas and whatnot are representing different viewpoints.

But I'd like to start there.

Okay.

Thank you, Avi. Hi, thanks.

So being the new person, I just I want to address kind of what my perception has been last election, last cycle when Dan got in and when I got in.

I think there has been a strong move in the community to push us to function as a well-rounded school committee, which the feedback I've gotten is that we all have opportunities to have leadership roles. I think there's a lot of people on the committee.

That's kind of a best practice.

And what a lot of other districts do, our select board does it. We rotate. I think it's very important for everybody to have a turn in these different roles in order to make us well-balanced.

I think, you know, each year we've seen an incumbent get voted out by a candidate.

Next year we have two others coming up.

And I want to make sure that I think it was you, Avi, but I'm not sure. So don't quote me on that. That said, you know, we want to have some continuity and some consistency on the board. And I think in order to attain that, we really need to be mindful of what kind of our community wants from us. And I think one of the areas that we can do better is kind of dividing the load and giving everyone some leadership opportunities.

I mean, Dan had 2,200 votes when he got in, and that's pretty significant.

I think the town is very confident in him. I've always been very confident in him watching the meetings. So I would put forth, you know, a motion to have him be chair.

And I would like to see Jeremy be vice chair.

I think that there would be a great combination.

And I think that would really go a long ways in helping us be more well-rounded and giving everybody opportunities and being more representative of kind of the public feedback.

Thank you.

Okay.

Dan, you're up next.

Thanks. Welcome, Georgianne.

There's a bad echo. Does somebody have to turn their mic off?

Okay.

Welcome, Georgianne.

We're glad to have you on the team.

And congratulations.

And to Avi as well, welcome back. And thank you both for your kind words.

And thank you to everyone who's filled a role on the committee last year.

These are volunteer positions on school committee.

And being in a role on the committee is double volunteerism.

So Julie was kind to chair our committee last year.

It was a lot of work. I appreciate Avi being vice chair and Shauna being secretary, too. Thank you. I'll be glad to work with anybody on the committee.

In any role, whoever's chair, whoever's vice chair. I think anybody on the committee could fill any role. We're all professionally accomplished people. So this, to me, is an opportunity to assign the work and distribute it. So I think we should let people do what interests them.

Everybody is happier that way.

And we should also make sure we're building everybody up on the team together.

So last year, there were seven leadership positions.

That was my first year on the committee.

There were three officer positions and four subcommittee chairs. So we'll be filling those again today.

If you include priorities, there were actually nine positions open last year. And all of those positions last year, just as a factual matter, went to the longest serving members of the committee, all of them.

So none of them went to the three newer members.

And the intent was totally positive.

I know that.

Everybody knows that. There was thinking at the time that we needed these experienced members in all those roles.

Now that I've been on the committee a while, I think that's actually backwards.

I think it's backwards because what I've seen is that the longer serving members don't really need that experience because they've already had it. They already have relationships with admin.

They don't really need integration the same way. So the newer members really benefit from those experiences the most.

And it really helps onboard them and get them up to speed quickly.

So I've seen a real cost from reserving those positions last year. I think it stunted our development as a team. And we've seen those divides in the committee flare up sometimes, unfortunately.

So I was really lucky last year because a vacancy opened eventually.

And I did get to chair the policy subcommittee.

And that was a wonderful experience for me.

I'm very appreciative to the committee for letting me do that.

I created agendas.

I ran the meetings. I got to work with our superintendent council.

And we got a ton of work done. So it worked out well for everybody.

So I just think when you give people opportunities, it can really pay off. Um, so, um, we have a large committee.

I just wanted to talk about the sheer number of members.

Seven's a large group. A more typical size of a school committee is five, like, like Canton's five and Stoughton's five. I think Weston's five too.

Uh, so we have all these people.

And, uh, the advantage, as I understand of having seven, why, why we increased to seven is because we can have different people coming through with different styles and different ideas. Uh, and we saw that when Avi was chair, uh, he contributed, uh, we've, we've kept some of those good practices.

Julie was chair last year.

Many thanks to them for doing that.

Uh, if I could be chair this year, um, I, I would be able to keep that rotation going.

And I wouldn't want to do it more than a year because I'd want after me, somebody else to come in and have that opportunity too. So, uh, I would like to be chair in the interest of that and, uh, see what I can contribute to the committee the same way, um, Julie and Avi successfully did.

Thank you.

Thanks, Dan. And I just, uh, off the top of my head, I, I respectfully disagree with what you just said about all the positions.

Um, I know that Jeremy was also on capital outlay committee.

Um, and, uh, Alan was on the rec advisory committee.

I mean, there were a lot of different positions and sometimes people who've been here a while, as I recall, took the positions because some people just weren't interested in them. Um, so I, I don't think you can say it's like people were hoarding positions when in fact it was like, does anyone, anyone, anyone want to do this? So I, I just want to respectfully disagree with you, um, on that and provide some context for the public. Adam. Thank you, Julian.

And welcome, Georgian.

Um, I, I just want to weigh in cause I really appreciated, um, kind of what Avi said in terms of the, the feeling.

And, and I think we, we did feel this a little bit during the election that there was a sense that, um, there was some kind of tribalism and different kind of parties within the school committee.

Um, and I, I really appreciate the sentiment of trying to form kind of a, a unity government, uh, in that sense. So, you know, I think to the extent that we look forward to, uh, kind of the, the next year as a clean slate and an opportunity to get to work together again and start fresh.

Um, I think there is a lot of value in trying to bring, uh, I'll say both sides of the table together so that we can move forward together, uh, as a single school committee, instead of kind of feeling like there are, uh, factions.

Um, thank you.

Okay.

Thanks, Adam.

Um, let's see, Alan, I don't know if you feel like talking.

Um, Jeremy, we haven't heard from you yet.

Okay, Alan.

Yeah, I'm not going to weigh in on the leadership positions that have already been discussed, but I will say I would be interested in this position of secretary when we get to that role.

Thanks.

Thanks, Alan.

Okay, Jeremy.

Yeah.

Um, I'm definitely interested in budget chair, um, and priorities.

Um, and I agree with Dan, um, that I think we should rotate.

Um, so Alan, is your hand up because you forgot to take it down or did you have something else?

Okay.

Thanks, Alan.

Okay.

Um, so I didn't actually hear a motion, but I think the first thing I did hear was Avi saying he was interested, so I will accept a motion to nominate Avi as chair.

I actually have my hand up to make a motion, Julie.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Um, I guess I was in the middle.

I know it's hard when there's all these people on, so, um, do I have the floor?

I'd like to make a motion to, um, nominate.

Was that, well, like, I'm not really sure because I was kind of in the middle of the motion, but, uh, well, I want it to be recognized.

Nobody has their hand up and I do, so I'm just following the order of the meeting.

That's okay.

Okay.

So I'd like to make a motion to recognize, um, to nominate Dan for chair, please.

Second. Okay.

And there's a second.

Thank you, Jeremy.

Okay. Well, you will take a roll call vote on this one.

Uh, Jeremy.

Yes.

Adam.

No.

Dan.

Yes.

George Ann. Yes.

Avi.

No.

Alan.

No.

And I'm a no.

The motion fails.

So I would like to return to my motion, which was what I interpreted as a semi motion, which was to nominate Avi as chair.

Is there a second?

I'll second.

Thanks, Alan.

Um, let's see.

Georgianne.

No.

Jeremy.

No.

Adam.

Yes.

Dan.

No.

Avi.

Yes.

Alan.

Yes. And I am a yes.

Congratulations, Avi.

According to our policy, I will now turn the gavel over to you.

And again, to the public, I'm going to turn off my camera for a little bit, but it's not because I'm not paying attention.

Thanks. Thanks, Julie.

Um, as I said before, I think my preference would be for Jeremy to accept the role of vice chair.

I'm not going to nominate Jeremy if he won't, if he doesn't, unless he's comfortable accepting that nomination.

So Jeremy, is that a nomination that you'd be comfortable accepting?

Absolutely not.

Okay. I think that it's, this is ridiculous that you're chair again, and I'll leave it at that.

Okay.

Then I'm going to nominate Dan for as vice chair and Alan as secretary.

Can I get a motion? I will move that.

I'll second.

Adam, were you raising your hand or can I take a roll call?

No, sorry. Hit the wrong button.

Dan.

Yes.

Adam.

Yes.

Julie.

Yes.

Alan.

Yes.

George Ann.

Yes.

Jeremy.

Yes. I'm a yes.

Motion carries seven. Oh, great.

All right. Discussing town appointments.

I think we should, well, let's start with budget or sorry, let's start with subcommittees.

I heard Jeremy mentioned budget subcommittee.

Is there anybody else interested in chairing budget subcommittee?

Dan, I see your hand up.

I would strongly support Jeremy chairing budget subcommittee.

Um, I thought he made some very positive contributions last year to the budget process, some of which we adopted.

And, um, I think the process was better for it. And, um, I'd, I'd love to see progress this year with our finance committee, um, potentially agreeing on a schedule of information sharing earlier in the process and working collaboratively with them. And, uh, I would have full confidence in Jeremy to do that if he accepted the position.

Uh, I'd also, if we're on subcommittees, um, I, I'd also, um, love to continue my role as policy chair.

I had a great time of it. You just heard me say that last year. Uh, we made a lot of great progress, but also in the spirit of my comments, I, I would be very open to somebody else chairing the policy subcommittee and supporting them as well. So, uh, I would, uh, support Jeremy assuming that chair's role.

Adam.

Uh, so I would also support Jeremy.

I think we made a lot of progress this year.

Um, I don't think we made as much progress as we wanted to.

Um, so look forward to continuing to, uh, improve on the kind of process and what we can do as a budget subcommittee.

So, and Jeremy was on the budget subcommittee last year for anyone who doesn't know. So I look forward to kind of continuing that momentum.

All right.

Do we have any volunteers to be on the budget subcommittee?

We need two more members.

I would like that, please.

Okay.

Adam.

Yeah, I'm happy to serve as well.

Okay.

Julie, I see your hand up. Oh, that's okay. Okay.

All right.

I would entertain a motion to name Jeremy K budget subcommittee chair, along with members Adam and Shane and George Ann Lewis.

So moved.

So moved, sir.

I'll second.

All right. Alan.

Yes.

Dan.

Yes.

Jeremy.

Yes.

George Ann.

Yes.

Julie.

Yes.

Adam.

Yes.

Naomi.

Yes. Motion carries seven. Oh, I see.

Jane, is that you with your hand up? It is. I'm sorry to do this.

Moving forward, when you guys do a motion in a second, can you slow it down? Because when everybody's going at once, I'm not sure that I'm catching who's making the motion and who's doing the second.

And I'm really thinking about the future when someone can't recognize voices.

Fair. Oh, okay.

Fair.

Thank you.

I heard Dan say that he would be interested in chairing policy. I think we all feels like agree that Dan did a great job there.

I think it's sort of a thankless job chairing policy.

Are there two other folks that would be willing to sit on that committee with him?

I'll do it. Sure.

You hear Julie? Alan, I see your hand.

Yeah, I'll do it. I'll do it as well. I think Dan did a great job. All right.

I would entertain a motion to nominate a policy subcommittee with chair Dan Newman and members Julie Rowe and Alan Metenko.

So moved.

Second.

All right.

We have motion moved by George Ann and seconded by Adam.

Dan.

Yes.

George Ann.

Yes.

Jeremy.

Yes.

Adam.

Yes.

Alan.

Yes.

Julie.

Yes.

And I mean, yes. Motion carries 7-0.

How do folks feel about a negotiation subcommittee?

We've had one in the past.

It presents, over the last few cycles, we've had a negotiations team that included the negotiation subcommittee chair and other members of administration, as well as other school committee members, in order to avoid having to notice all those meetings.

I think negotiations is something that we could have a subcommittee for, or we could simply name a team lead.

Julia, I see your hand up.

Oh, I was just going to, you can finish your sentence.

And then I'll speak. That was really the extent of my sentence.

I just know in the past, negotiation subcommittee members, obviously, no two members of the subcommittee can speak outside of an open meeting.

And so regarding, regarding the topic. And so there is that complication.

In the past, I've seen that kind of leave out members of the subcommittee.

So I'm open to hearing people's feelings.

So, Julia, go ahead. Oh, and thank you very much.

I'm interested in being the negotiations person, liaison, coordinator, whatever title.

I would say that anyone who is interested in being on the negotiations team, we have a contract negotiation coming up starting at the beginning of 2026.

And in past experience, it has taken a lot of time.

A lot of time.

We've had a couple days where we had full day meetings during the day. And I would request that anyone interested being on this be prepared to make that kind of a time commitment because it will be necessary.

All right.

Alan?

Well, I have.

Well, I'm not interested in serving as the lead of a negotiations subcommittee.

I do have a lot of experience participating in collective bargaining negotiations on the state level and would be interested in serving in any group that is formed from the school committee to participate in collective bargaining in the year ahead.

Sounds good.

Dan?

I was impressed hearing about all the experience that Georgianne has.

As an educator in her district and being part of negotiations from the other end, as I understand it.

And so I think Georgianne would be an excellent candidate if she would accept it to be on the team or chair of the team or whatever makes most sense.

But I think she would bring a lot of credibility to the position, just as I think Alan would.

Alan having much of that negotiation background as well. All right.

Georgianne?

Oh, you're muted.

All right.

Thanks, Dan.

I agree.

I think Alan, given his experience with what he does all day long, he would be a great fit. And I appreciate that, Dan, and I would absolutely love to be part of the actual negotiations team.

I think that would be something I could be very well suited and qualified for right from the get-go.

So I'd be willing to accept that. Thank you. All right.

So that's four.

Oh, sorry. Was that just Julie, Alan, and Georgianne?

I think that's right, Dan. You raised your hand through me. But, okay, I would accept a motion to nominate a negotiation subcommittee chaired by Julie Rowe with members Georgianne Lewis and Alan Metenko.

Wait, are we doing a- Yeah, I thought we were doing a committee.

Are we doing a subcommittee?

Yeah. Because I thought it sounded like we were not doing a subcommittee.

But we're doing a subcommittee.

So let me just stop real quick and ask politely for folks who are- Yes, sir. I'll call on you. I promise if you raise your hand.

I'm sorry.

Let me explain my thought here.

I suggested something that would have deviated from our norm. We're not creating a negotiations team at this moment.

We're creating our subcommittees and our town appointments.

I suggested the possibility of not naming a subcommittee.

It felt me, and clearly I misread it based on Julie and Georgianne's comments just now there.

It felt to me like I had three people volunteer to what I thought was be on the subcommittee.

I did clearly hear Georgianne say she'd like to be on the team, which I understand.

So if somebody can clarify.

Start, Georgianne, go ahead.

Sure, thanks. I would actually want to be part of the actual negotiations team, not necessarily the subcommittee.

I'm willing to do both, but I want to be part of the actual negotiations team.

All right, Dan?

Yeah, and I can clarify my comments.

I'm agnostic to the best format about negotiations occurring, so I'm not necessarily suggesting we have a subcommittee.

I know firsthand subcommittees are very restrictive.

I think the major value of having a subcommittee is if you want all that process and you want public comment regularly and you want a forum and agendas, but there's no requirement that we create a subcommittee.

You can have a team of three people without doing any of that. So I would recommend it for policy this year because it worked well last year, but I don't necessarily recommend it for negotiations.

All right. Adam? Yeah, so maybe someone can clarify for me. I think usually the negotiations subcommittees, when they meet, just go right into executive session, right? Like, there isn't much that is, like, there's no public comment or public element to that meeting.

And as such, I don't know if there's so much value to a formal subcommittee.

Julie?

Julie?

Hi, I have a suggestion, and that is instead of having a formal subcommittee with agendas and stuff, I'll be, like, the coordinator, and I'll work with, you know, the union to get in the council and everybody else to make sure we're, like, meeting and we can all meet.

And then we have expressed interest from Alan and from Georgianne.

So they will be, you know, offered the first opportunity, like, something like right of first refusal or something to be in that meeting and then open it up to everybody else.

Because does that something like that sound reasonable?

Sure.

Sure.

All right.

So no negotiation subcommittee then.

Is that what I'm hearing?

Okay.

Do we want a calendar subcommittee or do we want to handle that at the big table?

My preference, to be clear, would be to handle that at the big table. I think we've seen the subcommittee be more, be actually more restrictive for public involvement.

But do I hear any, does anybody disagree with that and want a calendar subcommittee?

No.

All right. To town appointments.

Adam.

I just wanted to ask. SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: I just wanted to ask. I just wanted to ask.

We got an email today that I thought was interesting kind of asking if we wanted to form a special education subcommittee to kind of specifically focus on that area. I kind of liked the idea, but wanted to kind of take people's temperature and see what they thought about it. And to be clear, like I said, I like the idea.

I think this should be a focus for this year. I think we've said that this will be a focus of this year and this will maybe be a nice way to work with the new director of student services administration to kind of track progress and understand plans in a kind of somewhat or in a more public way.

Yeah.

I see Peter.

Georgianne, I'm going to take Peter first and then I'm going to go to you.

Peter. Peter.

My suggestion would be to start by having one or two members as liaisons to the CPAC.

And then if that is not sufficient, because that's an existing organization that involves the director as well as special education parents.

And then if that is not sufficient, then consider a subcommittee.

Okay.

Georgianne.

You're muted.

Sorry.

I have too many buttons.

I agree with Peter. I think, although well intended by the community member that sent it, I'm concerned about how that reflects and the message it gives to the special ed community about what the intent is. And I would want any kind of decisions we make around subcommittees and special ed that we bring CPAC to the table and kind of look to their advice as the experts on it, how best we can support them versus kind of swooping in and trying to fix. That would be my thought.

Dan? Yeah.

SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: Dan. Dan.

Dan.

Dan.

Dan.

Dan.

Dan.

Dan.

Dan.

Dan.

It doesn't have well-defined goals and parameters.

So I think getting a better sense of whether a committee is necessary, maybe through working with CPAC and identifying really what would be the scope and really what would be the work of that committee would be really helpful this year.

Yeah, I want to share that CPAC and their leadership has asked a few times over the last few years if the committee would entertain having a CPAC member as a non-voting member at our table.

I think there'd be a lot of value to that, having understood the ask from CPAC, having gone through this special ed director or the student services director search committee process, sat with multiple candidates who spoke about this as a benefit at times.

So I think in addition to us naming liaisons, which I think we should have a conversation with CPAC about and then come back to the table.

I do think we could vote tonight to extend an invitation to CPAC to name a non-voting member to sit at our table.

I don't know how people would feel about that, but it is an ask that's been made.

And I think to Georgianne's point about prioritizing that viewpoint, it feels like it would have a benefit.

I don't know how people feel about that. I totally support the idea of offering a non-voting status to someone on the CPAC who would want to sit at our table, 100%. Thanks.

Dan? Yeah, thanks.

I, again, I'd want to hear more about what that means exactly in practical terms.

So I'm not necessarily opposed to the idea.

I do. I have heard many of these types of suggestions since I've joined.

Like, I know there's been requests to create a student member of school committee.

There's been a request to create a teacher member of school committee.

There's been a request to create a special education members. There's been all these requests, and I just want to understand a little bit, like, what that would mean. Would it slow down the meetings?

Would they get to talk on every topic?

And what would be the advantage over having somebody like a liaison?

I mentioned earlier, we have already a very big group. Like, lots of people have to speak already.

So I'm just very hesitant to jump into something like that without understanding the ramifications.

Not necessarily against it. Just want to understand it better.

Thank you. That's a very good point, Dan. Georgianne? Thanks.

Same as Dan, I want to know kind of some more, a better kind of overview of, like, what we expect that position to be, what are the benefits, what are we hoping to accomplish?

And I also, again, I think it's very important that we ask CPAC's kind of thought and whether or not they find value in it before we take any kind of vote.

Jeremy? I agree, Dan and Georgianne.

Like, I think we should try Leah's on first.

Okay, let's table that discussion.

And we can always take it up again.

I do just want to say, again, Georgianne, I'm responding to a request from CPAC. So I understand your point, but it was, it did initiate with CPAC.

Go ahead, Georgianne.

So I believe you.

They're not, if somebody from CPAC's on the meeting or someone could come speak to it, I think we'd probably all be on the same page. That's kind of all I'm saying.

Thank you.

Understood.

All right. I think that is all the subcommittees.

So to town appointments, we need to appoint somebody to rec advisory.

Any volunteers?

Julie, I see your hand.

I'm happy to do rec advisory.

All right.

I would entertain a motion to nominate Julie Rowe as the rec advisory liaison.

So moved.

Second.

Adam.

Yes.

George Ann.

Yes.

Alan.

Yes.

Jeremy.

Yes.

Ann.

Yes.

Julie.

Yes.

Thank you.

Miami. Yes. Motion carries 7-0. All right.

We need to appoint a capital.

Let's start with standing building. We got to appoint standing building liaison.

I don't know that there's anything going on, but do you need to appoint somebody to standing building?

SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: Julie?

Julie? Julie?

Can I just say something?

The high school project is basically finished.

So the kind of important thing is if there are new members to the standing building committee, because then that representative from the school committee is also the representative to the nominating committee for the standing building committee.

So this year, that means you would probably go maybe to one or two meetings, depending upon how many people they have nominated and they might need. But since the high school building project is over, I don't think attendance at the meeting is necessary anymore. All right.

With that information, is there anybody willing to serve in that capacity?

Julie?

I am happy to serve.

All right.

Is there anybody that is willing to be an alternate?

Nobody?

All right. I will be willing to be the alternate. I'm standing building.

When Julie is there, I don't think the alternate will be needed.

And I know that's a light lift.

I would entertain a motion to nominate Julie as the standing building liaison and me as the alternate.

I don't seconded.

I don't seconded.

All right.

Dan?

SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: Yes. SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: Jeremy? Yes.

SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: Alan? Yes.

Alan?

Yes.

Alan?

Yes.

Alan?

Yes.

Or Dan?

Yes.

Adam?

Yes.

Julie?

Yes.

SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: Miami? Yes.

Motion carries 7-0. All right.

Thanks.

Thanks, everyone.

We need to nominate two people in an alternate to capital outlay.

See Adam's hand?

SPEAKER_UNKNOWN: Yeah. I've served on capital outlay previously in this past year as an alternate.

So I'm happy to do that again in either capacity.

Okay.

Jeremy?

I'm happy to serve in capital outlay as well. Julie?

I'm happy to be the alternate.

Dan?

And Julie's been good about volunteering.

So I'd also be happy to be an alternate.

Oh, then I withdraw.

All right.

Either's fine. Either's fine. I want to express a sentiment that I am uncomfortable to bring up at first, but we do have a policy on within the school committee policies that states that there will not, that a school committee member will not undermine or work to undermine the vote of the committee after the vote has been taken. And I think this year there was a pretty public campaign. And I think this year there was a pretty public campaign by one member, Jeremy, to make it clear, you know, where he stood on our budget, both before priorities and then after priorities, including calling select board members and others to try to lobby them to go in the opposite direction of the school committee.

And I think this year, I think, for me, I think, for me, because of that, I wouldn't feel comfortable putting Jeremy in a spot where his seat represents this committee.

And again, to me, this committee only works if we hash things out at this table, we take a vote, and then once the vote is settled, we work towards the goal that the committee has voted by majority vote. I think if the minority vote and losing vote works publicly to undermine the stated goal of the committee, really, then it undermines the democracy of our elected positions and of this board.

So for me, capital outlay, priorities, those are places where I'm not comfortable putting somebody who would publicly work against the interests of the majority vote of our committee.

Julie?

I just wanted to second that and reiterate that when the school committee passes a vote, even if it's four to three, no matter how narrow it is, that is the school committee's policy.

And everyone on the school committee, that's it. That's what the school committee said, because you're not an individual, you're a member of a body.

So I think it was really inappropriate for Jeremy to try and do a presentation at the town meeting when the school committee had already established its position.

So if you were a private citizen, you know, whatever, but I think you need to think more about your role.

And I would also say that I don't think you should be on capital outlay, and I don't think you should be on priorities.

Jeremy?

We voted to present a budget.

We did not vote to recommend a budget. Your own words, Avi, we said we would present two, that there would be two budgets presented at town meeting, and that the town would decide.

We also didn't follow the law.

We voted two budgets, and we didn't have a public budget hearing.

So, A, I didn't stand in the way of us presenting our budget.

I did not vote to recommend that budget.

We did not vote to recommend that budget. In your own words, you said, we'll present ours, FinCon will present theirs, we'll let the town decide.

So I was in line.

If you want to twist words, if you want to twist the process like you guys did with clarifying what we had voted on when the meeting minutes clearly said that we had voted on two budgets, then sure, use all these procedures.

It's fine. But I'm not going to be involved if you guys are going to keep doing this.

Sure, Jen. So, being the new person at the table, I'm just going to say this is one of the reasons I ran, this kind of public discord and treatment of each other.

I think it's fine to hash things out, as you say, Avi. But it always feels when you're sitting on the outside and now that I'm sitting on the inside, it feels like an attack.

I think it was kind of inappropriate to even bring it up at this point and to then kind of have people ganging up. I mean, we have lots of policy around this type of behavior and treating each other this way. I find it disrespectful.

I find it very unprofessional.

And I just want to I want to note that.

And I'm hoping that we can just do better with these conversations and not keep going back and back and back and beating each other up.

It's just not a good look.

It doesn't it doesn't give the public trust in us to keep having these conversations and keep kind of attacking people who just may not agree with with the four that are one of the three now. So I think that we just need to be mindful about how we do these things and how we're going to resolve them. I think there's a better way to have this conversation than the way it's being had. And that's that's just my thought.

Thanks.

Dan.

Yeah, we do have a policy that speaks to people being a member of a team.

And I think the wording is something like you have to accept the decisions of the committee.

It doesn't say you have to agree with the decisions of the committee.

So I do think that's subject to interpretation.

I don't personally have any concerns about Jeremy representing us on any of these committees, including capital outlay.

We can have a conversation about what being a representative or a liaison means.

I think that's fair. But I don't have any problem with people having their own private opinions or even in their official capacity disagreeing with the decision of the committee, as long as they're not refusing to accept an outcome like actually challenging a vote or something.

So or disregarding their role.

So, yeah, I'd prefer if we could just try to stick to these jobs and getting the work done.

Julie.

So I have to politely disagree with both Georgian and Dan.

I hear what you're saying.

But I do think this is something that needs to be discussed.

And I think that what I'm hearing, I don't think this is what you're saying, but what I'm hearing from you is if we have a strong objection to a person being on a committee that could end up being potentially very important and could potentially have the situation of working against the majority of the group, we're just supposed to kind of just swallow it and be nice and let that person take over.

So I don't know.

I don't know what Jeremy could do to change my vote on this. Perhaps it would be to, you know, promise without any loopholes to uphold whatever the school committee decided, even if he's the one who dissents from it. Is he going to be able to do that effectively and argue for what the school committee wants? I don't think so.

But I could be wrong.

Alan.

Yeah, I just wanted to say without taking any position on this particular issue, I just want to remind folks listening that there are things that we can only discuss at this table, even if we would probably rather discuss them in private because of the open meeting law. And so, unfortunately, what sometimes happens is what should be or what ideally would be private communications and discussions between school committee members can't happen respectfully away from the table.

Unfortunately, they have to happen at the table just so that we don't violate open meeting law.

And I just wanted to put that out there for folks as a reminder.

Or Dan. Thanks.

Alan, thanks for clarifying that. I think that's that was kind of what I was getting at before.

So, Julie, I'm going to respectfully speak to what you said in that I'm not in any way saying we shouldn't discuss it. I think there was just a better way to address the concern without having it felt to me. It felt like a little bit like gaslighting and like an attack. And it has nothing to do with me. Like I said, I'm I'm just new here, but I did watch it all in play. I was at town meeting and now just sitting here. My my feeling hasn't changed now that I'm sitting on the inside. And I.

I really want to work to change these types of conversations to just be worded differently.

We can have the hard conversations without it feeling like a personal attack or I think it was a very big catastrophizing statement.

To say he could never be trusted.

I don't know that that's an appropriate way to put that.

And I absolutely have trusted, even though I've disagreed with some of you very wholeheartedly on many things over the years.

I would never sit here and say I wouldn't trust you across the board to do what you've been elected to do.

And those are the types of comments that I I find we could maybe do better with.

Adam.

Thanks, Javi. I feel like in the the town committees that you're referencing, specifically kind of capital outlay and priorities.

When you're at the table in those capacities, you are not necessarily representing the interests of a particular party, but rather trying to look into the out for the the interest of the town.

And so I think in that capacity, I don't think there is a requirement to.

And this is true, I believe, of school committee, of finance committee, of of select board to say we are here to only represent the interests of our particular board.

That being said, I think I understand where.

Avi is coming from and saying we do select the representatives from this table to serve in those capacities.

And, you know, we do want to send representatives that we think will represent the interests of the school board generally.