Dear Region One Board of Education members,

You were told that Steve Hurley was absent for 25 days. The central office asked him to sign off on the truth two weeks ago — the truth being that he was actually absent for 12 days (which is below average for the staff and teachers). Your process and attorney prevented him from being allowed to respond so the lie that he was absent for 25 days was conveniently allowed to stand — convenient for the administrators who wanted “to get rid of him,” as former Assistant Principal Maryanne Buchanan testified under oath. But the system also counts on you to have intelligence and awareness that you are being lied to. Think about Patricia Chamberlain and ask yourself why you keep letting her deceive you — and by extension the public whose taxes pay her salary and support the school. I am tired of trying to make you aware. But I am far from worn out — only just fascinated by your stupidity or your complicity in the deception, or both.

Next, Steve Hurley resigned from his previous employment. He did not leave with his ass on fire the way Diane did from Orange, CT. Steve resigned in the same way that Matt Harnett resigned in his previous district but the fact that Harnett was not going to be renewed didn’t stop him from being hired in Region One. That makes the decision to non-renew Steve Hurley arbitrary and capricious. By the way, I hear that Matt will be arrested for perjury — is that true? That must be because he’s taking the fall for the job evaluation of Steven Hurley that Diane was supposed to do in 2011 and failed to do, as was mentioned in my last email.

Anyway, back to Steve Hurley. Brochu and Chamberlain had absolutely no justification for not renewing Steve’s contract so they went digging into his previous employment just a few days before the hearing with a Freedom of Information Act request for documents from his personnel file. So if they were looking for reasons to get rid of Steve then, what was the basis for the non-renewal back in March or April? Scooter and Marilyn spoke after the hearing about the two issues I just mentioned — the bogus 25 days absence and the bogus previous non renewal — and both of those are false. So, Patricia acted capriciously and arbitrarily in recommending non renewal of Steve’s contract. Someone please define capricious and arbitrary for Jonathan and Laura – (they are the ones who are leashed to Patricia).

You people owe Steve Hurley his job back. We are not the kind of people who do what you are doing and allowing Patricia and Diane to do.  Someone congratulate Diane for me –  for her promotion to Principal of the HVRHS.  We are told she is the curriculum engineer and over the last couple of weeks she managed the screwing over of the gym staff. Isn’t that Matt’s job? Was it curriculum related? The CEA Union seems to spend a lot of its time managing Central Office abuse. Didn’t Diane assure us that she was not managing the High School? What could we save if we contracted out her job? What would we save if we had a Superintendent that didn’t need a lawyer (multiple lawyers) to cover over her actions so much of the time?
When will we speak about Scott Fellows? Are you asking yourselves why Patricia is protecting him so aggressively at the cost of your reputations? By “your” I mean each of you — Laura, Phil, Gale, Jonathan, Scooter, Marilyn.  We elected each of you to protect people like me, our tax money, our teachers and staff from letting happen all of the events that you are letting Patricia and Diane get away with.

Because of your ignorance and refusal to deal with these issues, I am calling upon each town’s Board of Finance to add to their responsibilities the job of auditing how the Central Office spends each dollar you — the Region One Board of Education — ask taxpayers to appropriate to Region One education.

Lawrence Van Valkenburgh – West Cornwall

Here is the transcript provided to The Region One Report on a special board meeting on August 8 . It appears that the superintendent and a couple of board members had a plan to “send a message” to Lucille Page, but it had a MUCH different outcome than the “Axis Of Three”  had planned!

Transcript of Region 1 Board of Ed Special meeting August 8, 2012

RE: Lucille Paige’s contract extension

(The superintendent had intended this part of the meeting to be held in executive session, but when she conceded under questioning that she had not directly told Lucille that she, Lucille, had the option of having the meeting in public, the superintendent suggested that the meeting be held in public instead of executive session. **No members of the public were present).

Transcript:
Superintendent Chamberlain: As I indicated earlier, we did complete the evaluation. I reviewed that document with Lucille today. As per our previous conversation, once we were complete with that process Lucille and I are continuing to work on our improvement plan and our goals. We have a plan in place for next year that’s going to be a continuation of what we actually started this year to be finalized we hope at the end of next year. I am recommending a contract extension for Lucille with the following changes.
Marilyn(Yerks): Is this last year’s (contract)?
Chamberlain: This is her…(current?)…contract so you can understand the changes. If you go to page two there is a change in the insurance benefits. We are keeping this consistent with the non-certified contract and I believe the non certified contract is increasing at a 1 percent rate so the 7.5 percent to 1 percent up would be 8.5 percent. And the contribution that the board is making to the HAS in the non certified contract is decreasing – its going from 75 percent to 70 percent next year. Umm, the installments will be paid as they’re being paid to all employees. There’s no change in the travel expense. There’s no change in the pension. There’s no change in the evaluation. I’m going to recommend that we extend this contract for one year so there’s no change on the termination of the agreement clause, there’s no change on the general provisions. For salary, because there’s a change in health insurance, etcetera, etcetera, I would ask the board to consider a one-and-a-half percent increase on salary.
Courey Toensing: What did the non certs get?
Chamberlain: They received 1.9 percent
Courey Toensing: Why are you not recommending 1.9?
Chamberlain: I felt to recommend the full extent, the 1.9, would, would not honor the work that we’re working on with this improvement plan that’s in place that I’d like to see more improvement for the full amount to be achieved.
Courey Toensing: Hmm
Chamberlain: The one-and-a-half/ if we don’t do some increase at this point I think that the insurance changes would actually be a set back. So I think it’s important to acknowledge that we’re achieving some savings on the health insurance side.
(Phil(Hart) or Jonathan(Moore)); Good.
Phil: We can get into discussion now or we can continue discussion as part of a motion. I would accept a motion to extend Lucille’s contract for one year.
Courey Toensing: I’ll make a motion to extend her contract for one year with a 1.9 percent increase.
Marilyn: I second,
Phil: Now, are there any further discussions? Heaing none, I’ll call the motion, All in favor?
(Courey Toensing, Marilyn and Phil raise their hands for “aye.”)
Phil: Opposed?
(Freund and Moore raise their hands for “nay.”)
Phil: Any abstentions?
Chamberlain: I think it might have passed. Let’s see that again.
Phil: Okay. All in favor? We got Canaan, Cornwall and Sharon.
Scooter: I’m going to vote yay.
Phil: Okay. And Salisbury.
Chamberlain: It passes. So… 1.9 …Thank you.
Phil: Now, there being no other business I think I’ll ask for a motion to adjourn.

Next we will post a meeting from February, that shows the disharmony that the board was, in comparison to the “harmony” we see at the retreat.

This summer Region One lost 50% of its elementary principals….

A trend? A weird situation of unusual circumstances? Should we be concerned?

ATTEND your local and Region One board meetings, ask for answers.