As we stated three days ago, and if WE AT REGION ONE REPORT KNEW THIS, the A.B.C. and Region One Board should have know this…
Both boards (All Boards Chairmen and Region One) gave an ADDITIONAL retirement package to the superintendent, with a multi-million dollar renovation project for H.V.R.H.S on the horizon, and with massive state cuts on the horizon. Well, here are the cuts in ECS funding for each town in Region One(and Norfolk)…once again NO RESPECT has been shown to the taxpayers that fund education in Region One….it is time to once again, defeat this current Region One Budget proposal, cut administrative costs, cut our bloated administrative budget, and spend the money on actually EDUCATING our students, not enriching our administrators. Read below and weep taxpayers in the following towns….
Just released in State Of Connecticut proposed budget:
Comparison of 2016-17 ECS Grants (Governor’s state budget)
Town Change in ECS funding (loss of funds in thousands of dollars)
Canaan (Falls Village) -7,800
Cornwall -85,129
Kent -167,052
Norfolk – 381,255
North Canaan -80,600
Salisbury -148,652
Sharon -139,261
Is it possible that Superintendent Patricia Chamberlain would see the impending financial crisis for the towns in Regional School District No. One and voluntarily “give up” her package which is worth about $44,000 of taxpayers’ money? There is no question that she has been very well compensated with salary and benefits over the years, including contributions to a 403b retirement annuity which already covers her retirement, making the severance absolutely unnecessary. Further there was no language in her previous contract to provide for the severance or the health insurance in her retirement. That was a gift of taxpayers’ money that was given to her by the Regional School District No One Board of Education. She doesn’t meet the minimum requirement that a teacher has to meet to get a severance, which is 20 years in the district that pays him/her. She is four years short of that number. Further, teachers are not given an annuity by the board for which he/she works. Taxpayers will have contributed about $112,000 to the annuity by the time she retires in June of 2017. The other big ticket item that she has been provided is the complete cost of obtaining a doctoral degree with no monetary or other restrictions. The taxpayers have paid more than $43,000 for her to pursue this doctoral degree to date. She is, apparently, wrapping up her work, just in time for her retirement. She also has had generous benefits in terms of other insurances besides the health insurance for which we either pay in its entirety or partially. That doesn’t count generous amounts of vacation and other days off. Perhaps the superintendent will consider a “give-back”.
Patricia Allyn Mechare