Elections board to probe Region 1 official’s words (from the Republican-American this morning) Reply
Elections board to probe Region 1 official’s words
BY RUTH EPSTEIN
REPUBLICAN-AMERICAN
FALLS VILLAGE — Salisbury resident Marshall Miles learned Monday that the state Elections Enforcement Commission voted to authorize an investigation of a complaint he lodged in August about a comment made by Region 1 Superintendent Patricia Chamberlain.
Shortly before the fifth referendum, Chamberlain said at an Aug. 8 school board meeting that she would give up the last year of her three-year contract and donate the 2 percent raise that went with it if the next proposal were passed.
Miles, in making the complaint, pointed to Section 9-364 of the election laws, which deals with people trying to influence votes in elections and referendums by such means as force, threat or bribery. Such actions, if found to be true, are considered felonies.
“I’m not saying she’s guilty, but it made it through the threshold,” Miles said Monday. “Her comment that she would give up the third year ‘if the budget is passed’ became to me, an inducement. The state wants to take a look. I don’t know if she was wrong or not.”
(full story behind paywall)
From the frying pan, into the fire……remember our blog post of August 9 when our Superintendent “offered” to cut her contract by one year if the budget passed (it did not!) Well guess who is going to investigate? 3
Here is our original post……
We think this is the state statute that might have been violated at last nights BOE Meeting
AUGUST 9, 2013 BY REGIONONEREPORTER 
0 COMMENTS { EDIT }
…key words are influence, bribery, and willfully…
Sec. 9-364a. (Formerly Sec. 9-344). Acts prohibited in elections, primaries, referenda, caucuses and conventions. Penalties.
Any person who influences or attempts to influence by force or threat the vote, or by force, threat, bribery or corrupt means, the speech, of any person in a primary, caucus, referendum convention or election; or wilfully and fraudulently suppresses or destroys any vote or ballot properly given or cast or, in counting such votes or ballots, wilfully miscounts or misrepresents the number thereof; and any presiding or other officer of a primary, caucus or convention who wilfully announces the result of a ballot or vote of such primary, caucus or convention, untruly and wrongfully, shall be guilty of a class C felony.
This is the letter I received today from The State Elections Commission (please click on it to enlarge)….
Region One Report has learned that Lucille Paige’s (former) office was taken over today by a Central Office Secretary..could there be a settelment? 2
Region One Report has learned from two confirmed sources that Lucille Paige’s (former) office was taken over today by a Central Office Secretary..could their be a settlement that has been reached?
Stay tuned…….
ATTENTION Sharon Residents….and media. This meeting is TODAY at Sharon Center School at 9 AM, its open to the public… 1
(btw is was listed in the “local events calendar) on the Sharon website, not where is normally gets posted on the home page under latest meetings, it is posted so it is open to the public).
We vote until we get a budget, old board or new board….. Reply
Region One Report has learned that a vote will be taken every thirty days until a new budget is approved. After the election, when a new board is seated, the budget process would still b
e handled by the new board, and the votes will continue until a new budget is passed.
Assistant Superintendent is back effective today (September 24) 3
Region One Report has received unofficial reports that the Assistant Superintendent is back on the job effective today (September 24). Other than an appearance in Hartford in the legal action against the Superintendent back in the end of the first week of September, the Assistant Superintendent has not been at work. One would hazard a guess it was probably a medical leave, but medical information, quite frankly, is none of our business unless released by that individual.
We love our followers and bloggers, and we love their humor! Read this, sent in to us today, it is funny, but IT IS THE TRUTH Reply
After watching the video cast of the September ABC meeting on CATV 6, as a resident taxpayer I have some comments on my visceral reaction, and some questions. (No reply expected.)
A. Dear Lord, what is Chamberlain’s official (statutory, legal) position vis-a-vis the ABC? Ditto the Region One board? Ditto each town’s B of Ed? (And the Assn. Superintendent’s as well? Surely she has not a shred of official standing as part of the boards.) In the meetings, C. comports herself as if she is a full member — although she seems never to vote. She interjects opinions unasked, and it appears to this independent viewer as if she runs the boards, not vice versa. In a just world — and maybe by existing state/local statute — she and her No. 2 would be advisors, reporting to the boards’ members only as requested. They would not even be seated at the board table, let alone to the right and left of the Region One chairman. This viewer of the incendiary Ch. 6 video casts suspects that the Super/Assn. Super occupy their elevated positions in official meetings at the acquiescence of the ruling bloc on the board. The actual rules ought to be researched, not guessed at. And enforced. Surely all central office leaders are at bottom mere contracted employees of the board and report up to the board as such.
B. In re. the Sept. ABC meeting: even if C. is an official member of any sort on the various boards, has she never heard of the concept of recusal? In this meeting (and in prev. board meetings) she has openly discussed aspects of her, as well as her No. 2’s, contract — unasked! Should not the chairman of that and the other meetings otherwise have asked her to step out of the room, as is the practice in every other board meeting in corporate America? This viewer was left gasping for air, and he spilled his wine.
C. About a lawyer to report on aspects of the C. contract, and of her No. 2, as discussed in the same meeting: Both C. — unasked! — and I guess the current chairman of the board (his head was turned away from your camera) — piped up, after Brian Bartram’s buy-out bombshell, that there is no need of an “outside” lawyer to be brought in to research the statutes etc. and to report; best to use the board’s current lawyer. Well, this viewer has seen that lawyer in action on Ch. 6, esp. on the Soviet-era hearing on that poor student advisor. Peeuw. Marshall, when you get elected the first thing you might want to do is find the smartest way, way outside lawyer you can to do all the legal clarification and review, and also recommendations on clarifying or revising the so-called 7000 Series. (The confusion on the R1 board as to whether the ABC is merely consultative or is authoritative, an important question for the board and esp. for C. and No. 2, was deeply embarrassing to this viewer.)
D. Some animals use decoys or other ruses to throw predators off the track. The R1 administrators and all too many board members are using technology to do the trick. Wide area networks; iPads; computer upgrades; etc. The bright folks who originally created all that technology for us got educations that seemed to work, although they of course did not themselves have any of that technology for their own education. How could that be? It was said a century ago or so that the best education in America was Johns Hopkins at one end of a log and the young person at the other. A student stood up at one board meeting to say that at other schools the students used the iPads (and other PDAs) mostly to gossip with each other during classes. At another meeting, a student stated that some three-quarters of current HVRHS students had petitioned to keep four admired young teachers. All ignored — without comment — by the board. Computers are here, and educational software is a nice supplement, but not as the be-all of education. How do I, 77 years old, know this? Because I have a good, seasoned crap-detector.
Furthermore: in the non-board video casts of the administration’s staff meetings, I have been shocked by the self-serving immersion in edu-babble about state rules and the like, consultants’ b.s., roll-out if Common Core, and so on — all the very essence of a cardinal mistake in management: process over product. I could count on the fingers of one hand, thumb not included, the in-depth discussions of students that I saw. In short, a dearth of humanity. The poor students! (Meanwhile, I must have missed the discussion, as the camera rolled, of why some half of a major student group failed a class one semester last year. Holy tumbleweed! Not good PR, I guess.)
E. Can someone please ask C. to stop saying “I would suggest that…” or “I would recommend that…” instead of saying “I suggest” and “I recommend”? Uriah Heep is only a fictional character — and one that Dickens did not intend posterity to emulate.
F. Finally, the new R1 board might want to implement the only clear, actionable recommendation of the Pingpank report: move the central-office folks out of the high school building and into a separate structure in a separate location in the region. The expense will be well worth it; I think the voters will applaud. (I would recommend looking in South Kent.)
Let me tell you the story of the Region One budget and the egg( a TRUE story) 1
While getting my haircut today (Saturday) at Hilton Hunt in Millerton this conversation actually happened between Marshall Miles and a woman from Salisbury.
So, Marshall, did the budget pass last week?
I answered, no, it was defeated..it seems to have taken on a life of its own.
She then replied….
The Region One Board seems to be like a restaurant that just does not listen to its customers!
I would like a bagel and hash browns please but NO eggs. The order comes, and sure enough..a bagel, and a hard-boiled egg….
I said, NO eggs.
The order went back to the kitchen, and a few minutes later came back with, you guessed it, a bagel and scrambled eggs….
Again, I sent it back to the kitchen saying NO EGGS!
A few minutes later back comes the waitress with my order….A bagel and a cheese omelette!
Sound familiar? Just call the story The Region One Board and The Egg.
Someone sent this post in, and obviously, they are misinformed, maladjusted, or from another planet… 4
Here is the post that was sent in….
If the 7000 series was such a well written document why doesn’t it quote the state statutes directly, instead of vaguely paraphrasing the statutes? What it really seems like is Pat Mechare is more interested in creating one board to rule over all the towns, taking away the independent status of each town. What is in it for her? She knows that the Region One office works directly with each local board and spends and equal amount of time with each. I don’t understand her motivation but I think there is something underhanded going on with her politics.
Here is Region One Report’s reply (point by point)…..
1) If the 7000 series was such a well written document why doesn’t it quote the state statutes directly
Our reply..for brevity’s sake
2) What it really seems like is Pat Mechare is more interested in creating one board to rule over all the towns, taking away the independent status of each town.
Our reply..What an idiotic statement as each town has their OWN LOCAL Board Of Education to independently run their local schools. Nowhere in Pat’s statement is there any thing about abolishing the local boards. So obviously the person who wrote this post is in the dark..or has never voted in a local BOE election, or has never attended a LOCAL BOE meeting.
3) What is in it for her? She knows that the Region One office works directly with each local board and spends and equal amount of time with each. I don’t understand her motivation but I think there is something underhanded going on with her politics
Our reply..Whats in it for Pat and everyone else is correcting the false statements and stances from the administration, some A.B.C members, and some Region One Board members on the real status of the A.B.C. Committee. The A.B.C is called a committee for a good reason. As a committee, it does not have the authority to spend money, it must request money from the Region One Board. It does not have the authority to implement any program, hire, pay, without the approval of the Region One Board. The A.B.C. is strictly ADVISORY. Period.
Directly from the 2007 series:
The 7000 Series is a policy shared among the six elementary schools and the high school. The policy says on page 4, under the heading “Governing Body”: “The governing body of the Regional School Services Center [wrongly refered to as “central office”] is the Regional School District Number 1 Board of Education (the “Regional Board”), in accordance with Section 2 of Special Act 405 of the 1959 session of the Connecticut General Assembly. The Regional Board shall receive and may act on the recommendation of the All Board Chairs (ABC) Committee, an advisory committee to the Regional Board, in all matters affecting the Regional School Services Center.”
It does not get any simpler than that.