Participants
Everyone in the record. Names follow the dialogue CSV; where the CSV says Unidentified, this page says unidentified. ASR renderings are shown in code. No minutes were available to check spellings.
| Name | Role | Participation |
|---|
| Frank Sprague | Chair; budget subcommittee | Ran the meeting; introduced the budget; explained the history of the middle-school cuts; backed restructuring ("I think this is a really good path"); set the retreat date. Answered roll as Greg Sprague. Abstained on the January 8 minutes, having been absent. |
| Rebecca Zullo | Vice Chair | Asked the administration to explain debt service, transfers and special education so "we know exactly what we're saying"; asked about teachers' job security and transportation under restructuring. |
| Jason Benware | Board member; budget subcommittee | Moved the minutes and the donation; spoke on special education costs and the one-time money. |
| Heather Whitney | Board member; capital improvement committee | Asked whether the one-time state money was restricted to capital projects, about bus leasing, and about class sizes. |
| Carolyn Towle | Board member | Raised the deliberative-session reading assignments and lobbying on school lunch debt. Answered roll as Carolyn. Joel. |
| Rob Lovett Jr.; Michael Petrin | Board members | Answered the roll (Michael Peachy); Petrin is named by the chair as a budget-subcommittee member (Mike patron). Neither is identified speaking; an unidentified board member who posted the governor's remarks to the board's Facebook page (0:32:18) may be one of them. |
| Mary Woodman | Clerk and recording secretary | Called the roll; took corrections to the January 8 minutes. |
| Michael Tempesta | Superintendent, SAU 6 | Presented the budget goals and the elementary restructuring proposal. |
| Richard Seaman | Business administrator, SAU 6 | Presented expenditures, revenues, tax rate, warrant articles and default budget; asked to widen the lunch-debt item into a food-service contract discussion in March. |
| Unidentified administrator | SAU 6; special education costs and Medicaid | Spoke at 0:23:23 and on the Medicaid item at 1:24:22; never named (possibly Donna Magoon, who is addressed later; not established). |
| Tyler Sullivan | Student representative (surname from the January 21 recording) | Gave the student report: ACT results, graduation distinctions, school events. |
| Mimi Ryan | Citizens' comments, Ward 1; school counselor at the high school | Spoke against ending the outside food-service program over lunch debt. |
| Unidentified questioner | Called on as the press by the chair | Began a question (1:16:46); said "I'm a teacher now" with two students at the high school. The words are split across several labels in the dialogue file. |
| Patricia Barry; Donna | Stevens High School principal (mentioned as present); SAU staff (asked to reserve the room) | Named on the recording; not heard speaking. |
Order of business (reconstructed)
No agenda for this meeting is posted in any district share, so this list is reconstructed from the chair's transitions on the recording. The board had a written agenda ("We have an agenda in front of us tonight"). Hover over (or Tab to) a clipped entry for the full text.
| Taken up | Item | Disposition |
|---|
| 0:00:16 | Call to order; Pledge; roll call | Roll at 0:01:03. |
| 0:01:14 | Approval of the agenda | Approved on a voice vote; no amendments. |
| 0:01:32 | Minutes of January 8, 2020 | First motion withdrawn for corrections; approved "with the corrections" (0:02:14); the chair abstained. |
| 0:02:35 | Minutes of the December 12, 2019 special district meeting | Approved on a voice vote. |
| 0:02:58 | Student representative report | Informational. |
| 0:05:38 | Citizens' comments | One speaker (school lunch). |
| 0:09:00 | Acceptance of a $2,500 donation to the Sugar River Valley Regional Technical Center | Benware motion, Sprague second; approved on a voice vote (0:10:34). |
| 0:10:48 | Fiscal 2021 budget presentation | Expenditures, revenues, tax rate, warrant articles, default budget. Informational. |
| 0:54:19 | Elementary restructuring presentation | Presented and questioned; no vote. |
| 1:23:41 | Future agenda items and meetings | Medicaid item moved to March; retreat set for Sunday, February 23 at 10 a.m. (1:28:31); warrant-article reading assignments for the deliberative session (1:30:26); lunch-debt item moved to March (1:32:55). |
| 1:35:53 | Adjournment | Moved and carried on a voice vote. |
Discussion timeline
Chronological, from the dialogue CSV. Each time is the start of the cited row, from the CSV's own second count. Hover over (or Tab to) a clipped cell for the full entry.
| Time | Topic | What was said | Flags |
|---|
| 0:01:51 | Minutes corrected off the record | Zullo: "there were some, a few minor errors in there, Mary." "But I'll just email them to you if that's okay." Benware: "I move that we accept the minutes from January 8th with the corrections." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:03:18 | Student report | "Stevens High School students outperformed the average for the state on the Act in 2019." "51% of last year's senior class graduated with a 27 diploma with distinction". | |
| 0:05:47 | School lunch | Ryan: "I googled national school lunch debt and I got about 23 million results." Replacing the contracted program with "a ham sandwich and a carton of milk is a giant step backward". "the district should continue to work on fixing this issues with the Abbey Group." | |
| 0:09:00 | Donation | "an acceptance of donations of $2,500" to the technical center; "I don't think there are conditions." Benware: "Of $2,500 from Doctor and Lucas Charitable Foundation. Care of the Ackerman family". | OBSERVATION |
| 0:12:55 | Budget goals | Tempesta: "we would focus on having a no taxpayer increase budget." Historical gaps: "the middle school core classes of only having half a year of science in social studies." | |
| 0:15:07 | Expenditures | "for our local budget, we're recommending a $34.7 million budget." "I haven't found a reason to transfer that $65,000 over. So we did not include it in this year's budget." At 0:21:26: "I couldn't find any work papers, anything related to that." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:21:37 | Special education | Zullo: "they're going to see 519,000, which is an increase." "I just know it's going to be a hot topic. So I want to make sure we know exactly what we're saying." Seaman (0:24:52): the special-meeting money has "gone into an expendable trust" whose use is "at the direction of the board". | |
| 0:27:32 | One-time state money | "one time money, one of them known as free and Reduced Additional Aid, where Claremont will be receiving $322,904", and "Fiscal Capacity Disparity Aid, where we'll be receiving $2,583,000 one time money." | |
| 0:32:18 | Board Facebook page | An unidentified board member: "I posted on our Facebook page the when the governor came to speak on these funds". | |
| 0:35:04 | Tax rate | "our local tax rate will be the 2049 plus. The state tax rate gives us a 20 to $42 for our tax rate." "we're down by $2.07." | |
| 0:36:40 | Is the money restricted? | Whitney: the state designed those funds "specifically for capital improvement projects". Seaman: "those dollars are considered unrestricted. They can be used for whatever purpose the school district wants to use them." | |
| 0:41:21 | Warrant articles | Maintenance and transportation contract $19,131; a bus reserve because "We have one that's up to 20 years old"; the aim "is to take and put aside $500,000 of these monies into a bus maintenance reserve." | |
| 0:46:11 | Default budget | "The 38 million is down to 35.5 million." Removes the capital work, the teachers' "$421,000", and "approximately 33 paraprofessional positions that had been vacant in the budget", about "$759,000". Result: "the default budget results in $5.68 reduction year over year." | POSITIVE |
| 0:52:57 | Why the middle school lost teachers | Sprague: "When doctor McGowan started, he was faced that year with a with a $900,000 deficit, I believe." "I don't want anybody to think that that's a criticism of Doctor Goodwin." [McGoodwin] | |
| 0:54:19 | Restructuring proposal | Grade bands by building, universal pre-K and specialists: "This would be grades two and three. And bluff would be grades four and five." "this is something we have to do pedagogically. This is something we have to do for students right now." A feedback form: "We put out a anonymous, feedback Google form". | OBSERVATION |
| 1:09:24 | Teachers' jobs | "you free up 6 or 7 teachers." "We're not talking we're not looking to downsize those teachers." | |
| 1:23:41 | Retreat | "One of the things that we have to do as a group by policy is we have to have a retreat." Dates offered (1:28:31); Sunday the 23rd at 10 a.m. chosen; "Donna, can you reserve the community" room. | OBSERVATION |
| 1:27:17 | Invitation to the hearing | Zullo: the 21st "is where the public can come and ask their questions and get answers and share their thoughts and ideas and concerns in regard to the the budget." | POSITIVE |
| 1:27:38 | One spokesperson | The chair asks for volunteers "to sort of manage what's up Claremont, and sort of be the spokesperson or persons for the board around what may have been said tonight, just to make sure that there's one message going." | |
| 1:30:26 | Deliberative-session assignments | "I think article one is read by Tracy isn't it." Zullo takes Article 4 (1:31:15); Sprague Article 5; Whitney Article 3; Lovett Article 7 (1:32:02). | |
| 1:33:09 | Food-service contract | Seaman: "I'd like to make it a more expansive, expansive discussion of food program the contract." Towle: "it's time that we start putting pressure on the representatives and senators of our state". | |
Items flagged for review
Flags are a reviewer's aid generated by comparing the meeting against the state law in force on January 15, 2020. They are not findings of violation and nothing here is legal advice. Each flag cites the rule it rests on; where no verified rule applies, the flag says so and is recorded as an observation. Six flags follow, ordered by severity. No HIGH or MEDIUM flag was found.
OBSERVATION No minutes are online, and the prior meeting's minutes were approved with corrections that were never stated aloud
RSA 91-A:2, II (2019 codification, in force on this date) requires minutes recording the members, subject matter, final decisions and the mover and seconder of each motion, open to inspection within five business days. None for this meeting are in the district's public shares, which begin in 2022; that is a limit of what the district posts online, not evidence that minutes were never kept, and the board did approve minutes at this meeting and the next. One practice on the tape bears on what those minutes say: the January 8 minutes were approved "with the corrections" after a member said she would "just email them" to the clerk (0:01:51, 0:02:01, 0:02:14). The public record of this meeting does not show what was changed in the January 8 minutes. Graded an observation under the project's rule for missing records.
Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II (2019 codification; source note ends 2018, 244:1).
OBSERVATION A Sunday retreat of the full board was scheduled; whether it was noticed and minuted as a meeting should be checked
The chair said the board must hold a retreat "by policy" (1:23:41), and members chose Sunday, February 23 at 10 a.m. in the community room (1:28:31, 1:28:57); at the January 21 meeting the chair called it "our next regular meeting where we'll be discussing things" (quoted from the January 21 recording, show 10704). Under RSA 91-A:2, I a meeting is the convening of a quorum "for the purpose of discussing or acting upon a matter" within the body's jurisdiction, and the chapter's exclusions do not include retreats or goal-setting sessions; so a retreat attended by a quorum needs 24-hour notice and minutes like any other meeting. No record of the retreat is online. This is recorded so that the February 23, 2020 retreat can be checked when later records are reviewed; nothing on this recording suggests the board intended to hold it without notice.
Sources: RSA 91-A:2, I and II (2019 codification).
OBSERVATION A $2,500 gift was accepted by public vote; the statute's agenda-notice step cannot be checked
RSA 198:20-b (2019 codification) lets a school board accept unanticipated money if the district has adopted its enabling article; for amounts under $5,000 the board must "post notice of the funds in the agenda" and "include notice in the minutes", and acceptance is made "in public session of any regular school board meeting". The board did accept the $2,500 gift for the technical center by motion and voice vote in public session at a regular meeting (0:09:00, 0:10:02, 0:10:34). Whether it appeared on the posted agenda, and whether the district had adopted the enabling article, cannot be checked because neither the agenda nor the district's warrant history is online.
Sources: RSA 198:20-b, I and III (2019 codification; source note ends 2005, 188:1).
OBSERVATION A $65,000 prior-year transfer was dropped because no one could find its basis
"I haven't found a reason to transfer that $65,000 over" (0:15:40); "I don't know what the basis for the $65,000 was. I couldn't find any work papers, anything related to that" (0:21:26). The same point recurs at the January 21 hearing and at the deliberative session. Removing an unsupported line is prudent; that a line in the adopted prior-year budget had no traceable work papers is a record-keeping question for the fiscal 2019 and 2020 audits. No verified rule is cited.
Sources: the recording at the times linked above. No verified rule applies.
OBSERVATION The restructuring plan was presented as something the district had to do "right now", then postponed within a week
The superintendent presented a grade-band model with a feedback form and a plan to meet people "tomorrow", and said "this is something we have to do pedagogically. This is something we have to do for students right now" (1:06:46, 1:07:09); the chair called it "a really good path" (1:22:47). Six days later, at the January 21 hearing, the superintendent announced it was pushed to the following year and said he would have presented it later. Nothing unlawful is suggested: a presentation without a vote is within the board's discretion. It is recorded because residents at the hearing criticized the way the plan reached them, and the sequence is visible across the two recordings.
Sources: the recording at the times linked above; January 21, 2020 page. No verified rule applies.
POSITIVE The board walked through the budget, the default budget and the tax effect in public a week before the hearing, and invited the public to it
Members asked the administration to explain debt service, inter-fund transfers and special education costs in plain terms: "So I want to make sure we know exactly what we're saying" (0:22:39); the default budget and its components were laid out (0:46:11); and the vice chair told viewers that the January 21 hearing "is where the public can come and ask their questions" (1:27:17). The chair also invited the audience to move their chairs forward to see the slides (0:12:25). RSA 40:13, XI(a) requires the default budget to be presented at the first budget hearing; walking through it a week earlier in open session goes beyond that minimum.
Sources: RSA 40:13, XI(a) (last amended 2019, 192:2; in force on this date).
Appendix: source files
Official and public sources
Project files (the dialogue file is linked; the others are not published with the pages)
Dialogue/10694 SchoolBoard011520.mp4.CSV: dialogue file, 538 rows.Input/Videos/10694 SchoolBoard011520.mp4; Input/Transcripts/10694 SchoolBoard011520.mp4.json.Input/SupportingDocuments/MAP.md, section 122.Scripts/attribution_reports_2015_2023/10694 SchoolBoard011520.mp4.md; Scripts/roster_2015_2023.md.
Laws and rules cited on this page