Single-item special meeting on whether to bring hybrid students back full time sooner than November 2, chaired by the vice chair because the chair could attend only by video. District counsel briefed the board on liability, the administration presented the costs of an October 5 return, a motion for October 5 went to a roll call whose result was never announced, and a substitute motion passed six to one: cohorts A and B back full time on October 19 once safety equipment is installed, the high school hybrid to the end of the first quarter, no high school busing. The page is built from the CCTV recording's dialogue transcript; no agenda, packet or minutes survive in the district's online shares. Timestamps link to the same moment in the Cablecast recording.
Body
Claremont School Board (Claremont School District, SAU 6)
Date
Wednesday, September 23, 2020 (set at the September 2 meeting as a single-item meeting)
Start time
No agenda survives. After connection problems the acting chair apologizes for “a few technical difficulties” (0:02:56) and the pledge begins at 0:03:48. Adjournment is moved and seconded at 2:20:00; no vote is heard. The dialogue transcript runs 2:21:28. A nonpublic session on the printed agenda was struck (0:05:35).
Location
Not stated in available records. Members, administrators and counsel are in a room with a video link; Frank Sprague, Carolyn Towle and Heather Whitney take part remotely, and the attribution report adds Jason Benware for part of the meeting (the room tells Whitney “Heather you're still Muted”).
None located. MAP.md records no Drive material for this meeting: neither district share holds a year folder older than 2022, and the Meeting Minutes share starts at 2023 (checked 9/26/26). The board approved these minutes by roll call on October 7, 2020 (see the October 7, 2020 page).
Board composition
Seven members, all present: Heather Whitney (vice chair, presiding), Frank Sprague (chair, by video, not presiding: “Frank Sprague is unable to attend in person tonight”), Jason Benware, Rob Lovett Jr., Michael Petrin, Carolyn Towle and Rebecca Zullo.
Participants
Everyone heard or addressed on the recording. Spellings follow the project's 2015-2023 roster where the transcript garbles a name (for example Bennett or Benwell for Benware, Patron for Petrin); there are no minutes to check spellings against.
Name
Role
Participation
Heather Whitney
Vice chair, presiding (remote)
Chairs in Sprague's place (0:00:54); argues for opening as soon as possible with the high school possibly hybrid to the semester (1:53:59).
Frank Sprague
Chair (remote, not presiding)
Asks how the administration can guarantee readiness by October 5 (1:04:11); votes on both roll calls.
Jason Benware
Member
Moves the agenda and the October 5 motion (0:56:34); seconds the October 19 motion; moves adjournment.
Rebecca Zullo
Member
Moves the October 19 substitute (2:06:02); keeps time on public comment.
Rob Lovett Jr.
Member
Argues the administration should get its extra weeks (1:29:31); votes no on October 5 (2:05:04); seconds the October 19 motion.
Michael Petrin
Member
Supports an early full return; seconds the October 5 motion (0:57:08); raises reopening board meetings to the public (2:17:33).
86 of 727 dialogue rows (11.8%), including the member who cast the lone no on the October 19 motion.
Order of business (reconstructed)
No agenda survives. The September 2 meeting set this as a single-item meeting, and the acting chair names the item at the start; the list below is reconstructed from her transitions.
Moved by Benware, seconded by Lovett; no vote heard before the recording ends.
Discussion timeline
Times are taken from the dialogue transcript (Dialogue/10993 SchoolBoard092320.mp4.CSV) and link into the recording. Quotations are as transcribed; bracketed words are corrections, with the transcript's wording kept where the correction changes sense.
Chronological topics with the most concrete material first.
Whitney: “Frank Sprague is unable to attend in person tonight, so I will be sharing the meeting” [chairing], and asks the room to hold her to points of order.
Benware moves the agenda without the nonpublic session; when a voice vote is suggested, counsel asks: “Roll call vote? Because you have people appearing electronically, right?” The clerk calls the roll. Whitney: “We have a quorum so we can move forward.”
Upton: “there are significant protections from liability associated with reopening schools”; immunity holds “as long as you're following prevailing medical guidance”, and a plaintiff would still have to prove causation (0:10:55). Asked about the Dartmouth-Hitchcock recommendations: “I think it's for the board to, to kind of way” [weigh] the studies.
Tempesta: the same slides are on the district website (0:12:57). Cohort counts “At the middle school, we have about 315 in those cohorts, 83 in the remote cohort”. An October 5 start would mean adjusting bus routes and, “unfortunately, that would be needed right away to to not be able to provide transportation to the high school”; “it's not required that we we have to transport to the high school”.
“we have most of our classrooms right now in every school building, only have 12 desks”; a full return would put “up to 24 or 26 in some cases at the high school”. Asked if CDC spacing can be met: “we can't meet the CDC, the six foot requirements”.
Benware asks for comparison data from prior years (0:29:50, the first words labeled Petrin in the dialogue file; see the footer). Magoon explains that a test result does not shorten a quarantine (0:46:57).
Sprague asks about spacing from drivers; Magoon: “So the driver does not have any protection currently.” The shields were ordered “least six weeks ago”.
“we've sent home approximately 150 people and anywhere between 75 and 57% of them have chosen to just not get tested”; “we don't have enough accurate data to pull from in order to make this decision”.
Tempesta: “But. But could could we do it? Technically, yes. Is it the safest way?” Magoon: “I don't think that the October 5th date would be enough time”. Asked by Sprague how readiness could be guaranteed (1:04:11), Tempesta: “Right now I can't.”
Herzog: “I certainly didn't want my senior year to be like this.” Of 17 students he reached, “All of them said that they wanted to go back at some point. It's just now is not the right time.”
“What the administration is asking for at this time is an additional four weeks”; “My concern is we are now going to blow past all the OSHA guidelines”. Benware replies that the claim is “so rampantly unscientific”.
Nester: “we have about 400 special ed kiddos in Claremont a little less”; “my recommendation again, is that we just come back at the natural break at the end of the first quarter”. Barry: “Our number as of today was 143 versus the 124 that you saw in the presentation.” and “There's no way to keep even a three foot distance.”
“I think it's unreasonable, and irresponsible to say that they should be back in school by October 5th”, while backing a return in two or three weeks with protective gear in place (1:45:28).
“I feel as if we push this back, that we will continue to push it back.” She could accept the high school “maintaining the hybrid model until the end of the semester”.
Whitney limits comments “to three minutes” with Zullo as timekeeper. “James Ward. Claremont, New Hampshire. My daughter is a Stevens student”; he asks the board to weigh the impact on families. Zullo calls time (2:03:07); no other caller (2:03:42).
Whitney: “we're going to do a board vote to fast track the full reopening from November 2nd to October 5th. We'll do a roll call vote.” Heard: an unidentified No no., Benware Yes., the clerk “Rob Lovett no.”, Whitney Yes., and further clipped answers; Petrin: “She did not vote and I did.” No tally is announced and Zullo moves a substitute (2:05:50).
Zullo: “Make a motion that we would consider reopening of the schools fully on October 19th, with the understanding that high school would not go back until after the first quarter.” Benware seconds (2:06:45). Restated by Magoon: “For cohorts A and B on ten. 19 pending all necessary safety equipment is installed. High school will remain hybrid until the end of the first quarter. Cohort C will remain remote until the end of the first semester.” Whitney adds “I want to add that no bussing will be provided.”
Answers heard include Sprague “My first. I'm sorry. Yes.”, Zullo and Benware Yes., Lovett Yes. and a run of answers after Towle's name; result “We have six yeses and one. No.” The lone no is not attributable from the recording.
Petrin: “We didn't take a vote or anything to close the meeting, so I'm not sure if we need to take a vote to open them back up”. Benware proposes registration and “a sign seating” [assigned seating]. Tempesta notes the 48 hours needed for a change of venue (2:19:33). Benware: “So do we have to vote on that? Okay, great.”
Benware moves, Lovett seconds; Towle: “this was the probably the most rewarding meeting I've had”.
Items flagged for review
These flags are a reviewer's aid, not findings of violation and not legal advice. Each one names the rule it rests on, as that rule read on September 23, 2020, or is labeled an observation where no verified rule applies.
MEDIUM No agenda, packet or minutes for this meeting survive in any district share
MAP.md records no Drive material for this meeting: neither district share holds a year folder older than 2022, and the Meeting Minutes share starts at 2023. The board changed the district's reopening date at this meeting, and the recording is now the only public account. RSA 91-A:2, II, as in force from January 1, 2019, required minutes naming members and persons appearing, the subjects, the final decisions and the mover and seconder of each motion, open to inspection within five business days.
MEDIUM limb, because the record mitigates the gap: the board approved these minutes by roll call on October 7, 2020 (see the October 7 page). The loss matters more than usual here, because the minutes are the only place the outcome of the first roll-call vote (flag 2) and the identity of the lone no on the second could be recorded.
MEDIUM A roll-call vote on the October 5 return whose result was never announced
The acting chair put the October 5 motion to a roll call at 2:04:19. The recording catches some answers (an unidentified No no., Benware Yes., the clerk's “Rob Lovett no.”, Whitney Yes.) and a dispute over whether someone had voted (2:05:29), then moves straight to Zullo's substitute (2:05:50). No one states the tally or whether the motion failed. The substitute's passage implies it did, but the record does not say so.
RSA 91-A:2, II requires the minutes to record final decisions, and III(e) requires a roll call when members participate remotely so that each vote is known. The roll call was taken; what is missing on the public record is the decision. With the minutes not public, a reader cannot learn how each member voted on the question the meeting was called to decide.
OBSERVATION Ending high school busing: the statute supports the superintendent, with limits worth stating
Tempesta said “it's not required that we we have to transport to the high school” (0:18:53), and the adopted motion provides that “I want to add that no bussing will be provided.” for the high school (2:11:41). RSA 189:6, in the text in force from July 1, 2020, requires a district to transport pupils in kindergarten through grade 8 who live more than two miles from their assigned school, and makes transport for grades 9 through 12 discretionary unless the commissioner directs it. The superintendent's statement is consistent with that.
Two limits the meeting did not discuss: federal law still requires transportation to the school of origin for students experiencing homelessness (42 U.S.C. 11432(g)(1)(J)(iii)), and transportation written into a student's special education plan is a separate obligation. The October 7 citizens' comment from a Stevens counselor shows the decision's effect on families who cannot drive their children.
OBSERVATION Public attendance at board meetings closed and reopened without a vote
Petrin: “We didn't take a vote or anything to close the meeting” (2:17:33). The board agreed by consensus to readmit the public in person from October 7, with registration and assigned seating, and Benware confirmed no vote was needed ({R(718)}).
No statute required a vote either way. What the law required during the emergency is narrower: Emergency Order #12 let a public body meet without a physical quorum only if it gave the public telephone access, published how to use it, provided a way to report problems and adjourned if the public could not get in; ordinarily RSA 91-A:2, III(c) requires remote participants to be audible to the public at the noticed meeting location. The meeting notices that would show which rules the board was meeting under are not in any reachable record. This meeting itself took telephone comment (flag 6).
POSITIVE Every vote by roll call, at counsel's prompting, and the remote chair's reason stated on the record
When a voice vote on the agenda was suggested, district counsel asked for a roll call “Because you have people appearing electronically, right?” (0:06:14), and the board used roll calls for both reopening motions. The acting chair stated at the outset why the chair was not in the room (0:00:54). RSA 91-A:2, III requires that a remote member's reason for not attending in person be stated in the minutes, and III(e) requires roll-call votes whenever a member participates remotely. Compare the voice votes at the September 2 and September 22 meetings.
POSITIVE Telephone public comment on the night's single decision, under an even time limit
Before the vote the acting chair opened the floor to callers with a three-minute limit applied by a timekeeper (1:58:54); James Ward spoke by phone (2:00:10) and the room checked for further callers (2:03:19). No statute required a comment period until RSA 189:74 took effect on September 6, 2022.
Google Drive: no packet folder, agenda, presentation or minutes. MAP.md (checked 9/26/26) records that neither district share holds a year folder older than 2022 and that the Meeting Minutes share starts at 2023. Not searched again for this page, per the run instructions for meetings with no Drive material. The superintendent says the presentation was posted on the district website; it is not preserved in any share this project reaches.
RSA 91-A:2, II and III(a), (c), (e), 2019 codification (source note ends 2018, 244:1): minutes content; remote attendance reason in the minutes; audibility; roll-call votes
Emergency Order #12 pursuant to Executive Order 2020-04 (March 23, 2020): waiver of the physical-quorum requirement on conditions including public telephone access
RSA 189:6, 2019 codification page (source note ends 2019, 181:1, eff. July 1, 2020): transportation required for grades K-8 beyond two miles; discretionary for grades 9-12