Participants
Everyone the recording shows taking part, as named in the project's dialogue file. No minutes exist online to check spellings against, so non-members' names are as the transcription heard them and are marked where unverified. Members are listed first.
| Name | Role | Participation |
|---|
| Frank Sprague | Chair | Presided over the hearing and meeting. Stated for the record that his remote yes in the September 15 Fish Tank vote was meant as a vote to move the question. Described his own COVID-19 infection while vaccinated and asked members to wear masks in school buildings, without a motion. |
| Heather Whitney | Board member | Asked about the survey respondents and the COVID-19 matrix; said she found no record of a board vote approving the Maple Avenue roof from the emergency fund; argued vaccinated members should be free to go unmasked; clarified her position on the Fish Tank motion; raised a homeschooled student's access to the in-school SAT. |
| Steven Horsky | Board member | Moved the amended agenda, proposed amendments to the September 15 minutes, gave the policy committee report, questioned why a middle school sports trip was refused when a Puerto Rico trip had been approved, moved acceptance of the donations and adjournment. Not read in the roll call. |
| Michael Petrin | Board member; SAU 6 chair | Seconded the agenda; questioned the nurse's protocol figures from personal experience; distinguished educational from recreational trips; said masks are required for anyone entering schools during business hours; spoke up for the performing arts. |
| Nicholas Stone | Board member | Moved to table the minutes; seconded the donations; pointed out that citizens had not been invited to comment on items under the board's new procedure; asked for a restructuring update. |
| Joshua Lambert | Board member | Asked that COVID-19 exposure letters identify the grade level; asked why the athletic director could not front the trip cost; supported masking by board members in schools. |
| Rob Lovett Jr. | Board member; Capital Improvement Committee | Reported the committee's question about the Maple Avenue roof and the emergency reserve fund. Identified by elimination and the chair's "Thank you. Rob." (medium confidence). |
| Michael Tempesta | Superintendent, SAU 6 | Presented the donations, the superintendent's report (Dow building renovation, COVID-19, restructuring survey), the transportation rationale for limiting field trips, and a statement defending the teachers who presented Fish Tank. |
| Mary Woodman | Clerk | Called the roll. |
| Emily | Student representative, Stevens High School senior | Introduced as the new student representative; gave a short student report near the end of the meeting. Surname not stated. |
| Ronnie | Lead school nurse, SAU 6; Maple Avenue nurse | Presented the COVID-19 protocol process, tracking and September and October figures by school, exposure letters and surveillance testing. Her self-introduction is garbled ("Ask you to leave nurse for six"); surname not stated. |
| Tessa Akins | School nurse, Claremont Middle School | Answered on vaccination proof, PCR testing and parent disclosure. Introduced by name by the lead nurse; identification of her voice is medium confidence and the surname spelling is unverified. |
| Sean LaPlante | Athletic director, Claremont Middle School | Explained the proposed trip to a professional game and the obstacles he had met. Self-introduction heard as "I'm Sean. The plan on the athletic director"; surname spelling from a later recording (medium). |
| Dr. Janeiro | Curriculum administrator, SAU 6 | Described a planned meeting with music teachers and said the Fish Tank books remain in use. Identification of this voice is low confidence; surname spelling unverified. |
| Unidentified | Various | 131 of 753 rows (17.4%), nearly all one- to three-word interjections by several voices. |
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 chair refers to a printed agenda ("It was at the top of the page two, so I missed it") and lettered items, and the superintendent refers to "the packet", so both existed. Hover over (or Tab to) a clipped entry for the full text.
| Taken up | Item | Agenda text / disposition |
|---|
| 0:00:11 | Public hearing: two donations | $10,500 from the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation and $1,000 from Claremont Savings Bank. No member of the public spoke; hearing closed at 0:04:51. |
| 0:01:41 | Roll call; pledge; student representative introduced | Roll taken during the hearing; pledge at the start of the regular meeting. |
| 0:06:07 | Agenda | Chair added the donations as item G. Horsky moved "to accept the amended agenda, adding the public hearing donations to item G for acceptance"; Petrin seconded; voice vote. |
| 0:07:13 | Superintendent's report | Taken up before the minutes, which the chair had missed on the agenda. |
| 0:28:18 | Minutes of the previous meeting (September 15) | Horsky proposed corrections; Stone moved to table; Whitney seconded; tabled by voice vote at 0:32:13. |
| 0:32:13 | Citizens' comments | None. |
| 0:32:32 | Discussion: agreements (MOAs) with the two bargaining units | Information only; "We we didn't want to pursue the Moas". |
| 0:33:08 | Nominations | Deferred to the next meeting. |
| 0:34:08 | COVID-19 process report (item C) | Lead nurse's presentation and questions; no motion. |
| 1:12:23 | CMS trip; Puerto Rico trip; travel concerns | Discussion; chair: "I don't think we need to vote". |
| 1:32:34 | Subcommittee reports | Negotiations, policy committee, Capital Improvement Committee. |
| 1:41:54 | Discussion: mask use by board members in school buildings | No motion, by the chair's choice. |
| 1:50:24 | G. Acceptance of the donations | Horsky moved to accept $10,500 and $1,000; Stone seconded; citizens invited to comment; carried by voice vote. |
| 1:51:19 | Future agenda items; other business; student report | Policy report, nominations, a nonpublic session on a contract, the student report (given at 1:57:18), Fish Tank remarks, homeschool SAT access. |
| 2:05:54 | Adjournment | Horsky moved; seconded; voice vote. |
Discussion timeline
Chronological, from the dialogue CSV. Times are the start of the cited exchange, taken 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 |
|---|
| 0:00:23 | Why the hearing is held | Chair: "whenever we as a public entity receive money that's from private entities exceeding a certain amount, we need to, allow the public to weigh in". On the threshold: "I think that the threshold is 5000." Superintendent: "Think it's 500." Chair: "I'm going to I'm going to call the school board and find out what that number is." | POSITIVE |
| 0:03:20 | The two donations | "10,500 are from the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation", for year-long professional development, much of it going "to outdoor classroom and other types of outdoor, class activities"; and "Claremont Savings Bank. For $1,000". Chair: "Any members of the public that would like to speak regarding these two". None. | POSITIVE |
| 0:05:26 | Student representative | Emily, a Stevens senior: "It was announced a few times that someone was needed for it and nobody took it, so I did." | |
| 0:06:07 | Agenda amended | Donations added as item G. Chair: "Mike patron seconded it." | |
| 0:08:06 | Dow building renovation | Superintendent: money was put away "when we had the governor's one time money"; the entrance should be "completed in the next three weeks." At 0:27:48: "we had a budget. We stayed with the budget." | |
| 0:11:17 | COVID-19 in the community | River Valley Community College "is one of the four driving PCR tests from your car locations in all of New Hampshire." "we've exceeded that peak right now" (the January peak). A 41-year-old friend "passed away last week"; "we can't stress enough to get the vaccine. We were not, you know, mandating". At 0:24:26: "we went over 300 cases of active infections in Sullivan County." | |
| 0:17:37 | Restructuring survey | "we had 202 responses so far", "who who, are not Claremont parents, actually 60% or so." Forum on Monday night. Whitney: "Sounds like the majority was were not parents." | |
| 0:22:58 | What if cases surge | Chair asked about a "doomsday scenario"; superintendent: "from the governor to the commissioner. There is no transitional model." Whitney at 0:25:19: the board's matrix uses absenteeism and "the low threshold is something like 15%". | |
| 0:28:18 | September 15 minutes tabled | Horsky asked to correct the record of the citizens' comment motion: "up to three minutes for each citizen, with a timekeeper appointed by the chair" and "we're doing this temporarily until the Policy Committee can craft a formal policy. The motion was made by Nicholas Stone, seconded by Stephen." Stone: "Do a motion tabled until we figure it out." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:30:10 | Chair's statement on his September 15 remote vote | "we voted the on fish tank and me being home." "I was participating remotely. And so my vote, which is the vote not asking for a change of the vote, was intended to be a vote on, what? I heard Mike make a motion to move the question." "even though I voted yes, my vote was for Mike's motion to move the question not on fish tank." "I think it's going to be really important to restate the motion". "it's on me. I could have asked to have the motion restated, and I didn't." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:32:41 | MOAs; nominations; background checks | MOAs placed in the packet for information only. Nominations deferred because the HR person was out. Fingerprinting backlog easing: "22 of those came in in one fell swoop today". | |
| 0:35:37 | How students are sent home | Lead nurse: a positive household member means "they're out for for ten days"; symptoms include "allergy symptoms like runny noses, coughs"; "We need your child to be tested or out for ten days." | POSITIVE |
| 0:37:52 | Tracking and state reporting | A spreadsheet for each school records "the child's name their their grade, whether or not they've been vaccinated, whether or not they ride the bus, whether or not they play sports." Positives are faxed to the state. "We're working in real time. The state is not working in real time." | |
| 0:40:06 | Stevens figures | "in September for Stevens High School, there were 79 students that we put on protocol"; "22 students actually tested positive for Stevens in September." October to date: "45 students are on protocol. One student is partially vaccinated. We have 44 unvaccinated students." Vaccination status was tracked only from October. | POSITIVE |
| 0:41:41 | Vaccination status questions | Status comes from asking students and parents; no card is required. Whitney: "Probably should produce a card." Petrin: "I have personal experience that your numbers are off." Horsky: "Are we legally. Allowed to ask if they have been vaccinated on?" Whitney: "HIPAA only. Only has to do with information from a healthcare provider to an insurance." Horsky: "the only person we should be asking is a parent." Nurse: "we should do and we will start doing is following up with the parents". | |
| 0:44:58 | Middle and elementary figures | CMS September: "65 students on protocol", "18 students tested positive", an eighth grade cluster "consisting of 15 eighth graders". Bluff, Disnard (Disney) and Maple Avenue figures follow; Maple had "one cluster within the fourth grade that included six students". | POSITIVE |
| 0:49:13 | Unreported cluster | "So this this cluster was not reported. And I want to apologize to all of you." The state case worker was on vacation; "it got posted to the web and I missed it." | POSITIVE |
| 0:55:19 | Exposure letters and privacy | The state is "honestly not doing any contact tracing". Letters are broad because children share lunch and recess; "we also need to protect privacy." Lambert asked that letters "identify the grade level"; nurse: "there's no reason why we can't identify grade level." Whitney: "assume your child is positive". | |
| 1:06:27 | Time lost to protocol | Negative-testing students return in "anywhere from I'd say 24 to 72 hours." Horsky: "basically one in every nine students roughly is on protocol" and "less than 1 in 3" test positive; "honestly, I'm quite impressed with those numbers so far." | |
| 1:08:58 | Surveillance testing declined for now | Nurses and administrators would have to run the logistics and "right now we don't have the bandwidth"; one nurse short next week. Recommendation: use the free RVCC drive-through, "seven days a week, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m." | |
| 1:12:35 | CMS trip to a professional game | LaPlante: a bus quote of $950, about "$55 per person", "about 60 to about 80, 80 people". District buses refused: "we didn't want to risk the fleet". Then told he could not buy tickets because "since I'm a school employee, would count as a school sanctioned tripped trip." | |
| 1:16:39 | Comparison with the Puerto Rico trip | Horsky: "Not long ago, this board approved a trip out of country to Puerto Rico." "It seems as though we're favoring, the high school trip". Petrin: "educational versus recreational". Superintendent at 1:20:54: "we don't have backup drivers"; limiting weekend trips "was a very conscious decision"; buses are "priority one, getting the kids in the classrooms." | |
| 1:23:22 | Board consensus: he may charter | Chair: "So why can't he charter a bus?" Superintendent: He can. Chair: "So you can do the transaction." Chair at 1:32:05: "So I don't think we need to vote or anything." | |
| 1:32:55 | Negotiations and policy committee | Ground rules bar disclosure while talks are active. Horsky: the policy committee found "some deficiencies in an audit that we had. As far as policies went". Chair: best practice is review "every, every three years or 1 to 3 years". | |
| 1:37:47 | Emergency reserve fund and the Maple Avenue roof | Lovett: "through a warrant article last year, we established an emergency reserve fund" and "it was our understanding that any funds being removed from that would have to be approved by the board." "the repairs done to the Maple Avenue. Roof. Was paid for through the emergency reserve fund, and we could not figure out when that had been approved". Chair: "Well, I think we have to vote it out." Whitney: "nothing indicating that we discussed it as an approval". Horsky recalled being told the fund "wasn't touched for the roof". Superintendent: "I don't have that record" and "I obviously will follow up". | MEDIUM |
| 1:41:11 | Per-item citizen comment not offered | Stone: "I know that we didn't do this all meeting, but, if there's any citizens that want to comment on this." Petrin: "my understanding was it was only if there's a motion on the floor." Horsky: "We did it open ended. They were allowed to speak during the discussion." Chair: "the facilitator of the meeting needs to know". | OBSERVATION |
| 1:41:54 | Board members and masks in schools | Chair, who had COVID-19 while "full and fully vaccinated": "I'm going to wear a mask even though I'm vaccinated and have had it." Whitney: "we have a 44.8% vaccination rate" and "If you're vaccinated, it brings you one step closer to freedom." Lambert: "It's not gonna hurt. Put on a mask." Horsky: "If I'm going to make kids mask up and muzzle them, I'm going to muzzle myself too". Petrin: in school during business hours "we follow the rules that are put forth". No motion. | |
| 1:50:54 | Donations accepted | Horsky: "I am going to make a motion to accept the donation from the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation in the amount of $10,500, and from Claremont Savings Bank in the amount of $1,000." Stone: Second. Chair: "Citizens comments on this." Carried by voice vote. | POSITIVE |
| 1:52:02 | Performing arts | Petrin: "I am here to speak up for performing arts"; suggested "Covid money, rent a tent, rent space heaters". Dr. Janeiro: music teachers invited to meet "tomorrow morning". | |
| 1:56:44 | Future items; student report | Horsky: "we may need to have a non public for personnel in regards to contract discussion." Student report: PSAT and SATs, "the suicide awareness walk on the 16th", "we have 52 students signed up" for the Puerto Rico trip, homecoming Saturday. | |
| 1:57:59 | Fish Tank: statement about the teachers | Superintendent: the presenting teachers "have taken a beating on social media"; "no one was disparaging"; named "Cassandra Lockwood and Joan Fontaine". Dr. Janeiro: the Newbery books remain in use; "the books themselves were not the issue." Whitney: "The issue that the board had was that the misrepresentation" and that "it was implemented as the social studies program, which we explicitly said we were not okay with." Superintendent: "we've rectified it and we, we own it". | OBSERVATION |
| 2:03:08 | Homeschooled student and the SAT | Whitney: a homeschool parent "was told that her child was not going to be able to take the SAT at Stevens"; the principal "was asking actually to have some kind of guidance from the board". Chair: "Exclude a Claremont resident from any activities that our kids are." Placed on a future agenda. | |
| 2:05:54 | Adjournment | Horsky: "I would like to make a motion to adjourn." Voice vote. | |
Items flagged for review
Flags are a reviewer's aid generated by comparing the meeting against the law in force on October 20, 2021. Several provisions cited below have since been amended, and each flag cites the text as it then read. They are not findings of violation, and nothing here is legal advice. Where no verified rule applies, the flag says so and is recorded as an observation. Seven flags follow, ordered by severity.
MEDIUM The Maple Avenue roof was reportedly paid from the voter-created emergency reserve fund, and no member could recall a board vote authorizing it
Reporting for the Capital Improvement Committee at 1:37:47, Rob Lovett said the fund was established "through a warrant article last year" for emergency building maintenance, that the committee understood "any funds being removed from that would have to be approved by the board", and that the committee had been told the summer's Maple Avenue roof repair "Was paid for through the emergency reserve fund". The chair: "Well, I think we have to vote it out." Whitney said her own notes showed "nothing indicating that we discussed it as an approval" and recalled telling voters that the fund would not be spent "unless the board by majority vote, agree with it." Horsky recalled the opposite answer at an earlier meeting, that the fund "wasn't touched for the roof". The superintendent said "I don't have that record" and would follow up with the business administrator, who was absent.
Two things are unsettled on this record: whether the money actually came from the fund, and what the warrant article said about who may authorize spending. If the fund is a capital reserve fund under RSA chapter 35, RSA 35:15, I provides that the trustees "shall hold the same until such time as the town, district or county shall have voted to withdraw funds" or has named agents to carry out its purposes; the text in force on this date was the 2021 amendment, effective August 30, 2021. If the district named the school board as its agent, spending is a board decision, which is what the members understood. Either way, a withdrawal from a voter-created reserve that no board member could connect to a board vote is a probable control gap. It is graded MEDIUM because the record shows an unresolved question, not an established unauthorized payment. Follow-up belongs on a later page: the warrant article, the trustees' records, and any later board ratification.
Sources: RSA 35:15, I (capital reserve funds held until the district votes or names agents; source note ends 2021, 105:2, eff. August 30, 2021).
OBSERVATION The board's new per-item public comment procedure was not offered for most items, and members disagreed about what it required
On September 15 the board adopted, temporarily and pending a policy, comment by citizens on each discussion and action item with a three-minute limit (see the September 15 page; Horsky restates the motion at 0:28:50). At this meeting no comment was invited on the COVID-19 report, the trips or the subcommittee reports. At 1:41:11 Stone raised it: "I know that we didn't do this all meeting". Petrin understood it applied "only if there's a motion on the floor"; Horsky said "We did it open ended". The chair then invited comment on the donation motion. No one in the room appears to have sought to speak, so no one is shown being turned away. New Hampshire's statutory 30-minute public comment requirement for school boards, RSA 189:74, was enacted in 2022 and did not apply on this date, so this is recorded as an observation about the board's own rule, not a statutory one.
Sources: No statute in force on this date; the rule is the board's own motion of September 15, 2021 as restated on this recording.
OBSERVATION The chair put on the record that his remote yes in the September 15 Fish Tank vote was meant for a different question
At 0:30:10 the chair said he had participated remotely on September 15 while home with COVID-19, and that "even though I voted yes, my vote was for Mike's motion to move the question not on fish tank." He did not ask to change the vote and did not say how he would have voted. On the September 15 recording, the members later concluded that the call of the question had never been seconded, so the roll call stood as the vote on the motion itself. The September 15 minutes were tabled at this meeting with corrections pending, and neither they nor any later version are online, so how the district finally recorded his vote cannot be checked. On the audible roll, the motion carried whether or not his vote is counted.
The episode bears on RSA 91-A:2, III as it read in 2021, which allows remote participation only when attendance "is not reasonably practical", requires the reason to be "stated in the minutes", and requires that "All votes taken during such a meeting shall be by roll call vote." The September 15 page examines that meeting's compliance. The chair's own conclusion, that motions should be restated before votes, is the right one; the SAU 6 meeting the next evening shows the SAU chair doing exactly that.
Sources: RSA 91-A:2, III(a) and (e) (2019 codification; in force until October 3, 2023); the September 15, 2021 page.
OBSERVATION A board member stated that Fish Tank had been implemented as the elementary social studies program contrary to the board's instruction, and the superintendent accepted responsibility
In other business (1:57:59) the superintendent defended the two teachers who presented Fish Tank in July, saying they had "taken a beating on social media". Whitney, who made the September 15 motion to remove the program, replied that the board's issue was "the misrepresentation" and that the program "was implemented as the social studies program, which we explicitly said we were not okay with." The superintendent answered "we've rectified it and we, we own it". The curriculum administrator said the books themselves remain in use. This is the administration's own acknowledgment, on the record, of a gap between what the board was told and what was implemented. The district's curriculum-adoption policy was not available to this page, so no rule is cited and the item is recorded as an observation.
Sources: Recording only; see the September 15, 2021 page for the vote.
OBSERVATION No agenda, packet or minutes for this meeting are posted online
MAP.md section 153 records that neither district Drive share holds anything before July 2022 (checked 9/26/26), so this page rests on the recording alone. That is a limit of what the district posts online, not by itself evidence that records were never made: the chair reads from a printed agenda, the superintendent refers to "the packet", and the board takes up and tables the September 15 minutes. In 2021, RSA 91-A:2, II required minutes to be "open to public inspection not more than 5 business days after the meeting" and to record "The names of the members who made or seconded each motion". The limb of the project's missing-records rule applied is the online-availability observation, because the recording shows minutes being kept. The record that matters most here, the correction of the September 15 minutes, is among the documents not online.
Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II (2019 codification); Input/SupportingDocuments/MAP.md section 153.
POSITIVE The board held a public hearing before accepting the $10,500 grant and accepted both gifts by a public vote
RSA 198:20-b as it read in 2021 let a school board accept unanticipated money "without further action by the school district" once the district had adopted the enabling article, and provided: "For unanticipated funds in the amount of $5,000 or more, the school board shall hold a prior public hearing", with newspaper notice of its time, place and subject at least 7 days before. The $10,500 grant was above that threshold and was heard at 0:00:11; the $1,000 gift, below it, was heard too. Acceptance came by motion and public vote at 1:50:54, with citizens invited to comment. The chair's recollection of the threshold, 5000, was correct for this date; the superintendent's 500 was not, and the chair said he would check. Whether the newspaper notice ran and whether the district had adopted the enabling article cannot be confirmed from the recording. The $20,000 threshold in today's statute dates from 2023 and does not apply here.
Sources: RSA 198:20-b, I and III(a) (2019 codification; source note ends 2005, 188:1, in force until 2023, 38:1, eff. July 18, 2023).
POSITIVE The lead nurse gave school-by-school COVID-19 figures in public, disclosed a cluster the district had failed to report, and identified no student
From 0:35:37 the lead nurse explained the send-home process, the tracking spreadsheet, and September and October counts for each school of students on protocol, household contacts, those who chose not to test, and positives. At 0:49:13 she volunteered that a Maple Avenue fourth grade cluster "was not reported. And I want to apologize to all of you." She explained that exposure letters are kept general partly to "protect privacy", and agreed to consider naming grade levels at a member's request. Board members pressed on the accuracy of vaccination figures and on asking students rather than parents; the nurse said the office would begin following up with parents. None of this detail was required by statute; it let the public see how the protocol was working while keeping individual students out of view.
Sources: Practice beyond statutory minimums; no statute required this report.
Appendix: source files
Official and public sources
- Cablecast show 11963, "Claremont School Board of 10/20/21": Claremont Community TV, CLAREMONT SCHOOLS gallery. Every timestamp on this page links into this recording.
- No Drive material: neither the Claremont nor the SAU 6 share holds a year folder older than 2022, and the Meeting Minutes share starts at 2023 (MAP.md, checked 9/26/26). No agenda, packet, hearing notice or minutes were located.
- Related pages: September 15, 2021 (Fish Tank vote; per-item comment procedure adopted), September 20, 2021 restructuring forum, and SAU 6 Board, October 21, 2021.
Project files
Working files this page was built from. The dialogue file is linked; the others are not published with the page.
Dialogue/11963 SchoolBoard102021.mp4.CSV (753 attributed rows; the basis of this page)Input/Videos/11963 SchoolBoard102021.mp4Input/Transcripts/11963 SchoolBoard102021.mp4.jsonScripts/attribution_reports_2015_2023/11963 SchoolBoard102021.mp4.mdInput/SupportingDocuments/MAP.md, section 153
Laws and rules cited on this page
- New Hampshire statutes, as in force on October 20, 2021. RSA 35:15, I (capital reserve withdrawals; 2021, 105:2, eff. August 30, 2021). RSA 91-A:2, II and III (minutes; remote participation; 2019 codification). RSA 198:20-b (unanticipated funds; 2019 codification, $5,000 hearing threshold).
- Noted as not applicable on this date. RSA 189:74 (school board public comment period), enacted by 2022, 333:1, effective September 6, 2022.