Claremont School Board, July 20, 2022

MEDIUM A $3,000 foundation gift for summer school was acknowledged, not accepted, and was not on the posted agenda

The chair added the item at the start of the meeting (“And then I had to add number five.”, 0:01:50). Taking it up, he described “$3,000 for the the high school. Summer school?” (1:19:42) from the Jack and Dorothy Byrne Foundation (1:19:29), then asked “So am I correct that this is under the $5,000 threshold? That doesn’t.” (1:20:38); the superintendent: “It’s just more the acknowledgment.” and the chair: “It doesn’t require approval.” (1:20:44, 1:20:45). No vote was taken. The amount is stated three ways on the record: the coordinator said “$33,000” (0:18:44), the chair $3,000, and the superintendent’s report in the packet (Supt Reprt CSB 7.20.22 UPDATE 130PM (1).pdf) “a donation in the amount of $3,000”, which this page treats as the figure.

RSA 198:20-b, III(b), as codified in 2022, is the rule for gifts under $5,000 to a district that has adopted the enabling article: the board “shall post notice of the funds in the agenda and shall include notice in the minutes”, and “acceptance of unanticipated funds under this subparagraph shall be made in public session of any regular school board meeting.” The posted agenda (Claremont School Board Agenda 7.20.22.pdf) has no donation item, the minutes (CSB minutes 7.20.22 (1).pdf) record the donation without an amount, and nothing was accepted by vote. The $5,000 threshold the chair invoked separates a public hearing (III(a)) from this lighter procedure; it does not remove the acceptance step. Whether Claremont voters adopted the RSA 198:20-b article has not been verified here; if they had not, paragraph I would not let the board accept and spend the gift without a district vote at all.

Control context: the coordinator said she applied for the gift herself, that “it’s in the mail” (1:20:49), and asked for a card to spend it directly rather than through reimbursement (1:21:23). Asked whether the district has a purchasing-card policy, the answer recorded was No (1:21:57); the superintendent said cards had caused problems in the past and spending is “done in a more controlled way.” (1:22:20). Graded MEDIUM: the gift is small and was discussed openly, but the statutory acceptance and agenda notice did not happen.

Sources: RSA 198:20-b, I and III(b), 2022 codification (under $5,000: agenda notice, minutes notice, acceptance in public session); Claremont School Board Agenda 7.20.22.pdf; CSB minutes 7.20.22 (1).pdf; Supt Reprt CSB 7.20.22 UPDATE 130PM (1).pdf

MEDIUM Claremont’s FY2019 audit was only just finished in July 2022, with FY2020 and later still open

Asked by Heather Whitney for an audit update, the assistant superintendent for finance said “2019 for Claremont is completed. We sent the rep letter in last Friday, which is the final step in that.” and that “20 has already begun for Claremont” (1:26:15). Earlier, Candace Crawford said the district was “up to date through the 2018” and had committed to be current by March 2023 (0:08:45). The fiscal year ended June 30, 2019, so the FY2019 audit closed about three years after year end, and the FY2020, FY2021 and FY2022 audits remained to be done.

For any entity that spends $750,000 or more in federal awards in a year, the single audit is due the earlier of 30 days after the auditor’s report or nine months after year end (for FY2019, March 31, 2020); OMB M-21-20 allowed a six-month delay for year-ends through June 30, 2021, which does not reach a 2022 completion. The meeting record mentions federal money only through ESSER (Crawford: “over $2 million that they hadn’t gotten reimbursed for, and that was for the 2019, 20 and 21, school district years.”, 1:29:57), and does not state Claremont’s annual federal expenditures, so the single-audit deadline is noted as likely, not proved. Graded MEDIUM for that reason; it would be HIGH if the audited years show federal expenditures above the threshold.

Sources: 2 CFR 200.512(a)(1), 2022 CFR edition (nine months after period end); 2 CFR 200.501(a), 2022 CFR edition ($750,000); OMB M-21-20, App. 3 sec. IX (six-month delay, year-ends through June 30, 2021)

MEDIUM The minutes record a different visioning-committee motion from the one voted on tape

On tape, Heather Whitney moved “to approve, an RFP being sent out to support the.” committee (1:13:07), said “I’ll write it out and then make sure that Melissa Small has it,” (1:13:45), and the second was “I second the motion when you ever written.” (1:13:53). The vote followed (1:13:58). Only after it did she add: “Just within that motion, I want to make sure that that dollars comes from the 100,000 that that was allocated to the visioning Committee.” (1:14:42), and the chair summed up “Will be approved to put out RFP.” (1:14:50).

The minutes (CSB minutes 7.20.22 (1).pdf) record instead a “Motion by Heather Whitney made to support support the Visioning Committee and that funding comes specifically from $100,000 budget, seconded by Whitney Skillen”, with no mention of the RFP, which was the decision the committee asked for (1:10:08), and with a funding condition that was stated after the vote. RSA 91-A:2, II requires the minutes to describe the “final decisions”. Neither version identifies what the $100,000 is or where it was appropriated. Graded MEDIUM: the minutes exist but do not match what was decided.

Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II, 2022 codification (minutes record final decisions, movers and seconders); CSB minutes 7.20.22 (1).pdf

MEDIUM The superintendent-evaluation subcommittee met in June; no notice or minutes have been located

Joshua Lambert reported: “we had a meeting for the superintendent evaluation Committee.” (0:46:31), at which members reviewed “the data that came back from both boards, Unity and Claremont” and agreed to revise the rubric and set a meeting calendar (0:46:42). The transcript gives the date as “424” (0:46:39); the SAU 6 board had set the subcommittee’s meeting for Friday, June 24, 2022 (SAU 6 Board, June 16, 2022).

A subcommittee of a school board or SAU board is a public body under RSA 91-A:1-a, VI(d) (“any committee, subcommittee, or subordinate body thereof”) and must post notice and keep minutes under RSA 91-A:2, II. No notice or minutes for this meeting have been located in the district’s shares. This project’s rule grades an unexplained absence of minutes HIGH where it is established that none exist in any district share; two SAU 6 2022 packet folders could not be opened for this page, so the absence is recorded as “not found” and graded MEDIUM. A member’s oral report in public session is not a substitute for minutes.

Sources: RSA 91-A:1-a, VI(d), 2022 codification; RSA 91-A:2, II, 2022 codification; SAU 6 Board, June 16, 2022