Claremont School Board, March 18, 2026

MEDIUM The nonpublic minutes were sealed for four weeks with no statutory determination recorded

The approved minutes record that after the board returned to public session at 9:49 p.m., Michael Petrin made a motion to seal the minutes for 4 weeks, Don Lavalette seconded, by roll call, all present in favor. RSA 91-A:3, III allows nonpublic minutes to be withheld beyond 72 hours only "by recorded vote of 2/3 of the members present taken in public session" in which "it is determined that divulgence of the information likely would affect adversely the reputation of any person other than a member of the public body itself, or render the proposed action ineffective, or pertain to terrorism" (statute text). The minutes record the vote and the period but no determination. A short, time-limited seal tied to a pending hire is consistent with the "render the proposed action ineffective" ground, but the record does not say so.

The vote happened after the recording ended, so the minutes are the only account (flag 11). Whether the nonpublic minutes were released when the four weeks ran out could not be checked: the 2026 Non-Public folder in the Unsealed Minutes share returned no listing through the Drive API on October 3, 2026.

Sources: RSA 91-A:3, I(b)-(c), II(a)-(b), III (nonpublic motion must state the specific exemption; discussion confined to it; seal only by 2/3 recorded vote in public session with a statutory determination); 3.18.26 approved minutes, Non-Public Session

MEDIUM The approved minutes differ from the recording on the organizational votes and on the by-laws item, and give no start time

Chair election. The interim superintendent asked for a second at 0:04:53; the voice that answered Second at 0:04:57 is labeled Brian Rapp in the dialogue file. The minutes name Michael Petrin as seconder and list the vote as Crawford, Howard, Lavalette and Petrin in favor and Rapp against, which omits Heather Whitney, the mover. On tape the outcome was announced only as “The ayes have it” (0:05:13). Vice chair. At 0:08:11 the second, “I'll second, because I don't. Want to torture Mike”, is labeled Rapp; the minutes name Loren Howard. The 3 to 3 result and the clerk's ruling (0:09:41) agree with the minutes.

By-laws. The agenda listed the by-laws for a vote requiring two-thirds. The chair said at 0:57:16 “I think that we can't approve them tonight”; the board instead agreed by consensus (1:06:00) that the current by-laws stay in force and named a three-member ad hoc group to redraft them (1:07:56). When the clerk later said “No, you needed to vote on it there” (1:31:30), Whitney answered “It was bored consensus.” The minutes record the item as Board discussed and approved unanimously with voice vote, which reads as an approval of the by-laws, and do not mention the ad hoc group or its members. Start time. The interim superintendent called the meeting to order “officially at 636” (0:00:13); the minutes give the 10:00 p.m. adjournment but no start time, which RSA 91-A:2, II has required since August 22, 2025.

RSA 91-A:2, II requires the minutes to record "The names of the members who made or seconded each motion" (statute text) and the final decisions. Where the recording and the minutes disagree on a seconder, the page cannot say which is right: this diarizer merges male voices, and the minutes were drafted live by the clerk. The by-laws entry is the more consequential discrepancy, because a reader of the minutes would conclude the by-laws were adopted on March 18.

Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II (minutes contents, including start and end time as amended by 2025, 112:1, eff. Aug. 22, 2025; mover and seconder); 3.18.26 approved minutes; 3.18.26 agenda

MEDIUM The superintendent search subcommittee screened and interviewed candidates, and no notice or minutes of its meetings were located

Reporting at 1:56:58, the subcommittee chair said: “We advertise. We got, I think, eight resumes. The committee went through them. We sifted out what we believed were three very strong potential candidates. We conducted interviews via video conferences”. Asked who serves at 1:57:52, he answered “Myself, Mike and Frank Sprague.” Five citizens' comments that evening concerned the process, beginning at 0:17:24: “it seems like it has been a very opaque process”.

RSA 91-A:1-a, VI(d) makes "any committee, subcommittee, or subordinate body" of a school board a public body (statute text), so the subcommittee's meetings, including interviews, carry notice and minutes duties under RSA 91-A:2, II; interviews may be held in nonpublic session under RSA 91-A:3, II(b) on a proper motion, which itself must be minuted. Drive title searches on October 3, 2026 for the subcommittee's name and for search-related minutes returned nothing, and no subcommittee material appears in the 3/4 or 3/18 packets. That search tool has under-reported before, so this is "not located", and the limb applied is MEDIUM: the work was reported in public session, but the record shows no notice, agenda or minutes for the sessions where candidates were screened. From March 18 the subcommittee includes a member, Frank Sprague, who has left the board.

Sources: RSA 91-A:1-a, VI(d) (a committee or subcommittee of a school board is a public body); RSA 91-A:2, II (minutes contents, including start and end time as amended by 2025, 112:1, eff. Aug. 22, 2025; mover and seconder); RSA 91-A:3, I(b)-(c), II(a)-(b), III (nonpublic motion must state the specific exemption; discussion confined to it; seal only by 2/3 recorded vote in public session with a statutory determination); 3.18.26 approved minutes, Subcommittee Reports

MEDIUM The board accepted the SAFE grants without knowing their total, and no prior public hearing is recorded for the one described as over $60,000

The interim business administrator said at 1:43:43: “Some of the grants range between 11,000 to 17 000 per building. And this building is over $60,000”, and sought acceptance and signing authority (1:44:28). The chair asked “We have a total for how much these amount to.” and he answered at 1:44:45 I do not. No match is required (1:45:15). Whitney moved acceptance “as detailed in the attached, document provided by the administration”; it passed by voice vote at 1:45:51.

RSA 198:20-b, III(a) provides: "For unanticipated funds in the amount of $20,000 or more, the school board shall hold a prior public hearing on the action to be taken", with newspaper notice of the time, place and subject at least 7 days before (statute text). The same board posted exactly such a notice for a Kiwanis scoreboard gift over $20,000, heard on April 1, 2026 (Public Notice 4.1.26), which shows the district applies the threshold to gifts. No comparable notice or hearing for the SAFE grants appears in the 3/18 agenda, minutes or packet. Mitigation: the grant documents are in a Safe Grant Documents folder whose contents the Drive API could not list, so the per-grant amounts and the grantor were not checked; if the money was anticipated in the adopted budget, or no single award reached $20,000, the hearing rule would not apply.

Sources: RSA 198:20-b, III (unanticipated funds: prior public hearing with 7 days' newspaper notice at $20,000 or more; agenda and minutes notice below; 2023, 38:1, eff. July 18, 2023); Safe Grant Documents (packet); 3.18.26 approved minutes, SAFE Grants; Public Notice 4.1.26

MEDIUM The FY2023 audit had not started in substance by March 2026, and the board says it does not know the fund balance it began this year with

The interim business administrator reported at 0:46:12: “I've sent off the trial balance for 2023 to the auditors”; “I hope to have 2024 to them by Monday”; FY2025 “will be simple for me, as I use that year to figure out the deficit”. The new chair restated it at 0:48:36: “we don't have a good balance number to start the year”, and at 0:48:58 that the auditor and the business administrator expect “a balance of for June 30th, 2025. And we'll have that by July”. The packet's budget-to-actual report through February 28, 2026 shows appropriations of $39,714,564.00, expenditures of $22,242,030.84, encumbrances of $13,454,263.09 and $4,018,270.07 (10.12%) remaining (CSD 02.28.2026 GF Expenditures.pdf); the business administrator spoke the expenditure figure as “22,000,242 zero”, a fused-digit rendering. The same report shows the principal-payment line at $1,245,307.45 against a budget of $912,558.43 (36.46% over); no one mentioned it.

Under 2 CFR 200.512(a)(1) a single-audit reporting package is due no later than nine months after fiscal year end; for FY2023 (ended June 30, 2023) that was March 31, 2024, and for FY2024, March 31, 2025. Whether the single-audit requirement applies depends on federal expenditures reaching the 2 CFR 200.501 threshold ($750,000 for those years), which this record does not state, so the page grades this MEDIUM. For context only: 2026 N.H. Laws ch. 272, effective July 1, 2026, later required each district's audit report within nine months of fiscal year end on pain of losing state grant funding; it was not in force on March 18, 2026. The forensic audit engagement letter was with counsel for changes and expected to be signed that Friday ({R(290)}).

Sources: 2 CFR 200.512(a)(1) (single-audit reporting package due no later than nine months after fiscal year end); 2 CFR 200.501 (single audit at $750,000 in federal expenditures; $1,000,000 for fiscal years beginning on or after Oct. 1, 2024); 2026 N.H. Laws ch. 272 (SB 586), approved July 2, 2026, eff. July 1, 2026 (RSA 198:4-d, VIII: audit report within 9 months of fiscal year end; not in force on March 18, 2026); CSD 02.28.2026 GF Expenditures.pdf; CSD 02.28.2026 GF Revenue.pdf