Claremont School Board, October 4, 2017 | The $1.2 million directive and the August aftermath

Participants

Everyone heard on the recording. Names follow the project roster and attribution report; there are no minutes to check spellings against. Organizers of the October 5 event who attended but did not speak are described, not named, except as members named them on the record.
Name	Role	Participation
Brian Rapp	Chair	Runs the meeting. Did not attend the September 30 budget session; presses colleagues to share their reduction ideas in public: “This is an open board meeting.” (1:07:05). Volunteers for the diversity subcommittee (2:01:28).
Chris Irish	Vice Chair	Explains the September 30 budget directive (0:45:09), proposes how members' budget questions should be answered (1:00:02), and criticizes the organizers of the October 5 demonstration (2:18:30).
Michelle Pierce	Member	Asks about the Stevens High School schedule timeline (0:16:24); moves the German exchange trip (0:40:02) and the policy third reads (2:32:22); asks for a full special education cost breakdown (1:11:57). Did not attend the September 30 session (0:42:25).
Frank Sprague	Member	Says “we've got a patient who is who's dying on the table” (0:50:40); asks about out-of-district special education costs (1:12:54); explains class-rank weighting (1:39:34); moves the policy approvals (2:30:30) and adjournment (2:40:59).
Patrick Adrian	Member	Asks how the community will share leadership on diversity (0:11:41), questions preschool expansion amid shrinking revenue (0:54:54), and defends the organizers of the October 5 event (2:15:47). He resigned before October 18.
Rebecca Zullo	Member	Supports the exchange trip (0:36:31), reads the budget directives (1:11:16), asks for cost per pupil (0:59:49), supports a parent opt-out from lead screening (1:53:48) and asks colleagues to lower the temperature (2:21:30).
Michael Petrin	Member	Reports the September 30 session's $1.2 million directive (0:42:25); asks for staffing by school (0:58:19) and the cost of bringing out-of-district placements home (1:21:22).
Middleton McGoodwin	Superintendent, SAU 6	Superintendent's report on the late-August events and a community plan (0:00:02); presents class rank (1:31:16), the lead-screening policy (1:47:12), the diversity plan (1:59:25) and conduct policies (2:24:55).
Cory LeClair	Assistant Superintendent, SAU 6	Reports on the Stevens schedule committee (0:18:15), the district's grant administrator (1:15:59) and the search for space for an in-district special education program (1:22:26).
Chris (surname not on record)	SAU 6 special education administrator (inferred)	Labeled Chris in the dialogue file and distinct from Chris Irish. Reports meeting the Brattleboro Retreat about a local satellite program (1:25:28). The assistant superintendent refers to “Middleton and Chris met with the folks from Brattleboro Retreat”; the role is inferred from the content, and the surname is not stated.
Michael O'Neill	Director of Business and Finance, SAU 6 (spelling per project roster)	Hands out a two-page sheet of 2016-17 actuals and 2017-18 spending to date (0:44:37) and promises an employee list by budget line (1:27:26).
Patricia Barry	Principal, Stevens High School	Recognized as Pat (2:02:07); speaks against the planned October 5 demonstration outside the schools (2:02:17).
Lexi Grenier	Student representative, Stevens High School (spelling unverified)	Self-identified “I'm Lexi Grenier. I'm a senior at Stevens.” (0:25:46). Gives the student report and speaks on class rank (1:41:52) and on the planned demonstration (2:07:34).
Unidentified teacher	German exchange program coordinator	Presents the 2017-18 exchange with the partner school in Altdorf (0:33:28); the name is not stated.
Unidentified	Various	88 of 895 dialogue rows (9.8%), including a procedural voice on how the policy readings should be voted (2:31:06).

Order of business (reconstructed)

No agenda survives. The superintendent refers to the agenda's numbering (Roman numeral seven B, at 2:32:52); the items below are reconstructed from the chair's transitions.
Taken up	Item	What was said and done
Not recorded	Call to order, roll call, agenda, minutes	Not on the recording, which begins mid-report.
0:00:02	Superintendent's report	Already under way: “Racism, bullying, however you wish to describe it.” Questions follow (0:10:38).
0:10:17	Agenda omission	Petrin: “we forgot to add the student rep report to our agenda.” The chair: “We can make room.” The superintendent apologizes (0:10:29).
0:25:34	Student representative's report	Lexi Grenier, senior at Stevens.
0:32:49	Citizens' comments	No one speaks; the chair closes the period (0:32:59).
0:32:59	Action item: German exchange program	Pierce: “make a motion to accept the trip for Germany and the fundraising for it.” Zullo: Second. (0:40:08). Voice vote, no tally announced (0:41:31).
0:41:51	Discussion: review of the September 30 budget study session	Report of the board's $1.2 million reduction directive; how budget questions will be handled. No vote.
1:31:12	Discussion: class rank	Consensus to have the administration study it: “I think we're all in agreement.” (1:46:40). No vote.
1:47:08	Revisiting the lead screening policy	The superintendent will bring a revised draft with a parent waiver to the next meeting (1:55:33). No vote.
1:59:23	Diversity plan	Subcommittee of administration and board volunteers Zullo, Rapp and Pierce (2:01:31). Principal Barry's statement on the planned demonstration follows. No vote.
2:24:41	Policies involving conduct and behavior	Sixteen policies presented for review; recommendations to come at the next meeting (2:25:53). No vote.
2:29:09	Action items: second reads (wellness; administering medication) and third reads	Sprague moves to waive a third read and give final approval to a list of policies, transcribed “JLC FJLCD wave third read and take gb ECI ge IHAMJLCKJLDJLIF and JLF2”; voice vote (2:31:46). After a voice notes the items are separate, Pierce moves the third-read group, transcribed “JLDJLIF and JLF for third read”; second unidentified (2:32:33); voice vote (2:32:39).
2:32:45	Future agenda items	FY19 budget items for October 18: “Study actual versus original number of new hires, staff list encumbrances by school and the budget for the tech center.”
2:40:59	Adjournment	Sprague: “I'd like to make a motion to adjourn.” Voice vote (2:41:01).

Discussion timeline

Times are taken from the dialogue transcript (Dialogue/9354 SchoolBoard100417.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.
Time	Topic	What was said	Flags
0:00:02	The late-August events	The superintendent describes “a great deal of community dialog and online dialog regarding the events of late August”, and says he put a series of conduct policies on the agenda because “one is 11 years old and others are 8 or 9 years old, and there's been changes in the law”. The goal is “to develop engagement”, and “this process is not going to be let's buy something and fix it.”
0:01:01	Recycled Percussion	The band's performance at Stevens on September 26 is described as “a $30,000 concert”; Petrin clarifies “We didn't pay that.” (0:11:23). WMUR is to air the episode October 6 (0:01:28).
0:11:41	Who leads the community conversation	Adrian: “we cannot do it alone”. Zullo asks who will organize community events; the superintendent: “I think I'm going to take the lead”. Irish: “please don't work to provoke or engage the larger audience until you have worked with those closest to the issue first.”
0:16:24	Stevens schedule timeline	Pierce asks whether the relaxed schedule timeline means the board will still see the plan before it is implemented. LeClair: a phased year-long plan with checkpoints, and the committee's “meeting minutes are posted” on the Stevens web page (0:19:32). The superintendent: the agreement “was signed in January 2007.” [January 2017, on his own later wording] and the final document “you, by the way, need to approve”.	POS
0:25:46	Student report	Recycled Percussion's visit, Community Service Day on September 27, a college visit by 36 juniors and seniors, the fall play, and a new Stevens Student Communication Club that “will partner with Claremont Community Television CCTV”. Irish later asks whether CCTV could rebroadcast the WMUR episode (0:31:55).
0:32:49	Citizens' comments	The chair: “It's great to have an audience.” No one speaks. Members later say that organizers of the next day's demonstration were in the room at that point (2:20:04).
0:33:28	German exchange approved	The coordinator: the exchange with a school in Altdorf, Bavaria, has run “for almost 15 years now”; German students visit around Easter and Claremont students travel in mid-June. Adrian asks whether policy already covers the fundraising; LeClair: the issue is “approving a overnight out of country trip”. Approved by voice vote (0:41:31).
0:41:57	The September 30 budget session	The superintendent thanks members “for putting these minutes together”. Petrin: “Brian and Michelle were not able to make it”; the board concluded that “Claremont taxpayers are a bit of a crisis” and resolved to cut “The 1.2 million, which would affect the tax rate about $1.70.” (0:42:57) without, he says, affecting students or teachers. Sprague: “we were unanimous on Saturday”.	OBS
0:47:39	The directives	Rapp: “one of the directives is no reductions in instructional staff”; Petrin and Sprague: “Without supporting data.” Zullo later reads the list: “no reduction in instructional staff without supporting debt and board approval, no additions to administrative or support staff without supporting data and board approval, no increase to the tech center budget or programs” [data].	OBS
0:52:39	Superintendent on the cause	“the past few years be increased in the tax rate has not been due to the budget. It's been due to the reduction in state aid.” “When we implemented full day kindergarten in 2015, our budget was $14,000 less than the previous year. Taxes went up.” A $1.2 million reduction “will be much more than that, because there are some uncontrollable fixed cost increases”.
0:54:54	Preschool expansion	Adrian worries about expanding programs while revenue shrinks, and that state full-day kindergarten money is being put into pre-K: “we're still not fully funding the kindergarten”.
1:00:02	How members' questions will be answered	Irish asks members to email questions rather than raise them all at the table, with answers going to all. The superintendent: “Problematic with the open meeting law?” “What we communicate to you outside of the board packet needs to be done publicly”. Rapp: answers “can also be tabulated and put in the packet for our next board meeting”; the superintendent: “what we receive in your packet, the community receives online as well”.	POS
1:03:49	Where would the cuts come from?	LeClair asks for the ideas members discussed on Saturday. Irish: “No, we shut it off Saturday”. Rapp: “you already gave a $1.2 million figure” and “it would be good for the public to know where you think”; “if we can do it in public meetings, should be done in public meeting”. Irish: “We're just not there yet.”	OBS
1:10:28	Areas named	Petrin: administrative assistant ratios and the outside technology contract (1:10:52). Pierce on special education: “I want a full breakdown right down to the last penny.” Sprague: out-of-district tuition and transportation, “that $2.3 million”, is local money, not grant money (1:13:15).
1:15:59	Grants	LeClair: the grant administrator works “2 to 3 days a week”; federal grants cannot supplant general budget costs (1:17:59).
1:21:22	Bringing placements home	LeClair: talks with the Brattleboro Retreat about a local satellite program and space in the One for All building, the goal being “a space that doesn't cost the taxpayers $2 million to get online”. Transportation for out-of-district placements runs “90 to $100 per kid per day” (1:26:59).
1:31:03	Responsibility	Irish: “Make no mistake, this crisis lays at the feet of our state reps past, present and future.”
1:31:16	Class rank	The superintendent: “If you take a fine arts course, if you're involved with instrumental music, if you take a tech center course, your points will go down.” Sprague explains weighted honors and AP grades and the alternative of honors groupings (1:40:37). The student representative: “I'm in, like, the top ten of my class” and expects not to be valedictorian because of band and choir. Irish suggests involving the alumni association, which gives most of the scholarships (1:45:22).
1:47:12	Lead screening policy	The superintendent: “the state law RSA 141 C semicolon 20-A.” [RSA 141-C:20-a] covers immunization against communicable diseases, and “The lead poisoning is not transmissible from person to person.”; he proposes “a revised draft of the lead screening policy that will allow a parent to opt out”. Rapp: “I thought Clermont was a universal testing” [Claremont]. Sprague calls one sentence of the policy “a real black eye on Claremont”. Zullo: “I don't feel comfortable telling any parent in this district that they are required to have a lead screening.”	OBS
1:59:25	Diversity plan	The superintendent proposes “a subcommittee” of board, administration and staff; Zullo, Rapp (“Sign me up.”) and Pierce volunteer.
2:02:17	The planned October 5 demonstration	Principal Barry: the event “comes from a good place”, but “the schools have never been contacted about this”, and students leaving at 2:06 may see “strangers, and potentially police presence, potentially media presence outside their school”. The superintendent asks publicly that organizers “take your energy and your interest with this difficult topic and join us” and “not demonstrate tomorrow”. The student representative: “This is the first time I've ever heard of anyone protesting”. Barry says the school has not yet addressed the August incident with the whole student body “because it's an ongoing investigation” (2:12:31).
2:15:26	Sidewalks and organizers	Rapp: the plan is to demonstrate “off school property on public property”, and “it's nothing the school can do to stop anything”. Adrian says the organizer, transcribed “Erica Ray was sitting there”, had attended and left. Irish, criticizing the organizers and a named resident, says “You are creating the anxiety by continuing to give them a forum.” (2:18:58); Rapp: “I looked right at them and made sure that they understood that they could speak.” Zullo: “it makes me sad and disappointed to see.” “Our chair and vice chair immediately jump on somebody”; Rapp: “I don't recall jumping on anybody.”
2:24:55	Conduct and behavior policies	The superintendent lists “16 policies involving behavioral conduct”: “Student conduct is eight years old. Bullying and cyber bullying is eight years old, as is hazing, public conduct and school properties 11 years old.” Revisions to come.
2:29:23	Policy votes	Second reads of the wellness policy and the administration of medication, adding insulin (2:29:23). Sprague's combined motion lists policy codes that the transcript renders as letter strings; a voice says the items “are separate, items on the agenda, so you should be doing them separately”, and Sprague asks, “Do you want me to rephrase it or would you like to just fix it in the minutes?” Two voice votes follow (2:31:46, 2:32:39).	OBS
2:32:52	Future agenda	For October 18: the saturation study, new hires against original numbers, staff lists, encumbrances by school and the tech center budget. Whether the preschool coordinator is a new position is debated; the superintendent: “So there were no additional positions.”
2:37:28	Other business	Sprague reminds members of the SAU 6 board meeting the next Thursday, 6 p.m. (2:37:40). Pierce asks for a board discussion of how the middle school handles bullying (2:38:58).

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 October 4, 2017, or is labeled an observation where no verified rule applies.

MEDIUM No agenda, packet or minutes survive, and the recording is missing the meeting's opening

MAP.md records no Drive material for this meeting: the district's shares hold no year folder older than 2022, and the Meeting Minutes share starts at 2023. The recording begins in the middle of the superintendent's report (0:00:02), so the call to order, the roll call, the adoption of the agenda and any minutes approval are not on the tape, and the agenda the members worked from is not available to compare against. RSA 91-A:2, II, in the text in force for calendar 2017, required minutes including the names of members and persons appearing and a brief description of the subject matter and final decisions, open to public inspection within five business days.

This page applies the MEDIUM limb of the project's severity rule because the record mitigates the gap: at its next meeting, on October 18, the board approved its October 4 minutes on tape, so minutes were produced. What is missing is any public copy now. Because the opening is missing, the minutes are also the only record of attendance and of how the agenda was adopted, including whether the student report the chair added by consent (0:10:17) was formally added.

Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II (2016 codification; text in force for calendar 2017)

OBSERVATION Which policies the board adopted cannot be determined from the recording

Two voice votes adopted policies at the end of the meeting (2:31:46, 2:32:39). The motions listed policy codes that the transcript renders as run-together letter strings, a voice pointed out that the items were separate agenda items that should be voted separately (2:31:06), and the mover asked whether the motion should be restated or the clerk should “just fix it in the minutes” (2:31:27). The chair then restated the second group himself (2:32:07). A reader of the recording cannot tell which policies received final approval and which went to a third reading. Under RSA 91-A:2, II the minutes must describe final decisions, so the October 4 minutes, which are not available, are the only record that could settle it.

Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II (2016 codification: minutes describe final decisions); Dialogue/9354 SchoolBoard100417.mp4.CSV (rows 722 to 768)

OBSERVATION A $1.2 million budget directive came from a Saturday session that left no recording in the archive, and its basis was not discussed in public

Members reported that a September 30 budget study session agreed to direct the administration to take about $1.2 million “off the top” of the proposed FY19 budget, worth about $1.70 on the tax rate (0:42:57), with no reductions in instructional staff and no additions to administrative staff without supporting data and board approval (1:11:16). Sprague: “we were unanimous on Saturday”. The chair and Michelle Pierce did not attend (0:42:25). The other five members, a majority of the board, attended and acted together; the superintendent's thanks for “putting these minutes together” indicates that minutes were kept. MAP.md has no section for a September 30 recording, and the Cablecast archive could not be checked from here (the server returned 403 on 2026-10-02).

When the chair and the assistant superintendent asked for the specific ideas behind the figure, the vice chair said the session had “shut it off” because there was no budget yet (1:04:07); the chair answered that “it would be good for the public to know where you think” (1:05:06). No rule verified for this page required a deliberative Saturday session to be televised, and members said the specifics would be discussed in public once the budget arrived. For a reader, the result is that the public record of this meeting holds the target and the directives but not the reasoning or the session itself; the September 30 minutes, not available, would show whether it was noticed and what was decided.

Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II (2016 codification: notice and minutes); Dialogue/9354 SchoolBoard100417.mp4.CSV (rows 177 to 286)

OBSERVATION The April lead-screening policy required documentation that the superintendent now says state law does not support

The superintendent told the board that the immunization statute he cited, RSA 141-C:20-a, covers communicable diseases, that lead poisoning is not transmissible, and that the policy's testing requirement cannot be enforced: “it's not enforceable” (1:48:44); he proposed an opt-out. The statute as in force on October 4, 2017 bears that reading: it requires immunization against listed diseases and, in a paragraph added by 2017, 137:1 effective August 15, 2017, provides that nothing in the section requires immunization for noncommunicable diseases. It does not mention lead screening. The chair's understanding that Claremont used universal testing (1:49:05) and his remark that state law requires doctors to test children (1:56:18) were not resolved on the record, and the April policy text is not available here.

The board responded to a resident's objection by reviewing the policy and asking for a revision; on October 18 it adopted a rewrite with an opt-out paragraph (see the October 18, 2017 page). The observation is that a requirement adopted in April was, on the superintendent's own reading, one the district could not enforce.

Sources: RSA 141-C:20-a (2017 codification; source note ends 2017, 137:1, eff. Aug. 15, 2017)

POSITIVE Members' budget questions were routed so the answers reach the whole board and the public packet

Rather than have answers to individual members' questions circulate by email, the board agreed that questions go to the superintendent and the answers are compiled into the packet for the next meeting (1:02:12), with the superintendent noting that what members receive in the packet the community receives online (1:03:23) and that communications outside the packet raise open-meeting concerns (1:01:05). RSA 91-A:2-a, II, in the text in force in 2017, provides that communications outside a meeting, including sequential communications among members, shall not be used to circumvent the spirit and purpose of the Right-to-Know Law. Publishing the answers goes beyond what that provision requires. The assistant superintendent also reported that the Stevens schedule committee posts its meeting minutes online (0:19:32).

Sources: RSA 91-A:2-a, II (2016 codification; communications outside a meeting)

Appendix: source files

Official and public sources

Cablecast: SCHOOL BOARD MEETING 10-4 (show 9354; run time from the Cablecast API not retrieved, the API and show pages returned 403 to the fetcher on 2026-10-02)
Google Drive: no packet folder, agenda or minutes. MAP.md: "neither share holds a year folder older than 2022, and the Meeting Minutes share starts at 2023 (checked 9/26/26)." Not searched again for this page, per the run instructions for meetings with no Drive material.
September 30, 2017 budget study session: no MAP.md section and no recording in the project's corpus; the Cablecast archive could not be checked (403, 2026-10-02).

Project files

Working files this page was built from. The dialogue file is linked; the others are not published with the page.

Dialogue/9354 SchoolBoard100417.mp4.CSV (895 attributed rows; the basis of this page)
Input/Videos/9354 SchoolBoard100417.mp4
Input/Transcripts/9354 SchoolBoard100417.mp4.json
Input/SupportingDocuments/MAP.md, section 42
Scripts/attribution_reports_2015_2023/9354 SchoolBoard100417.mp4.md (speaker attribution report)

Laws and rules cited on this page

RSA 91-A:2, II, 2016 codification (source note ends 2016, 29:1, eff. Jan. 1, 2017; the text in force for calendar 2017): notice, minutes content, five-business-day inspection
RSA 91-A:2-a, II, 2016 codification (source note 2008, 303:4, eff. July 1, 2008): communications outside a meeting
RSA 141-C:20-a, 2017 codification (source note ends 2017, 137:1, eff. Aug. 15, 2017): immunization requirements; no requirement for noncommunicable diseases