| 0:01:10 | Bus-driver recognition | A “108 pine tree” fell toward a bus of summer-program students; the driver chose to drive through, “and because of that, not a single student or adult was injured.” | |
| 0:04:38 | Citizens’ comments: the soccer-coach decision | Zutter: “I stand before you tonight simply to speak about one coach. Speak about something more larger than that. Trust.” St. Aubin at 0:08:01: “If that process is good enough now, why was it not good enough back in June?” Bernard at 0:11:21: “That’s disrespectful.” Zutter at 0:17:55 asked the board “what district policy govern this decision?” Saracino at 0:19:46: “I don’t want it to be an appointment of convenience again.” | OBSERVATION |
| 0:14:34 | Citizens’ comments: website and communication | Williams: last year the board documents “were all clearly labeled and in one folder”; now residents “have had to search high and low just to find the agenda”. “We’re already falling back in the gains that were made last year.” | |
| 0:26:45 | Auditor’s opening | Campo: “they’re not good reports.” “you don’t need to wait for the 25 and 26 reports are out to start making changes.” On grants: “a lot of these grants are falling out of their period of eligibility. And then the general fund is absorbing it. So what that means is that you’re asking your taxpayers to cover the shortfall of what should be coming from federal tax dollars.” Broadrick at 0:27:59: “we are talking about a couple million dollars a year.” | HIGH |
| 0:27:48 | Fund balance “that they didn’t have”; held checks | Campo: “for consecutive years, the school district put up use a fund balance that they didn’t have”. At 0:28:42: grant figures had to come from the state’s website because “The general ledger has not been maintained historically for the grants fund.” At 0:30:20: “The business office was holding on to checks. They were writing checks and holding on to them.” At 0:32:01: “no revenue posted for one of the periods.” | HIGH |
| 0:33:34 | Whitney’s 13 questions: engagement and delay | Five firms audit NH schools and municipalities (0:34:06); the board directs the superintendent to engage auditors, which “stopped happening in 16. And it was reintroduced in 19” (0:34:23). What the board could have done: “holding the business administrator at the time when I started accountable for for getting the audits done” (0:37:25). On FY24 and FY25: “The goalpost keeps being moved” (0:37:58). | |
| 0:39:11 | Disclaimers and the opening balance | “it’s going to take two years to get out of a disclaimer, okay, because you need to be able to rely on the opening balances” (0:39:55). Broadrick at 0:40:19: “until all of these audits are done and we can get you through one clean year, we’re going to have to keep saying we’re not sure.” Bank accounts keep surfacing; the auditors asked Claremont Savings Bank for a list (0:40:48). | MEDIUM |
| 0:41:40 | Policies that existed but failed | Campo on the fixed-asset policy at 0:42:12: “There’s no threshold.” He advises reviewing “every significant financial policy, once every three years” (0:44:56). Whitney at 0:48:22: the board makes policy; the administration creates the procedures. | |
| 0:49:16 | Manifests approved after the fact | Whitney reads the FY22 audit: the board “performed a retroactive review of the manifest monthly, rather than approving them prior to disbursement”. Campo at 0:50:14: “it was retroactive and it doesn’t comply with state statutes in terms of making sure that the board signs it.” Whitney: “So can a check be released without board approval?” Campo: “It shouldn’t be, no,” followed by “but it was repeatedly. Yes.” (the file places that line under Whitney). | HIGH |
| 0:52:31 | Reports the board was told could not be run | Whitney was told budget-to-actual reports were unavailable. Campo: “That’s completely inaccurate. They don’t make GL software for a municipality that that isn’t a function.” On the 2023 general fund “overdrawn by close to 800,000”: “General ledger maintenance and withholding checks.” | HIGH |
| 0:53:39 | How the fund balance drove the tax rate | Campo: business administrators “used a number for unassigned fund balance that they didn’t have. So what happens is when you raise the taxes in the community, you’re not raising that number, but you’re still raising the appropriation, so you’re still obligated to spend that money.” Crawford at 0:54:33 ties it to the MS-22. At 0:56:00: “not enough money was raised through taxes because of falsification.” Campo: “That’s a loaded word. But misrepresentation is a better word.” | HIGH |
| 0:57:34 | The treasurer’s role | Campo: an independent set of books reconciled monthly to the ledger would have forced timely cash balances; “that whole role was not utilized throughout this process.” At 0:59:42: on manifests, “do the vendors make sense?”; privacy claims about special-education items are, in his word, nonsense. | HIGH |
| 1:01:52 | Special education and purchase orders | Madden: “Is there any reason, reason that special ed doesn’t have to comply with the normal rules and purchase orders before?” Campo: “No, there’s no reason for that.” Madden: “Okay, well, that’s not what I was told.” | |
| 1:02:19 | Madden presses the auditor | Madden asks for documentation that the firm told the board it was not complying with the law. Campo: “I guess I did not come out in those words.” Asked how bad it would have to be before he resigned: “I’ll resign tonight if you want me to, but that’s up to you.” Whitney at 1:06:02: she and Campo held monthly meetings from March, and the business manager stopped attending. Crawford at 1:07:26: the audits were delayed by the 2016–18 backlog, turnover, COVID and wiped computers. | |
| 1:12:41 | Timeline for FY24 and FY25 | Expenditure testing across a three-year window is done. “Again we need records” (1:13:17). Crawford at 1:13:35: “on July 8th, we had one employee in the business office and she had been on the job for three months.” Campo at 1:15:01: “you have the federal clearinghouse for your single audit grant compliance. Even though they’re not good, they still want those there.” Whitney at 1:15:36: the forensic firm “required us to have our audits done before they can do their work.” | HIGH MEDIUM |
| 1:16:30 | Corrective actions start with purchasing | Broadrick: the first corrective action will be a purchasing procedure; controlling spending “doesn’t mean limiting spending. It means authorizing and keeping track of spending.” At 1:24:32: every employee will sign that they have read the procurement guide. | POSITIVE |
| 1:26:11 | Deputy treasurer | Diamond: “The appointment is with the school board’s approval.” A volunteer post (1:26:49). Appointed unanimously at 1:28:00. | POSITIVE |
| 1:28:14 | Treasurer’s reconciliation: payments he did not authorize | “all of the lines that are in red were. Were checks or EFTs that were issued this past month that I didn’t know about.” “The auto pen of the previous treasurer was used, even though she’s no longer the treasurer.” The superintendent “confirmed with our attorneys that this is in fact, quite illegal and we should not be doing this.” Broadrick at 1:31:27: staff believed a prior-year expense needed the prior treasurer’s signature; “That is incorrect.” | HIGH |
| 1:32:15 | Manifests withheld from the treasurer; backdating | Diamond: “I didn’t get it for 2024 [24] days later, even after repeatedly asking for it.” Broadrick at 1:32:52: “These are public documents and they must be shared with the district treasurer.” Diamond at 1:33:16: “there seems to be a practice of backdating checks”; “that appears to me to be, falsifying public records because these are public records.” At 1:34:28: checks 353966–353970 to Dead River “were all issued on the 31st” and “all dated April 30th.” | HIGH |
| 1:36:19 | FY27 grant allocations and September 30 | Kennedy: “we have until September 30th to make sure all of our 2425 grants are in order”; November 14 for Department filings. Allocations per the minutes: Perkins $94,851.72; Safe and Supportive Schools $262,308.48; Title I $1,104,604.39; Title II-A $212,877.42; Title IV-A $141,311.40; total $1,815,953.41. Broadrick at 1:42:13: about $2.4 million with IDEA and preschool, and “I stood in front of you in June and told you that there was something on the order of maybe almost $2 million unclaimed for last year”. “Can’t not won’t, can’t.” | HIGH |
| 1:45:08 | Why September 30 | Broadrick: 2024–25 money “won’t all get spent and it won’t all get claimed”; small activities are being written off; unclaimed money “ends up in the tax rate where it doesn’t belong”. | HIGH |
| 1:47:21 | Wit and Wisdom curriculum | Kennedy: board-approved K–5 program; a grades 6–7 pilot could be grant-funded, but “we would have to fund that locally” if adopted. Lavalette at 1:59:30: teachers may not have every required text. Cost at 2:03:20: Broadrick, “Order of magnitude plus or -200,000”; Kennedy, workbooks “about $25 a student”. Madden at 2:07:59 asks for curriculum documentation; Kennedy offers a walkthrough at 2:10:03. | |
| 2:10:30 | FY26 budget v. actual | The FY26 excess rose as encumbrances were released (transcribed “about 4,000,362” two weeks earlier, “4,000,592” now); “I am not reporting to you tonight that we’re going to end a fiscal 26, more than $4.5 million to the good”. Payroll is “the number one most important function in the business office.” Crawford at 2:16:17: Bluff lines left in place; supply lines zeroed “because we had to cut the budget.” | |
| 2:19:28 | Line items and functions | Madden asks for footnotes on the changes. Broadrick: “changes to an approved line item budget should not be made.” Transfers between functions will come to the board by memo and vote. At 2:25:55: “Three months into the year, you should see 85% of the budget spent or encumbered.” | |
| 2:26:56 | Electronic manifests | Current manifests are “hard to read. I look at lump sums that aren’t itemized.” A PandaDoc sample from another SAU; “Make sure that the gross numbers are higher than the net numbers. I wish I were making this up.” “I have seen over 100 right to know requests here in the Claremont School District.” Madden at 2:31:34: “by the end of September, this is how we’re doing manifests.” | HIGH |
| 2:31:48 | Forensic audit; biweekly pay | Procurement procedures “by, if not before September 2nd.” Forensic audit signed in May; the $10,000 deposit check was never cashed, and the firm has “been acquired by another company.” On the $50,000 authorized: “I think you’ll be lucky to get that done for 50 grand.” Pay divided by 27, starting August 14. Whitney at 2:38:53: the SREA agreement “hadn’t gotten shared with members.” | |
| 2:39:27 | Buses and McKinney-Vento | One bus deemed unsafe, one totaled in the Newbury incident with a Primex claim pending, one damaged in the yard ($1,000 deductible). At 2:44:04: “We don’t talk about a bus replacement cycle when we prepare the annual budget. We just call the saw [SAU] when we need a bus”. Crawford at 2:44:46 on homeless-student transport: “I believe it’s probably still 500 a day.” Broadrick at 2:45:14: “If you want to talk about unfunded mandates, put this one high on the list.” | OBSERVATION |
| 2:45:14 | Hiring and reopening | 44 hires since July 1 against four resignations; all schools open on time; openings for special-education teachers in every school; CMS at 24 certified or certification-eligible teachers. | |
| 2:54:35 | Athletics; business office | “I have also not found evidence since 2023 of the superintendent even approving or signing contracts for coaches. That is not consistent with state law or regulation.” Mr. Beaupre to run high- and middle-school athletics with written evaluations filed centrally. On the business-administrator candidate: “That topic in detail is exempt from public discussion because the negotiations are pending”, “which is one of the reasons I included one of the letter codes next to the proposed motion to go to nonpublic tonight.” The SAS grant would cover 90% of a new wellness director. | OBSERVATION MEDIUM |
| 3:08:43 | Elementary start times | “you will note this is marked confidential. I didn’t post it online”; buses serve Disnard first, then Maple. A member at 3:10:54: “We have to do that in nonpublic.” Broadrick at 3:11:10: “as soon as we approve it, it’s going to become public.” Consensus at 3:11:27. | |
| 3:14:03 | Nominations and alternative certification | “certified staff are nominated by the superintendent and appointed by the board.” Twelve new nominations. At 3:15:25: the district paid a consultant “a $17,000 a year contract” for alternative-certification support; “I did not sign that contract for fiscal 27.” Frontline hiring workflow at 3:18:26; step placement for vocational teachers at 3:24:11. | POSITIVE |
| 3:27:01 | The 3–3 vote | Broadrick: “If you have a specific concern, we do need to go to nonpublic.” Madden at 3:27:26: “We had a motion on the floor in a second. We had discussion. So now we’re just going to abandon the vote.” Crawford at 3:28:06: “So if the motion fails, it fails.” At 3:28:32: “the motion fails and we will talk about it in nonpublic.” | MEDIUM |
| 3:28:48 | Non-certified hires; job descriptions | “I hired these three people who are non certified staff.” If the board wants to appoint other positions, “pass a policy that says you want that”. Wellness director position approved at 3:33:29; curriculum director job description at 3:35:27. | |
| 3:36:11 | Dress codes, handbooks, compliance calendar | Madden: no agreed dress code after “well over a year.” Broadrick at 3:37:42: “Handbooks need to be approved annually.” Whitney at 3:39:49 asks to revive the prepopulated agenda approved in March 2025. Broadrick at 3:40:46: a draft state calendar of “all of the things that must be done by regulation or law.” | OBSERVATION |
| 3:41:51 | Motion to enter nonpublic session | “I’d like to make a one, a three, a, C and E.” Roll call at 3:42:09: five Yes responses audible. An unidentified voice at 3:42:23: “are you going to take action on personnel?” The recording ends. | MEDIUM MEDIUM |