Issues of employee conduct and lawfulness, once taken for granted in the sleepy environs of New Rochelle, NY now threaten to crowd the customarily mundane springtime agendas of its school board.
What with issues of employee discipline and accountability and on-the-job accountability and performance for administrators, teachers and even its security detail, it is hard to see how the New Rochelle school board will be able to find time to continue to address the 2011-2012 budget.
Will the embattled Superintendent Richard Organisziak and his compliant New Rochelle School Board be able to keep their “eyes on the prize” as they seek yet another in an uninterrupted string of 12 or so budget increases since these questions were first placed before the electorate in the 1990s.
Voters more familiar with personnel costs, mandates, Tier increases and the like may have a tough time understanding New York State criminal law, administrative rules. Federal labor regulations etc. as the school administration begins to unravel the terrible trail of managerial failings and supervisory neglect that led to recent charges of criminal behavior by employees of the district. It remains to be seen whether a school board more accustomed to celebrating the likes of “Mr. McGillicudy’s award-winning ninth grade poetry curriculum” or “Ms. Epstein’s record-breaking girls’ modified lacrosse record” is capable of confronting serious accusations of law-breaking, child abuse and internal corruption.
Like one wag used to say about his favorite sport of hockey; “I went to a City Court. Criminal Division hearing and a school board meeting broke out!” Would that these matters affecting the welfare of our children not be so monstrous.
Look forward to a tumultuous season of the politics of New Rochelle’s school system. One would hope that once we are done with the district’s police blotter, there will be opportunity and public attention left suitable for consideration of their always-perplexing fiscal prognostications. It’s going to be a bumpy ride!