NEW ROCHELLE, NY — School board members may be feeling a bit of whiplash this evening as the District has now had 3 people as Assistant Superintendent for Business & Administration in a month.
Frank Ferraro was “hired” by the New Rochelle Board of Education to replace Jeff White as Assistant Superintendent for Business & Administration. We had prepared a file on Ferraro who was run out of Kearney, NJ in 2014 with 2 years to go on his Superintendent contract.
Ferrarro resigns, takes buyout (10/28/2014)
Resolution 19-226, appointing Ferraro, was posted on BoardDocs but pulled a few hours ago after he “quit”.
We are now hearing that in addition to bringing back former Business Manager Lynda Greenbaum, and Treasurer Carol Amorello, the board is reaching into the Wayback Machine to re-hire Tom Ryan as Interim Assistant Superintendent for Business & Administration. Ryan, who left New Rochelle in 2007, was the predecessor to John Quinn.
UPDATE: the plan is to hire Ryan for a month which given the holidays hardly seems to serve much purpose.Still up in the air is who is working on the 2019-20 school budget while BOE President Jeffrey Hastie is on a European Vacation.
There was another resolution pulled this afternoon, hiring Greenbaum and Amorello from December 5th to December 28th. Amorello is now being extended to June 30, 2019.
Ryan goes way back with the pair: he hired Greenbaum as Business Manager and promoted Amorello to Treasurer during his first go round in New Rochelle.
Ryan has not worked in a public school system since 2007 when he left New Rochelle the first time. As a result, he has no experience working under the New York State Tax Levy Cap, he has no experience with site-based budgeting which is new, he has never worked with the Nvision Finance System the District now uses and otherwise will have a steep learning curve.
Ryan worked for 26 years in Shrub Oak before coming to New Rochelle in 2000. He “retired” from public schools in 2007 but went to work for another 5 years as VP of Finance at Manhattan College until 2012. He has mostly been living in Florida.
Ryan was in charge when the SAVE Legislation was passed. He put together a plan in 2002 which was not touched until after the Sandy Hook tragedy in 2012. Similarly, he failed to implement the RESCUE Law.