Tonight's meeting of the Portsmouth School Committee was mostly good news: one of our excellent students won first place in an Island-wide essay contest, our excellent teachers are being recognized by both Wal-Mart and grant agencies (including our new IT Director, Rose Muller, who helped score a major tech grant) and we finally have in place a new Director of Finance and Administration, Chris Tague.

[Update: original post had the wrong name here. My profound apologies. -jm] Savannah Geasey's essay, "The Pride of Ignorance," won top honors among all high schools on the Island in the Aquidneck World Affairs Essay Contest. It is a grim picture of the realities of global warming: "Examine more closely the genocide currently occurring in the Darfu region of the Sudan. A laregly misunderstood conflict, the tribal war was sparked in the 1980s when climate changes due to global warming altered the region's water supply...In survival situations as such, culture clash becomes inevitable." Congrats to Savannah and all the senior finalists, and the teachers who helped this all happen.

One of our own Hathaway teachers, Kelly Goss, was selected as the local Wal-Mart teacher of the year, based on letters of recommendation written by her students. She won $1K, and the Wal-Mart folks showed up with a giant check, "Kind of like Publisher's Clearinghouse," joked Superintendent Susan Lusi. The money will go to Hathaway for new books.

Colleen Jermain had a long list of good news as well: the Middle and High School have received a Doce Grant to increase science background knowledge, including $1K for science equipment, and teachers will be working with Dr. Ballard at URI over the summer. The Department of Ed awarded the High School a major technology grant — 20 new computers, digital camera, scanners — in support of the new Senior Project requirement. IT Director Muller and tech guru Gail Darmody deserve the kudos for scoring that. Several teachers were also recognized for their outstanding work on the Chemistry curriculum and early childhood ed.

Sometimes, I wish I could just stop writing there. Wouldn't it be nice to have a meeting that was just good news for a change? Sigh.

The School Committee, preparing for their meeting with the Town Council tomorrow night, got an update from Lusi and Tague on their discussions about warrant items with Town Admin Bob Driscoll and Finance Director Dave Faucher. First, Lusi cleared up some miscommunication.

"It is not the case that we haven't been using the money," said Lusi of the building warrants. It had been erroneously reported that there were large unexpended sums in the building warrant, but their conversation with the Town had cleared that up. "The town doesn't see [the cost] until it's expensed," Lusi explained, and while they had projects on the board — many with POs — for $330K, the Town just wasn't aware of them.

Tague also said that she had brought some ideas from her years on the municipal side to the discussion with Driscoll and Faucher. She said they had discussed stretching the payback on the building warrants to 10-15 years to ease the budget impact, and stressed the importance of keeping these items intact. "Rating agencies may look unfavorably at us if we put the maintenace off — they may see pressure on our operating budget." I was quite impressed with Ms. Tague, who seems to have done an admirable job of getting up to speed on a complex situation quickly, and is already adding value.

The situation on the Tech warrant side is dire. All funds, said Lusi, are encumbered, with the exception of $367. With costs for software licensing — not new software, just one year of maintenance costs — at $100K, this item alone could be a killer if it has to be brought into the operating budget. And that doesn't include $115K in tech hardware (to replace aging systems) or $100K for new textbooks.

"We have one history text," said Finance subcommittee chair Dick Carpender, "That only goes up to the landing on the moon."

Hey, you know what? Given how much current events feel like we're living through a Tivo-fast-forwarded-replay of 1969, maybe that's not such a bad thing. But let me tell you. I knew John Mitchell. John Mitchell was a friend of mine. Gonzo, you're no John Mitchell. But I digress.

So parents, citizens, if you care about our schools, please be there tomorrow night to support restoring of the warrant items to the Town budget.

One glimmer of hope: Dr. Lusi proposed the recall of two nurses and a librarian and guidance counselor to the elementary schools, based on the increased population from the retention of the 5th grade. This is the item I intend to call on Tailgunner Gleason to support, given her insistence that the Council prioritize safety.

And check this out — if the schools do not recall any teachers that they end up needing by the end of the school year, those teachers are eligible for unemployment. And guess who pays for that unbudgeted expense. Yep. The schools. Finance Director Tague estimated the costs at $13K/week, putting the cost of a whole summer at over $100K.

Marge Levesque suggested that the School Committee urge the Town to move up their final budget vote. "The other Town departments — none of them have the time crunch we have," she said, urging them to communicate to the town the risk of wasting 13K/week. "Can we be more forceful?"

"We can beg," suggested Dick Carpender.

In the No Fucking Sense of Humor Department, Loudy Factmangler asked the committee for the results of the evening's executive session. "No votes were taken," said Chair Sylvia Wedge, who then asked for a motion to seal the minutes, and joked, "And I guess we should destroy the tapes."

"You shouldn't have said 'destroy the tapes,' warned Fatmoonass. "That's against the law."

No kidding. It was a joke, Larry. Your folks just dragged these people in front of the AG because they forgot to report out an Exec Session, and I suspect you will try to make hay out of tonight as well. Wedge was making a little joke to cover their embarassment. Do you understand embarrassment, or the potential to regret an occasional memory lapse? Do you understand human emotion? The emotions of higher primates? Or is it all just a plot. Collusion. Scheming in dark rooms. Paranoid ideation.

And tell me this: how come your buddies on the School Committee didn't do the right thing and remind everyone they needed to report out? These folks are essentially citizen volunteers, and unlike you, Larry, they may occasionally forget the fine points. So why didn't Buddemeyer, or Heaney, or Wilkie just say, "Hey, we forgot to report no votes in Executive session." Could they have forgotten too? No? Then is this just a trap you're waiting to spring at every meeting from now until doomsday? Because, man, that will get old pretty fast.