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Nauset Regional School Committee

    EDUCATION

    School Committee Did Not Know About Bullying Scandal

    Administration’s ‘lack of transparency’ is called ‘mind-boggling’

    By

    ORLEANS — Nauset Regional School Committee members said on March 2 they had no idea the U.S. Dept. of Education’s Office for Civil Rights had investigated the high school and found that the administration had failed to follow its own grievance process for harassment based on race, color, or national origin.

    The federal complaint was filed in 2019 by Sandy and Will Rubenstein, who said their daughter Mia was taunted by classmates and by a teacher for being Jewish throughout her freshman year (2018-2019). In March 2021, after an investigation, the Nauset district agreed to conduct staff training on diversity and rewrite its policies on harassment.

    While Supt. Tom Conrad, now retired, nominally complied with the settlement agreement by conducting staff training, none of the staff knew why the training was taking place, the Independent reported on Feb. 9.

    The school committee was not informed either.

    “Am I the only person who didn’t know that this was going on?” asked Cathryn Lonsdale, a committee member from Brewster.

    Several other members said they also didn’t know.

    “Why?” asked Lonsdale. “Why weren’t parents and the school committee made aware that there was an investigation going on?”

    Chair Chris Easley of Wellfleet said all he knew was that in 2019 Sandy Rubenstein sent an email to committee members about her daughter being harassed. Mia said that students sent her pictures of Hitler and of concentration camps and of a student with a swastika on her forehead. She was called a “filthy Jew.” The email said the Rubensteins had taken Mia out of Nauset High, Easley said.

    “But as far as any type of investigation, that was never brought to us,” said Easley.

    “Well, I find that mind-boggling,” Lonsdale said.

    Judy Schumacher of Orleans said she and Easley are the only current members who were on the committee in 2019.

    “My recollection is the same as Chris’s,” Schumacher said. “We were assured that the situation had been dealt with. Did we ask tough enough questions? Perhaps not. But I don’t recall being given the opportunity.”

    Lonsdale said, “There clearly was a lack of transparency, and it would appear that everything was swept under the rug.”

    Easley said it is “difficult to dissect a situation” that occurred a while ago and involved people who are not now present like Conrad and former Principal Chris Ellsasser.

    The committee had asked Robin Millen, director of curriculum, instruction, and assessment, to make a presentation on the current diversity work being done in the district’s schools.

    Millen titled her presentation “A Vision for Improving Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging at Nauset Public Schools.”

    The school hired diversity consultants to provide professional development in 2021-2022, Millen reported. This year the staff is working with the organization Dignity Consulting.

    Millen said staff are being trained to review textbooks for discriminatory content and to be sensitive to diverse perspectives. Millen said she had spent the day with the first group of about 30 teachers doing in-depth training.

    Dick Stewart, a committeeman from Orleans, said the training seemed focused on adults. “The students — I don’t see too much in here,” he said.

    Millen said there are plans to involve students as well. “I do think we need more of that,” she said.

    FINAL FOUR

    Finalists for Nauset Superintendent Include Clenchy

    Visits to the four candidates’ districts will be followed by public forums

    By

    ORLEANS — The Nauset Regional School District Superintendent Search Committee has named four finalists after interviewing seven from among a field of 17 candidates. The district’s 15-member expanded search committee, made up of parents, students, teachers, and administrators, announced its choices in an open Zoom meeting on Saturday after a closed executive session. They had deliberated for four hours.

    “To get 15 people to come to consensus is a rich process,” said consultant Patricia Grenier, a former Barnstable school superintendent, who was hired to facilitate a search that has been officially underway since Oct. 5, 2021.

    All meetings leading to the final selection will now be conducted in open session. The state’s Open Meeting Law does not allow screening committees to meet in executive session after they have chosen finalists.

    Brooke Clenchy, Nauset’s interim superintendent, is one of the finalists. The others are Sara Ahern, the current superintendent of the Franklin Public Schools; Andrea Schwamb, the assistant superintendent of the Wareham Public Schools; and Frank Tiano, former superintendent of the public schools in Chelmsford and later Uxbridge. The resumes of the finalists are posted under the “Superintendent Search” link on the district’s website.

    “It’s important to me that Nauset gets the right leader, whoever that is,” said Clenchy after the finalists were announced. Clenchy started as interim superintendent this past July. Over the last six months, Clenchy said, she has worked on creating a school committee handbook that will be adopted next month and on a strategic plan and vision for the public schools moving forward.

    Schwamb said she’s looking forward to having the screening committee members visit Wareham, where they will get to meet people who know her well. As assistant superintendent, she said, she implemented the International Baccalaureate program in 2017 and has found that, since then, students are more “actively engaged in their own learning.”

    Ahern is also a candidate for the superintendent’s position in Barnstable Public Schools, as reported by the Franklin Observer on Jan. 4. She is currently in her third year of a six-year contract in Franklin.

    In the Observer article, former Franklin School Committee member Jen D’Angelo expressed disappointment that Ahern was leaving, saying “the consistency and commitment in leadership” the contract implies was “one-sided.” The current school committee vice chair Elise Stokes, however, defended Ahern, saying, “Franklin has been fortunate to have a dedicated superintendent who understands effective education, policy, operations, and long-range planning.”

    Neither Ahern nor Tiano was available for comment before this week’s deadline.

    Over the course of the next two weeks, three of the six core search committee members will visit the candidates in their districts. There, they expect to meet with parents, staff, and faculty to better understand the candidates’ performance. The three are Chair Gail Briere, who is also chair of the Orleans School Committee; Martha Gordon, chair of the Wellfleet School Committee; and Judith Schumacher, vice chair of the Nauset Regional School Committee.

    Two teachers on the search committee, Eloise MacLelland of Nauset Regional Middle School and Lisa Brown of Nauset Regional High School, will visit separately. And Briere said the committee will encourage another parent, teacher, administrator, or staff member to accompany the group as well.

    In Saturday’s open session, the screening committee members debated whether the visits — historically on-site and in-person — should be done online instead because of the pandemic.

    “I’m really torn,” said Briere. Some members worried about giving an unfair advantage to candidates who allowed an in-person visit if others didn’t; other committee members lamented the possible loss of the nuanced view an in-person visit provides.

    “We have got to go to the schools and see our person in their environment,” said committee member Richard Stewart.

    Orleans Elementary School Principal Elaine Pender agreed. “The intangible things you collect from those experiences give so much more depth to what those candidates have told you,” she said.

    As of Sunday, Grenier confirmed that all four finalists had given permission for an in-person visit.

    After the visits are complete, the candidates will visit the Nauset School District by turns from Jan. 20 to 25. They will tour two or three schools, meet the administrative leadership, and be present at an open forum where students, staff, and parents can questions publicly ask questions.

    “We’re still working out the logistics to try and make it hybrid, so that if there are questions from people who don’t want to come in live because of Covid, they would still have an opportunity,” said Grenier.

    The Joint School Committee, which consists of all 30 members of each town school committee plus the regional committee, will conduct final interviews with the candidates on Jan. 27. They have yet to decide whether the interviews will happen in person or on Zoom.

    On Saturday, Jan. 29, the committee members will meet to deliberate in an open session and announce their choice for superintendent.

    SCHOOLS

    Nauset Superintendent Pick Expected by End of January

    What to expect when you’re selecting

    By

    ORLEANS — A new superintendent for the Nauset Regional School District is expected to be announced on Jan. 29 at a 9 a.m. meeting after finalists’ interviews are conducted in public on Thursday, Jan. 27.

    Leading up to that, January will be a marathon of meetings, many of them closed to the press and public, during which the search committee will comb through 17 applications to whittle them down to two or three finalists.

    To understand the selection process, it helps to get a picture of the bureaucracy that governs a regional school district.

    The four district towns — Wellfleet, Eastham, Orleans, and Brewster — send children to the district’s schools. Each town has its own elementary school and its own elementary school committee.

    The middle and high schools are regional, and one regional school committee governs both of those schools.

    The superintendent, who oversees all of these schools, is hired and supervised by yet another entity, the joint school committee. The joint committee includes members of all of the elementary and regional school committees.

    A six-member search committee, which includes members from the elementary and regional bodies, is in charge of the meeting marathon ahead.

    Following closed meetings on Jan. 4, 5, and 6, the finalists will be selected on Jan. 8, at the end of a five-hour executive session, the last of the closed meetings in the series, said Kathleen Spencer, the consultant hired by the Nauset District to guide the search process.

    The finalists will be named publicly after that — as soon as “their viability for and continued interest in the position is confirmed,” Spencer wrote in an email.

    Though the public-school superintendent hiring process must be conducted in open session, the Mass. Open Meeting law allows private meetings “to consider or interview applicants for employment or appointment by a preliminary screening committee if the chair declares that an open meeting will have a detrimental effect in obtaining qualified applicants.”

    Between Jan. 13 and 18, members of the search committee, which is chaired by retired Orleans Elementary School Principal Gail Briere, will visit the finalists in their current jobs, presumably in schools, for a half day each.

    The finalists will visit the Nauset schools between January 20 and 25.

    The next meeting, held in open session, will be on Tuesday, Jan. 25 at 8:30 a.m. via Zoom, during which the search committee members will refine their interview questions and outline the interview process.

    On Jan. 27 — the exact time has not been announced — the search committee and the Nauset Joint School Committee will interview the finalists and vote to select a new leader. Interim Supt. Brooke Clenchy has said she is among the 17 applicants and would like the job.

    To attend the public meetings, go to nausetschools.org and follow the links provided under the subheading “about” and click on “superintendent search.”

    The Independent could not find recordings of past public search committee meetings. Spencer said she too was unable to locate them.

    EDUCATION

    Nauset High Principal Will Not Be Back

    A ‘very sad’ Ellsasser says he lacked support

    By

    EASTHAM — Nauset Regional High School Principal Chris Ellsasser announced last week that he was resigning as of the end of the school year. His replacement will be chosen by a newly hired district superintendent — who will be selected in the next several weeks.

    Ellsasser wrote in an email to parents and students on Wednesday, Dec. 22: “I will not be returning next fall to serve as the principal of our high school…. I want to thank each of you for playing your part in immersing our kids in such a caring and dynamic community where striving to be your best each day is the norm.”

    He told teachers the same day during a staff meeting preceding the Christmas break.  He said he received a standing ovation and many hugs afterwards.

    Chris Ellsasser at Nauset Regional High School’s homecoming dance this fall. (Photo Nancy Bloom)

    But so far, Ellsasser, 56, is the only one who is talking publicly about why he is giving up the job of principal of the largest school on the Outer Cape after four years.

    He told the Independent on Dec. 23 that the district administration’s decision to give him a one-year rather than the standard three-year contract last spring prompted him to look for a new school.

    “As a school administrator, or any leader, one of the things you are looking for is a multi-year contract,” he said. “That is a show of confidence in and support for the work you are doing.”

    Ellsasser was hired in May 2018 by now-retired Supt. Tom Conrad. At that time, he signed a three-year contract. But when it was time to renew the agreement, Conrad offered him only a one-year contract.

    Conrad then retired in June after serving for 21 years as principal of the high school and six years as superintendent. This week, Conrad declined to comment on his reasons for a move that he surely knew would force Ellsasser’s hand.

    The current interim Nauset school superintendent, Brooke Clenchy, who started in July, said she could not discuss “personnel specifics” with a reporter.

    Ellsasser, a 1982 graduate of Nauset High, made it clear that leaving was not what he wanted.

    “There is no one who thinks I didn’t love my job at the high school,” Ellsasser said. “It is very sad to me.”

    The 10-member Nauset Regional School Committee does not hire or supervise principals, said chair Chris Easley of Wellfleet. Clenchy said, “School committee members are an excellent source of information for a superintendent, and they often provide helpful guidance, suggestions, and support. They do not hire or fire general school district employees.”

    Nonetheless, Easley said he does know enough to say that “Chris was treated fairly.”

    Easley added, “All anyone wants to do is the best for the school.”

    Amy Roberts, head of the Nauset Educators Association — the local teachers’ union — would not comment.

    Clenchy, who began the one-year interim superintendent job on July 1 at a salary of $190,000, now has a magnifying glass on her as a candidate for the permanent job of superintendent.

    “I have every interest in a full-time position,” she told the Independent in May, a month after the search committee selected her from a pool of 19 candidates. The other finalists were Jane Daly, assistant superintendent of the Chariho Regional Schools in Rhode Island, and Frank Tiano, superintendent of the Uxbridge Public Schools.

    The search committee for the permanent position has received 17 applications, Easley said. They are expected to announce finalists on Jan. 8, Clenchy said.

    Conrad was the last of the four-town Nauset school district’s long-term leaders.

    Keith Kenyon is the first-year principal at the middle school, and Patrick Clark is the new assistant principal at the high school. The high school is about to become a massive construction site, with a $131.8-million renovation beginning next year.

    “You hate to have so many moving parts,” said Easley.

    Ellsasser grew up in Eastham. Other than being a Nauset graduate himself, he was an unusual choice as principal of a public school. After graduating from Brandeis, he moved to California in the late 1980s when his wife, an attorney, got a job offer there. He worked at Pepperdine University in Malibu as a writing tutor and, after getting a doctorate in education from Columbia Teachers College in 2000, he became an associate professor of education at Pepperdine for seven years. He also took English teaching positions in California schools and coached soccer.

    Ellsasser said he and his wife are committed to social justice. He encouraged his Pepperdine students to become inner-city educators in Compton, where his wife was a public defender.

    After 25 years in California, they moved back to Massachusetts to help care for his wife’s father. He spent six years as director of studies at Lawrence Academy, a private school in Groton. In 2015, he joined the faculty of the progressive Cambridge School of Weston, where he was academic dean.

    Ellsasser said he was inspired by the late educator Ted Sizer, former dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, founder of the Coalition of Essential Schools, and one of the founders of the Francis W. Parker Charter Essential School in Devens. Ellsasser said he has read the book The Students Are Watching: Schools and the Moral Contract, written by Sizer and his wife, Nancy, numerous times. “It is about how kids learn by who their teachers are,” Ellsasser said.

    He said Nauset staff have modeled “collaboration, growth, and innovation, and none of that has subsided, even during this crazy time.”

    Ellsasser said has been looking at leadership positions in public and private schools, as well as collegiate jobs.

    EASTHAM: THIS WEEK'S CURRENTS

    Transitional Trailer Transaction

    Meetings Ahead

    By

    Most meetings are being held in person, but some are still remote or virtual. Go to eastham-ma.gov/calendar-by-event-type/16 and click on the meeting you are interested in to learn about meeting locations and any remote options that may be offered.

    Thursday, Dec. 16

    • Council on Aging Board of Directors, 9:30 a.m., Council on Aging
    • Cape Cod Commission, 3 p.m., virtual
    • Board of Health, 3 p.m., Town Hall
    • Nauset Regional School Committee, 6 p.m., virtual

    Monday, Dec. 20

    • Select Board, 5:30 p.m., Town Hall

    Tuesday, Dec. 21

    • Historical Commission, 10:30 a.m., Library
    • Elementary School Committee, 4 p.m, virtual

    Conversation Starters

    Transitional Trailer Transaction

    The Nauset Regional School Committee may soon be the proud owner of 37 pre-owned modular classroom trailers, courtesy of the town of Lincoln. The deal, which has been in the works for months and is needed for renovations to get underway at Nauset High, “almost fell through,” School Building Committee Chair Greg Levasseur said at the school committee’s Dec. 7 meeting. “But we rescued it at the last minute,” he said. “Put it on life support.”

    The two parties had tried and failed to complete the transaction by each issuing requests for proposals, but the “legal eagles” nixed the plan, said Levasseur.

    The school building project manager, however, discovered an exception in Massachusetts procurement law. Now, representatives from Nauset and Lincoln can legally sit in a room and negotiate the price of the trailers. At the meeting, the committee voted to nominate as chief negotiators Giovanna Venditti, the district’s director of business and finance, and Griffin Ryder, a member of the regional school committee.

    If everything goes according to plan, the modular classrooms will be in use this fall when Buildings N and E, which house administration, special education, foreign language, science, and math, will be under construction.

    Kathleen Tringale, a building committee member and science teacher at Nauset, said the shifting teaching spaces have affected schedule planning for next year, and that administration is “constantly counting and recounting” how many courses can be offered. “The move feels challenging,” Tringale said, speaking for fellow teachers. “But they know the end result is going to be awesome.”

    Tringale and Tom Faris reported they were excited by a recent visit to West Bridgewater Middle and High School, which was built by Flansburgh, the architect hired for the Nauset project. “Some of the little nooks that they have for students everywhere looked like they were very effective,” said Tringale. Faris was interested in the communal areas. “I think the way the community spaces are grouped together works extremely well,” he said, also noting as a positive the proximity of the gym to the cafeteria and the auditorium. “The new performing arts center,” he added, “is something that the community is going to be really proud of.” —Cam Blair

    OLD EXIT 12

    Sherman Defeats Hastings in Brewster Vote

    School choice petition fails at Orleans town meeting

    By

    BREWSTER — Sarah Harlow Sherman won a one-year term on the Brewster School Committee in the May 25 town election by defeating Rheanna Hastings. The vote was 1,675 to 839.

    Cathryn B. Lonsdale and Richard Charles Draper, with 1,914 and 1,658 votes, respectively, were elected to the Nauset Regional School Committee (NRSC) over Dion C. Dugan, who got 736 votes.

    Hastings, the Independent reported on May 20, had at one point this spring been named Lower Cape team captain for the United Cape Patriots, a politically conservative group that was recruiting candidates for local school committees.

    Citizen petitions aimed at reducing school-choice out-of-district enrollment in the Nauset Regional Schools failed at both the May 15 Brewster town meeting, in a 144-75 vote, and at the May 25 Orleans town meeting, by a vote of 152 to 49.

    Both petitioned articles sought to reduce school-choice enrollment to 2 percent or less of the total student population and asked that Truro and Provincetown, which are not in the Nauset Regional School District but send many students to its schools, to pay a share of operating, capital, and debt service costs. The two towns are currently paying tuition of about $18,500 per student under an agreement that runs through the 2023-2024 school year.

    The articles’ proponents had argued that per-student costs far exceeded the approximately $5,800 per-student reimbursement from the state for out-of-district students other than those from Truro and Provincetown. They claimed that district taxpayers were subsidizing the program by more than $4 million a year.

    “The frustrating thing with numbers is that you really can make them say whatever you want to say,” said NRSC member Josh Stewart at the Orleans town meeting. “The committee has looked at the supposed costs of school choice every year. It’s determined that there is zero additional net cost to the schools. We are making money off of school choice, and we are providing a higher-quality educational program at the high school because of it.”

    He noted that the NRSC holds a public forum each spring on school choice and a vote on school choice is taken at every school. “A nonbinding referendum at a town meeting isn’t really the place to discuss this,” Stewart said. “So, we’d love to have more of you at our school committee meetings. Come, check out our numbers, talk to us. But this right here is not going to do anything productive for our schools.”

    OLD EXIT 12: BREWSTER ELECTION

    Critic of ‘Liberal Mob’ Recruits School Board Candidates

    Two in Brewster have links to Lange’s United Cape Patriots

    By

    BREWSTER — Voters will have an array of school committee candidates to choose from at the May 25 town election, including one who wants to reduce the number of school-choice students enrolled in the Nauset School District and one who is opposed to diversity initiatives in schools.

    Rheanna Hastings, 38, is running for the Brewster School Committee for a one-year term against Sarah Sherman. Dion Dugan, 63, is competing against Richard Draper and Cathryn Lonsdale for a one-year term on the Nauset Regional School Committee.

    The Nauset district includes four towns: Brewster, Orleans, Eastham, and Wellfleet, and many Truro and Provincetown students attend the district schools as well.

    Dion Dugan, candidate for Nauset Regional School Committee.

    In speaking with the Independent, both candidates distanced themselves from the United Cape Patriots, run by Brewster resident Adam Lange, whose group hosts rallies featuring speakers such as Dave Kopacz of Ware, president of the Mass. Republican Assembly. At a May 2 Brewster rally, Kopacz said, “There are tyrants and perverts going after your kids now. They are changing your curriculums … Populate your town boards.”

    Lange would not confirm Dugan’s or Hastings’s association with United Cape Patriots, saying it’s up to them to reveal any connections. “I would caution Rheanna to be very careful speaking to the liberal media,” Lange added. “The liberal mob is so evil and so full of hate. It’s a scorched earth approach, what they are doing to her online.”

    Before the 2020 presidential election, Lange rode around in a military-style vehicle with Trump signs. Since the election, Lange has been leading an energetic campaign to recruit “Cape patriots” to serve on town committees and boards.

    “Run for School Committee in any of our Cape Cod Towns!” Lange wrote on Facebook in January. “This is a rare opportunity to have influence over what is being taught in the schools in your district. We share many of the same concerns about sex education and the redefining of our history in our schools.”

    United Cape Patriots have held training sessions for recruits and have appointed team leaders for each region of Cape Cod. At one point this spring, Hastings was named as team captain for the Lower Cape.

    In a recent newsletter, the Cape Patriots listed events planned in May. One on May 24 at the Nauset School Administration building in Orleans is titled the “Let Our Children Breathe Protest.” It promotes “bodily autonomy, parental choice and medical reform,” according to the newsletter, and appears to be basically a protest of required mask-wearing.

    Hastings’s name was recently removed from the United Cape Patriots website and newsletters, said Brewster resident Sky Freyss-Cole.

    “My biggest issue is how disingenuous she is,” Freyss-Cole said.

    Hastings is from Duluth, Minn.; she moved to Brewster less than a year ago. A mother of four, she told the Independent in January that “tolerance, diversity, curriculum, and mental health” are her main issues.

    “I think tolerance goes both ways,” she said. “I’m trying to empower people at the table so it’s a fair process. So, whatever the solution is, there is an option for the marginalized group.”

    When asked her own political views, she called herself “nonpartisan” regarding school issues.

    But in January the Cape Patriots listed her as the contact person for anyone interested in “demanding an alternative” to the effort by the Nauset Regional Middle School to create a diversity subcommittee and implement Learning for Justice, a program, formerly known as Teaching Tolerance, of the Southern Poverty Law Center.

    Hastings sent emails out in March as a representative of the United Cape Patriots asking people to become involved with the Brewster Taxpayers Association and with a new group called the Cape Parents Community Coalition. One speaker at an April coalition meeting was Michael King, director of Community Alliances for the Massachusetts Family Institute, which works to “strengthen and preserve marriage between a man and a woman.”

    Rheanna Hastings, candidate for Brewster School Committee.

    Hastings could not be reached for comment this week.

    When Hastings asked to put a campaign sign on Freyss-Cole’s lawn, the candidate presented herself as a nice mom with four children but was not open about the agenda revealed in her posts on the United Cape Patriots website, Freyss-Cole said.

    Hastings canceled her appearance at a candidate forum in Brewster and blocked on social media people who tried to get her to explain her views and relations with the United Cape Patriots, Freyss-Cole said. When you’re running for a public office, “people are generally forthcoming. It’s disrespectful to the community,” Freyss-Cole said.

    Dugan, who is a former member of both the regional school committee and the Brewster Finance Committee, said he is not a member of the Cape Patriots, though he did vote for Trump, and he did allow Lange to park his camo-colored truck in front of Dugan’s property on Route 6A during the election.

    “I know Adam and I like Adam,” Dugan said.

    But, Dugan added, his purpose in wanting to be on the school committee is to persuade state lawmakers to increase by $10,000 the per-pupil reimbursement for school-choice students. The current $5,800 per-pupil reimbursement does not cover costs, he said. Nauset Regional High School attracts about one-quarter of its student body from other districts.

    RENOVATION DEBATE

    Easley Challenges Brewster Committee’s School Cost Numbers

    School choice program is attacked and defended

    By

    EASTHAM — Members of the Nauset Regional School Committee have taken issue with a report on the high school building project that asserts that eliminating — or substantially reducing — the school choice program could save between $4 million and $5 million a year in operating costs.

    The calculation was included in an unsigned document published online last month and titled “Subcommittee Report to Brewster FinCom Finalized January 2021.” The members of the subcommittee are not named, either in the report or on the Brewster town website, but the report has been cited by critics of the proposed $132-million renovation, including in an op-ed in the Feb. 11 issue of the Independent by former school district treasurer Bill Dugan of Wellfleet.

    nrhs
    The windowless room where an architecture class meets at NRHS, photographed during a 2019 tour of the campus. (Photo Ryan Fitzgerald)

    Nauset School Committee Chair Chris Easley said last week that the Brewster report is misleading. “I challenge the committee in question to get an accountant to certify their analysis,” he said at the committee’s Feb. 11 meeting.

    “I don’t know where anybody comes up with the $5 million,” said school committee vice chair Judith Schumacher. Schumacher said that amount would represent the salaries of more than 50 teachers. Estimating that between the middle school and high school the district employs 135 teachers, she said, “I really don’t think we can get rid of half of our staff.”

    Opponents of the high school renovation plan argue that Nauset’s high percentage of school choice students is driving the scale of the project, which is planned for 905 students. The high school’s enrollment last year was 921, of which 219 students, or 24 percent, came through the state’s school choice program. Opponents argue that the choice program should be phased out and a smaller school built.

    The Mass. School Building Authority has approved a $36.6 million grant for the renovation, which would bring its cost down to less than $96 million for the four towns of the school district, Brewster, Orleans, Eastham, and Wellfleet. The state grant is contingent on a favorable vote on the project at a district-wide election scheduled for March 30. Lawn signs supporting and opposing the renovation (or “expansion,” as “vote no” signs refer to it) have been popping up in the four towns.

    The 16-page Brewster finance subcommittee report uses 2018 data from the Mass. Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) to calculate a per-pupil cost based on that year’s expenses of $29,551,080. That figure includes costs of all school district departments for both the middle and high school: administration; operations and maintenance; teachers; benefits and fixed charges; pupil services; guidance, counseling, and testing; instructional materials and technology; professional development; other teaching services; and instructional leadership.

    In 2018, the Nauset district served 1,468 students, and, according to the DESE, the per-pupil cost was therefore $20,130.

    The Brewster finance subcommittee report came up with a higher per-pupil cost of $25,162 “per member town pupil.” The authors then take the difference between the two figures, $5,029, and multiply it by the number of in-district students to arrive at $5,139,506. This amount, they assert, represents the “total annual subsidy burden to member towns.”

    The authors then adjust that total downward to $4,724,579, deducting $414,927 to account for students from Truro and Provincetown, who are not school choice pupils but whose tuition is paid by the two towns under an agreement with the Nauset district.

    The bottom line, according to the report, is that the district would save about $4.7 million per year without having to “subsidize” school choice and tuition students.

    “These are not made-up numbers,” said Brewster Finance Committee Chair Peter Dahl, who stood by the report’s findings at a Feb. 8 meeting of the Brewster Select Board. “These are the numbers reported by the Nauset Regional School Committee to the Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education.”

    Meanwhile, a report released by the Nauset district’s superintendent’s office last month asserts that the school choice program generates revenue for the district. That report estimated that the cost of additional teachers needed to accommodate the 198 school choice students for the 2020-2021 school year was approximately $644,085. Projected school choice revenue is $1,549,403, the superintendent’s report states. According to the DESE data, that revenue projection would be for all school choice students enrolled in the Nauset district for the year — so, including both middle and high school students, a total of 257.

    “You can claim you need to do a marginal analysis,” Dahl said, “but the cost of over 30 percent of your students, 20 percent being choice, is not marginal, it is material.” His committee voted against the high school project 5 to 3 last month.

    Brewster’s select board did not go along with the finance committee, voting 4 to 1 in support of the renovation.

    In his op-ed essay, Bill Dugan wrote, “Bigger is not better. Bigger is just more expensive,” in urging citizens to vote no on March 30.

    At last week’s regional school committee meeting, member Richard Stewart defended the school choice program. What’s at risk without it, he said, are “the very characteristics that make the school great.” At Nauset High School, he said, “They don’t take a cookie-cutter curriculum; they have an incredible, rich array of courses. This is the part of choice that some of the critics ought to look into.”

    Stewart added that he believes that’s the reason the school ranks high in comparison with others across the state.

    SCHOOLS

    Nauset Board Sets HS Vote for March 30

    Critics say district-wide vote on renovation is ‘undemocratic’

    By

    NRHS
    The Nauset Regional School Committee has set March 30 as the date for a district-wide vote on rebuilding the high school. (Photo Linda Culhane)

    EASTHAM — The Nauset Regional School Committee voted 6 to 1 on Jan. 7 to set March 30 as the date for a district-wide vote on the $131.8-million renovation of the regional high school, with Orleans committee member Josh Stewart casting the dissenting vote.

    “I apologize if it’s going backwards some,” said Stewart, who had voted on Dec. 10 to approve the district-wide vote. “I’m curious if there’s any kind of official support from the four towns’ finance committees and boards of selectmen as far as changing to this one vote option.”

    The renovation project has been in the works for years. But the committee’s decision to have a district-wide vote has sparked criticism, especially from those who say the school should be much smaller and cost much less to rebuild.

    Responding to Stewart, Nauset Supt. Thomas Conrad said he had not met with town finance committees or select boards.

    “It was a big decision a year ago, and I think it’s an even bigger decision this year given budget shortfalls in most of our towns,” Stewart said on Tuesday. “We need to make sure the selectmen and finance committees are on board as partners with us. Letting this thing sit and stew for a year has brought up some people that are concerned about it.”

    Stewart said he still supported the project and understood the need to shift to a district-wide vote. “The single date makes sense,” he said. “Unfortunately, we cannot guarantee that we’re going to be able to pull off four town meetings and four town votes in the time frame that the state requires, during a pandemic.”

    The committee had planned to take the project to town meeting voters last year, but the postponement and uncertain scheduling of town meetings prompted it to defer the votes until 2021. Now, with a May 31, 2021 deadline on the project’s $35.6-million Mass. School Building Authority grant, and uncertainty about the dates of this year’s town meetings, the committee voted unanimously last month to hold a district-wide vote. Both the building project expenditure and the debt exclusion question would be voted on simultaneously in all four towns and decided by the cumulative vote.

    “We couldn’t put this $36 million [state grant] at risk because we didn’t know if town meetings and in turn town elections were going to occur in an orderly fashion this year because of Covid,” said committee chair Chris Easley. “The greatest way to tick off the voters is to lose the $36 million.”

    Kavanaugh Speaks

    Reading from a prepared statement during the “citizens speak” segment at the beginning of the meeting, Brian Kavanaugh of Orleans urged the committee to rescind its decision.

    “First, the changed process violates well-established Nauset past practices,” he said, citing a $6.5-million replacement of windows, doors, and roofs at the school that was approved by town meetings in 2011. “Second, the change in process represents a failure to honor its word with respect to how voter approval has been sought since the project’s conception, and it is also a basis upon which you received over a million dollars to perform design,” he said.

    Kavanaugh is a retired commodities trader and former member of the Nauset Regional School Committee. He warned of potential pitfalls of a district-wide vote, naming the 2018 Dennis-Yarmouth district vote on a $117-million middle school project, which passed by a narrow margin, with Dennis voting 1361 to 876 in favor and Yarmouth 1502 to 1955 against.

    “Their project resulted in great inter-town discord and landed them in court,” said Kavanaugh.

    “There is a contradiction between how you were elected to this committee and how you are seeking approval of your project,” he said. “You were not elected by the four towns. You were elected by a single town, with responsibility to represent your town’s interest.”

    At that point Kavanaugh was cut off by Easley because he had used up his allotted two minutes of “citizens speak.” A bid by another resident to yield his own two minutes to Kavanaugh was rejected by Easley.

    “I don’t think that’s how citizens speak works,” he said. “We’re not in the middle of a meeting and you’re not yielding to somebody else that’s participating in the meeting.”

    Stewart said that, while he understood the spirit of the two-minute limit, he would like to see citizens allowed time to voice their concerns, even if they take three minutes. “It doesn’t seem to be in the spirit of a school to be shutting down voices,” said Stewart.

    “To be clear, Josh, it’s not my rule — it is the rule of this committee,” said Easley, adding that speakers could request time to appear before the committee and be put on a meeting agenda.

    Kavanaugh said afterward that he planned to ask to be put on the committee’s agenda to give a presentation, along with Bill Dugan of Wellfleet.

    In a recent letter to local newspapers, Dugan, a former Wellfleet town administrator and former treasurer of the Nauset school district, advocated the “phasing down” of the school choice program by not accepting new out-of-district pupils.

    “Nauset voluntarily accepted 290 Choice Program pupils in FY 2020 into our Middle School and High School from outside of the Nauset District,” Dugan wrote. “These Choice students will not pay for their share of the cost of enlarging the high school. Their presence hugely inflates the building costs for Nauset taxpayers.”

    According to the Mass. Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) website, the Nauset district’s school choice enrollment was 290.9 in 2020, 314.7 in 2019, and 348.9 in 2018. While not comparable to the DESE numbers because of a different reporting date, the Nauset School District reported school choice enrollments as of Oct. 1, 2020 of 198 at the high school and 60 at the middle school, with 23 Provincetown and 60 Truro students paying tuition to attend.

    Nauset receives $5,000 per school choice student and approximately $18,000 per student from Provincetown and Truro.

    “The number of pupils drives all the costs,” Dugan told the Independent. “Both the operating budget and the capital budgets — which are construction budgets. Obviously, the larger the school population, the bigger building you need.”

    The Nauset High renovation is designed for an enrollment of 905 students. According to the school district’s enrollment records for 2020, there were 877 students at the high school.

    Dugan recommended building a smaller high school based on the number of students who live in the four-town district.

    “I would welcome Truro and Provincetown joining Nauset,” said Dugan. “I think it’s the logical thing to happen. Now, I think they’re reluctant to join, because they have a better deal as nonmembers than they would as members. As members, they have to pay their share of building the new high school. As nonmembers, they don’t have to pay anything.”

    Dugan agreed with Kavanaugh’s opposition to the district-wide vote, calling the change “undemocratic.”

    “Each town should have the opportunity, as we have had in the past, to vote twice, so we have the opportunity to ask questions on the floor of the town meeting and also have the benefit of the secret ballot vote [for the debt exclusion],” said Dugan. He predicted a small turnout of voters in March, saying that many residents will be away at that time.

    SCHOOLS

    District-Wide Vote Set on Nauset High Renovation

    Hanging in the balance is $35 million in state funds

    By

    EASTHAM — In an effort not to lose a Mass. School Building Authority (MSBA) grant of $35.6 million that’s contingent on voter approval of the proposed $131.8-million renovation of Nauset Regional High School, the Nauset Regional School Committee voted on Dec. 10 to hold a district-wide vote on the project in late winter or early spring 2021 and to rescind a prior vote to bring the project before voters at spring town meetings.

    The MSBA grant is set to expire on May 31, 2021. It was initially approved in February 2020, and two extensions were granted. A recent request by the school district for a third extension was denied.

    The project was expected to be on town meeting warrants last spring, but those meetings were postponed due to the pandemic.

    The Nauset Regional School Committee voted on Dec. 10 to hold a district-wide vote on the project in late winter or early spring 2021. (Photo Ryan Fitzgerald)

    “We got on this road so that we would have a partner in the expenses for this project,” said committee chair Chris Easley. “So, we have to make sure we continue in keeping those funds available to us.”

    The committee agreed to place a $98 million code-only upgrade on the spring town meeting warrants as well, a fallback option if the renovation project is rejected by voters. The code-only upgrade would not qualify for funding assistance from the state.

    “My one concern with it is we lose that traditional sales pitch opportunity on the floor of the town meeting,” said committee member Josh Stewart, “where you do have a captive audience of voters, to show them the hard facts of a $96 million renovation versus a $98 million code upgrade, and what we’re getting from the state versus the possibility of having to pay it all out of pocket.” Stewart was referring to the $96 million balance of the $131.8 renovation after subtracting the $35.6 million state grant.

    Easley said there would be plans for virtual forums to inform voters about the project, including possible live television programming. “We’re working on the publicity end very hard,” he said.

    According to the MSBA website, the high school renovation project would create 214,250 square feet of educational space and would “address a number of deficiencies identified by the District in their Statement of Interest, including deficiencies in all major mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems; and structural issues. In addition to the physical plant issues, the District reported insufficient square footage, overcrowding, and accessibility concerns.”

    School reopening was delayed this fall until repairs could be completed to the ventilation system after an inspection found some fans were not providing proper air exchange. The campus reopened on Oct 15.

    “If the pandemic has done nothing else, it’s shown that we can’t continue just putting Band-Aids and bubble gum on the school,” said committee vice chair Judy Schumacher. The budget and finance subcommittee, said Schumacher, had concluded that something had to be done this year, given the “dire need” of renovations to address the health and safety of the students.

    “That leaves us with only two options: either we do the current renovation project and get substantial reimbursement from the state, or we do a code upgrade option with no reimbursement,” she said.

    Eastham Town Administrator Jacqui Beebe said on Monday that the district-wide election would be held simultaneously in all four towns and would be decided by the cumulative vote of the population of the district. A debt exclusion vote would also be held at that time on a separate ballot.

    REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK

    Covering Schools Can Make You Batty

    By

    On Aug. 6, when the Nauset Regional School Committee met with all four elementary school committees in the district, nearly 100 people were on the Zoom meeting. That’s the size of some town meetings. Only there was no public participation allowed. The time was needed for questions from the school committee members, and, believe me, they were numerous.

    Everyone sat for almost four hours while plans were unveiled and vetted for elementary, middle, and high schools. Then, just a week later, Nauset Regional Middle School Principal Julie Kobold changed the plan. Instead of returning to classrooms on Sept. 16, the middle school would follow a “hybrid” plan, with students in the building two days per week. That’s the same — currently — as the high school’s plan.

    It was somehow symbolic when a bat found its way into Eastham Town Hall midway through the meeting. It flew in panicked circles around the school administrators.

    When at long last the meeting ended, my two high-school-age daughters and three of their friends peppered me with questions: What about lunch and MCAS? How will the students be divided into cohorts? Have the teachers mastered Google Classroom? They want to know what in-person education will be like as much as they want to know what the quality of virtual instruction will be.

    When I said I didn’t have many answers, they couldn’t believe all that time yielded so few details.

    The truth is, details were in short supply. What the adults had talked about all that time were a lot of what-ifs, especially what if a case of Covid were to be found at school? There were a lot of arguments against returning to classrooms full-time, and there were not many answers.

    Supt. Tom Conrad said decisions about staying open or going remote will be guided by the number of cases in the community. But that’s clearly not the only factor, because Barnstable County’s consistently low number of cases didn’t stop Kobold from reversing course.

    In Provincetown, which of all the Cape’s districts has the most space for students to keep a safe distance from each other, the administration has pushed off a return to the classroom until at least the end of September. That decision, says Supt. Suzanne Scallion, will be based on research published in medical journals.

    The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that social distancing, hand washing, disinfecting, cohorting (separating into groups), and community case data should guide decisions to return to work and to school.

    There is talk of data. But our emotions are on edge. It’s becoming clear that no matter how long we talk, what we are doing is guesswork. The bat is not the only creature flying around in panicked circles.

     

    LEARNING

    Nauset PreK-8th Grade Plan: Back in Buildings Sept. 16

    Nauset High will try a hybrid of remote and in-person classes

    By

    EASTHAM — Nauset Regional High School students will attend school twice a week and stay home for remote learning on the other three days, while the plan for preschool through eighth grade in the district — Wellfleet, Eastham, Orleans, and Brewster — is to return to classrooms five days a week beginning Wednesday, Sept. 16.

    Unlike in the spring, when online learning was limited and there were no grades, courses will be graded and attendance enforced, Supt. Tom Conrad told members of the five school committees during a Zoom meeting on Aug. 6.

    The four-hour meeting had about 100 participants and was broken up when a bat entered Eastham Town Hall and dive-bombed Conrad and Nauset Regional School Committee Chair Judy Lindahl.

    The reopening of the district schools includes a requirement that all students — even those in preschool — wear masks, though there will be mask breaks: designated times when students can be outdoors with a plan for safe distancing from each other. Children will have assigned seats on buses and in classrooms.

    The eight-day-late start will give teachers time to prepare for a challenging year, said Conrad.

    High school educators must be prepared to teach both remotely and in person at the same time. All staff will add policing social distancing and mask-wearing to their job descriptions.

    Meanwhile, the Cape and Islands teachers’ unions are opposing a full return to classrooms, and pushback came from some school committee members from all four towns. Martha Gordon, of the Wellfleet committee, asked why schools will return to business as usual when everyone else in town government still works from home.

    Conrad responded, “We have depended on information from a variety of medical directors and they are going to be giving us additional information, but they are of the opinion that, if we can follow the guidelines as discussed, our staff and students will be safe.”

    Of all the schools in the district, only the aging high school is too small to allow all the students to return with the minimum three feet between desks required by the state, said Principal Chris Ellsasser.

    How small is it? Only four sets of bathrooms are currently monitored and usable in the entire campus serving 900 students, Greg Levasseur, chair of the Nauset School Building Committee, told the Independent. The school district will be asking voters to pay for the renovation of the buildings at upcoming town meetings.

    Parallel Processing

    High school students will be separated into two groups based on grade level, Ellsasser said.

    One group will attend school in person on Mondays and Tuesdays, everyone will work at home on Wednesdays, and the other cohort will come to school Thursdays and Fridays. Wednesday will serve as a cleaning and disinfecting day, with few students in the school. The exception will be “high needs students,” who are learning English, on individual education plans, or have certain socioeconomic needs. They will be allowed to attend school on campus four or even five days a week, with each case to be decided individually, Ellsasser said.

    Ellsasser said remote learners will follow the same schedule as students participating in the hybrid model. Everyone will attend four 80-minute classes each day, whether in person or online.

    The classes will be live, so remote learners will watch their teachers as they teach students in person.

    Ellsasser said the school is trying to have the online experience and the hybrid experience be synchronous.

    “When friends who are at home are going to lunch, you’re going to lunch,” he said. “When you’re on a mask break, the other students are on a screen break. So the experiences mirror each other.”

    Either/Or for Young Students

    Hybrid models were not recommended at the middle school or elementary schools. Children will have the option to attend school five days a week or learn remotely five days a week.

    The middle school will switch from hour-long blocks to five 100-minute classes each day, with breaks in-between, according to Principal Julie Kobold. She said the school is doing away with the use of lockers.

    Google Classroom and Google Meet will be the platforms for online learning at the high school and middle school.

    At the elementary level, kindergarten through grade 2 students will use a platform called Seesaw, while students in grades 3 to 5 will use Google Classroom, according to Wellfleet Elementary Principal Mary Beth Rodman.

    “Students working remotely will still be submitting assignments and receiving feedback,” Rodman said.

    An initial survey of families received 1,269 responses districtwide, with a large majority — more than four out of five — wanting to return to in-person learning. Just 182 families (14 percent) preferred a remote learning plan, Conrad said. Five percent were unsure.

    Eleven families said they still need internet access while 82 families said they need increased bandwidth to be able to participate. Twenty percent said they would need child care should a remote or hybrid plan move forward, Conrad said.

    Many What Ifs

    Cape Cod has not seen a major increase in Covid-19-positive tests despite an influx of visitors, said state Sen. Julian Cyr of Truro, who is on the Cape Cod Reopening Task Force. Following a small bump after July 4, new positive cases have numbered between 3 and 10 per day throughout Barnstable County, Cyr said Aug. 6.

    But the Cape and Islands Educator Action Network, which includes Cape teachers’ unions, wrote a letter arguing that reopening should be phased in slowly.

    “I’m extremely sympathetic to families needing child care, but we also want all kids and staff brought back in the safest way possible,” network president Cheri Armstrong, a Monomoy middle school teacher, told the Independent. “For us, we have to be sure that it is safe. And that’s the MTA’s slogan, ‘Only when it’s safe.’ ”

    Students’ reactions reflect fear of reopening combined with extreme dislike of remote education.

    “Whatever measures they can take, there will be a lot of issues,” Will Mulholland of Chatham, president of the Nauset class of 2022, told the Independent. “My friends are concerned for their family members, so people are scared. On the other hand, a lot of people want to get back to being in contact with their friends. For me, remote learning was a struggle. It was not the same thing. But you have to weigh knowing that the community is safe and moving on with our lives.”

    School committee members asked how the schools would react to a positive case, and at what point the schools would be shut again. Conrad said he was awaiting further guidance on that, but reiterated that there are many unknowns.

    “The one thing we would all agreed on,” he said, “what we thought we knew today, will change tomorrow.” That’s something he says he’s getting used to. “We were taken aback by the number of families who wanted to go back to school,” Conrad said. “We have to be nimble and shift.”

    currents

    This Week in Eastham

    By

    Meetings Ahead

    Meetings are held remotely. Go to eastham-ma.gov/calendar-by-event-type/16 and click on a particular meeting to read its agenda. That document will provide information about how to view and take part remotely.

    Monday, July 13

    • Select Board, 5:30 p.m.

    Tuesday, July 14

    • Conservation Commission, 6 p.m.

    Wednesday, July 15

    • Planning Board, 5 p.m.

    Thursday, July 16

    • Dog Owners Association, 6 p.m.

    Conversation Starters

    Covid-19 Update

    As of June 27, the number of confirmed cases in Eastham was 10. The number of cases has remained at 10 since June 4.

    Special Election

    The select board voted at its June 29 meeting to approve a special election to be held after annual town meeting on Oct. 6 from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.

    The town budget will be voted on and all petitions submitted for May town meeting will be carried over without having to resubmit. The warrant will open up again on July 13 for two weeks in order for any new petitions to be submitted. New petitions will need 200 signatures.

    School Committee and Anti-Racism

    The Nauset Regional School Committee will meet via Zoom on Thursday, July 9 at 6 p.m. The agenda includes a discussion of the Mass. Association of School Committees (MASC) Covid-19 and anti-racism suggested resolutions.

    The MASC is encouraging all Massachusetts school districts to consider the resolutions locally and forward them to Gov. Baker and state representatives for implementation, according to a statement on its website.

    The resolution related to Covid-19 includes a request “that the state must guarantee every school district full reimbursement for whatever Covid-19 expenses are required to follow state mandates.”

    The resolution related to anti-racism requests that “every district will incorporate into their curriculum the history of racial oppression and works by black authors and works from diverse perspectives.”

    It also includes a request that “all the school districts in the Commonwealth must guarantee that racist practices are eradicated, and diversity, equity and inclusion is embedded and practiced for our students, families, faculty and staff.”

    Housing Plan Resumes

    The project to construct a 20-unit apartment development consisting of four single-story townhouse buildings along Route 6 will come before the planning board again for site plan approval on Wednesday, July 15.

    Tim Klink of Coastal Companies is proposing the construction, which also includes a swimming pool, at 4615 and 4655 State Highway.

    After working out a plan with neighbors of the property, Klink will not use Wiley Lane as an outlet for the condominium project but instead has developed an access point from the state highway with a turnaround for fire vehicles.

    Bridge on Bridge Road?
    An open span bridge was the alternative roadway design that received the most attention during a virtual public forum on June 24 on Eastham’s low-lying roadways. The project team, which includes Conservation Agent Shana Brogan, Town Planner Paul Lagg, DPW Director Silvio Genao, and Adam Finkle of Woods Hole Group (WHG), is wasting no time in trying to vet possible design alternatives for the four roadways determined as being most susceptible to flooding in the coming decades.
    Alternatives presented by Finkle included an embankment blanketed with “100 percent biodegradable erosion control matting” planted with coastal grasses and shrubs. The embankment would be made of earthen material that’s placed and compacted for the purpose of raising the grade of the roadway. All approaches will eventually involve elevating the roads, though just how much will be determined later in the process.
    The bridge proposal would be most appropriate for Bridge Road, Finkle said, where it could improve tidal flow and result in ancillary benefits to the large salt marsh in the area. But it would need longer design and construction lead times and improvements would be costly.
    Area resident James Arnold said that because Boat Meadow marsh was cut off by construction of Bridge Road it fills regularly. “My concern,” he said, is that “water is going to continue to rise and undercut the shorelines all the way around the entire marsh. If we don’t open this marsh up and allow for the natural flow of the water through the entire marsh by building a raised, expanded bridge along Bridge Road, then we’re really just wasting money and pushing out the problem a little further down the road.”
    Though action is needed on all four roads, Bridge Road and Samoset Road have been prioritized based on feedback from the public.
    Finkle said the team submitted an application to the state coastal zone management office (CZM) to fund a next phase of this project to include stakeholder engagement, modeling of proposed plans, and draft engineering design plans for sections of Bridge Road and Samoset Road.
    If the grant is awarded, that work will begin in September. —Ryan Fitzgerald

     

    RENOVATION

    Nauset Asks for High School Project Extension

    The district has filed for a 120-day extension for project voting

    By

    EASTHAM — The Nauset Building Committee has requested an extension from the state of the deadline for getting four towns’ approval for the proposed renovation of Nauset Regional High School.

    The Mass. School Building Authority (MSBA) voted to endorse the project on Feb. 14. State regulations give the district towns (Brewster, Orleans, Eastham, and Wellfleet) 120 days from that endorsement to secure approval for the expenditures at town meetings and elections. The 120-day window expires on June 11.

    The building committee held a virtual meeting on April 8 and the regional school committee did the same thing the following day to discuss the project.

    Gov. Charlie Baker has signed legislation giving towns the ability to reschedule town meetings up to or beyond June 30, the last day of the fiscal year. Town elections can be rescheduled for as late as June 30.

    The district towns have begun some tentative rescheduling of town meetings and elections because of the coronavirus pandemic.

    Town Town meeting Town election
    Brewster TBD June 23
    Orleans June 15 June 23
    Eastham June 15 June 23
    Wellfleet June 1 TBD

    Some towns have rescheduled town meeting and elections, while two dates are still up in the air.

    The regional school committee has also postponed its vote on the bonding method and request for funds for the project. Once the committee takes that vote, district towns have 60 days to hold town meetings and elections to vote on the matter.

    “The school committee votes to request the funding,” regional school committee chair Chris Easley said. “That sets a 60-day time frame for towns to respond. With no town meetings being established in any of the towns, just preliminary discussions, we do not want to force the hand of the towns. We want them to make the decision, then we’ll determine the best way to proceed with our request for funding.”

    Project Manager Richard Marx said that the MSBA can authorize a 120-day extension from the June 11 deadline, which would push it back to Oct. 9. The MSBA was scheduled to hold a board meeting on April 15.

    Proposed NRHS site plan
    The site plan for the proposed renovation of Nauset Regional High School. (Courtesy Nauset Building Committee)

    Both Marx and Easley said it may be necessary to ask for another 120-day extension after the October deadline, based on the current predictions about the pandemic.

    “They want to be able to commit funds to other schools,” Marx said. “They don’t want to tie up funds.”

    Greg Levasseur, chair of the building committee, said right now they’re not trying to push out too much information to residents and are waiting for town meeting and election dates become firm.

    “Part of the reason we’re kind of slowing down is that this is not really the time to be bombarding folks about the project,” Levasseur said. “We want them to deal with the crisis and their families and their personal lives. When we do have a schedule for the four towns we can regroup and move forward.”

    “I think as towns we have a conundrum right now,” said Eastham Town Administrator Jacqui Beebe. “I think it would be unreasonable for the MSBA to not allow us a further extension, given that it is the emergency order of the governor that we cannot have town meeting until he’s lifted his ban.”

    Beebe said the select board and finance committee in Eastham had unanimously endorsed the project. Levasseur said the Brewster Select Board had also endorsed it, but the town’s finance committee had not met to vote on it yet.

    REGIONAL SCHOOLS

    Committee Ponders Future as Long Shutdown Looms

    Safety of students and community trump concerns about MCAS

    By

    BREWSTER — The Nauset Regional School Committee was considering the possibility of a district-wide shutdown in response to the coronavirus pandemic when it met on March 12. Since then, the schools have closed and will most likely not reopen until at least the end of spring vacation on April 27.

    At that meeting, committee members Ed Brookshire and Amy Handel asked Supt. Tom Conrad whether school days would need to be made up or if MCAS testing would be affected by a closure.

    Conrad did not speak to making up school days and said he’s not worried about the MCAS. Instead, he said he was focused on the safety of the students and community. “We have to do what we have to do,” he said. “We see it as a community issue, not just a school issue.”

    The committee also discussed how the pandemic might affect the high school renovation project. Bond adviser Lynn Foster-Welsh of UniBank Fiscal Advisory Services pointed out that the crisis has caused interest rates to drop. “Where the market may be when we’re ready to finance — I wish I could tell you,” she said.

    The committee is planning to decide how to finance the renovation project before district town meetings are held. The most likely choices are a 20-, 25-, or 30-year bond. Foster-Welsh said that after the committee decides, it has to notify each town’s select board within seven days. Each town then has 60 days from the date of the committee vote to hold a town meeting vote on the matter.

    Chair Chris Easley brought up the possibility of town meetings being postponed, which now seems inevitable. A delay in towns’ votes could further complicate things.

    Plans for making public forums on the renovation project “virtual” are underway. Two forums have been cancelled: one planned for March 25 in Wellfleet COA and another for March 31 in Eastham.

    Conrad presented numbers for the school choice program for next year and the committee approved the opening of 32 seats in grade 6 and 13 seats in grade 7, for a total of 45 seats in the middle school; also 30 seats in grade 9 and 14 seats in grade 10, for a total of 44 seats at the high school.

    The decision comes after some Brewster residents questioned the fairness of having nearly a quarter of the population of students at the high school come from choice towns that do not contribute directly toward the project.

    But Conrad said, “I feel comfortable with these numbers.” He added that the district expects more students from Grade 8 to attend the Cape Cod Regional Technical School in 2020-21 with its new building set to open.

    The committee also approved the FY21 operating budget of $24,690,214 — a $602,226 increase from last year. The total assessment to the towns would be $11,861,180 (48.04 percent) to Brewster, $4,818,616 (19.52 percent) to Orleans, $4,798,023 (19.43 percent to Eastham) and $3,212,395 (13 percent) to Wellfleet.

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