The recording of the special School Committee meeting from a few nights ago has been posted on the GCTV YouTube channel, so I was able to go back and catch the beginning of the meeting that I missed.
As it turns out, the Executive Session that was on the agenda ended up not happening. The committee voted to postpone it until their next regular meeting, citing “a last minute change to the details of that item.” Based on the small bit of discussion on the motion to postpone, this is about Unit A, which is the GPS district’s contract with the teachers.
I was also able to catch up on the small bit of the discussion I missed the other night regarding the Open Meeting Law complaint filed by Chair Proietti against Mayor Wedegartner. I have not read the mayor’s emails to the committee that prompted the complaint, but it sounds like there had been some confusion at a prior meeting about GPS enrollment numbers and the mayor sent two emails to the rest of the committee explaining those numbers.
Some of the early discussion of this complaint by the committee was of the “Why do we have to spend time on this?” variety. Members Johnson-Mussad and Deneeve were the most vocal in this regard. I understand the sentiment—that the committee’s time would be better spent on addressing the needs of the district—but it is beside the point here. The Open Meeting Law is pretty clear, and breaches of the rules need to be addressed.
I had also somehow managed to forget that all of this is happening against the background a motion introduced by Chair Proietti to censure Mayor Wedegartner. That motion, which will be considered at the June regular meeting, stemmed from an April 16 op-ed the mayor wrote in the Recorder in which she disclosed her votes on several union contracts during an Executive Session.
I guess I need to go back and watch that meeting now as well…