[There's a little background about last year's contracting process posted here.]
Press release from Donald Sternberg, Business Administrator for North Plainfield School District:
“Pursuant to NJSA 18A:11-11, the North Plainfield Board of Education will begin discussions regarding the Superintendent of Schools [Marilyn Birnbaum], Assistant Superintendent of Schools [Robert Rich] and Business Administrator [Donald Sternberg] contracts.
A public hearing will be held at the Board of Education meeting on June 18, 2008 [at 33 Mountain Ave. at 7:30 p.m.].
Following the public hearing Board action may be taken.
A copy of the proposed contracts will be placed on file in the Board’s business office [33 Mountain Ave.] and will be available for review prior to or at the public hearing.
The Board, pursuant to NJSA 10:4-12(b), the Open Public Meetings Act, shall not publicly discuss personnel matters and shall not respond to comments made by members of the public.
The subject of this hearing retains the right of privacy and shall retain all rights regarding defamation and slander according to the laws of Ne Jersey. The Board shall not be held liable for comments made by members of the public.
Chilling, eh?
It’s almost like they’re expecting a crowd of taxpayers to come out and vigorously challenge the job performance of the school administrators (particularly Dr. Birnbaum) and angrily question why Birnbaum’s salary is approaching $200,000 (as covered in Sunday morning’s Courier-News in a followup to the Keansburg golden parachute fiasco) when Governor Corzine’s salary is capped at $175,000 (although he actually only collects $1 per year ’cause he’s so rich from his former life in the private sector.)
The School Board seems to be expecting that public outcry, and intent on ensuring that no member of the public expressing public views at the meeting will have any hope that what is said by members of the public will impact the School Board’s ultimate contract decisions in any meaningful way.
I’ve also heard a rumor that Dr. Birnbaum may be at the end of one five-year contract and planning to retire or move to another district before a new contract is negotiated. Some readers have noted that many school administrators are part of a “revolving door” culture and move from one district to the next every few years, upping their salaries by a few thousand dollars with each move.
Whatever the situation, and whatever the Board’s willingness to listen and respond, show up anyway.
Ask your questions, even if they don’t get answered.
Share your thoughts, feelings and ideas about the schools and the administrative salaries, even if they aren’t considered important enough for a verbal response from Board members.
Show up, not for the School Board members’ benefit, but to be there for each other, to hear each other, to meet each other, and that way, to build a stronger community consensus that – eventually – they won’t be able to ignore anymore.
On a related issue, if the charter amendment to change from partisan to nonpartisan elections wins a majority in November, North Plainfield voters will have another (May) election date to remember and pay for in addition to the February presidential primaries (every four years), the April school elections, the June non-presidential primaries, and the November general elections.
There’s a bill in the legislature (A-15) to move the school elections to November.
As this June 2 article from the Philadelphia Inquirer states, the intent is partly to reduce municipal election costs, and partly to increase voter turnout on school issues, which tend to be decided now by a fairly small proportion of the eletorate that bothers to vote in school elections at all, which may also be because participation is somewhat meaningless, as voter budget decisions can be overturned by municipal councils and the state education commissioner.
Another legislative bill (A-10) is aimed at cutting administrative spending by 10% over the next three years, covered in this May 12 article from NJ Politicker.
Two bipartisan measures Assembly Speaker Joseph J. Roberts, Jr. is championing to enhance local voters’ ability to hold elected school board members accountable for their fiscal and policy decisions and to slash inefficient non-classroom administrative spending in public schools were released today by the Assembly Education Committee.
The bills would move school board member elections to the November ballot (A-15) and require 10 percent cuts in administrative non-classroom spending in certain districts over the next three years (A-10).
Of interest for North Plainfield – If these bills clear the Legislature and are signed by Governor Corzine, then school election questions would appear on the November ballots in a special section called “non-partisan” since School Board members are already elected on a nonpartisan basis.
If North Plainfield voters adopt the nonpartisan charter change, under the current terms of office (barring Council or Mayoral resignations in 2009), my understanding is that 2010 would be the first year for implementation of that new schedule.
So, losing the April school elections and gaining May municipal officer elections would mean the Borough taxpayers would about break even as far as election costs.
And, if the legislature deems voters smart enough to understand a nonpartisan school portion of the November general election ballot, then eventually the nonpartisan municipal elections might also be moved onto the November ballot, streamlining and cutting the costs further.
Personally, I think increasing voter engagement in democratic self-governance year-round is worth much larger investments of public money, time and energy than that effort currently gets (for example, I support public funding for campaigns, as a way to involve candidates who can’t finance their campaigns out-of-pocket or can’t bring themselves to grovel for campaign donations only to have to pay back those donations with legislative favors later.)
But I do see the value of bundling important electoral events in packages, to increase the number of people participating.
1 response so far ↓
GimmeABreak // June 16, 2008 at 10:34 am |
I’m always confused as to why there are laws against ‘publicly discussing’ personnel matters when these people are being paid by the taxpayers. We have to fork over for what are, sometimes, bloated salaries, but we don’t seem to have any say in the process through which they get them.