More Coffee, Please

I love inconsistencies and logical fallacies. Good thing too, since it seems to be the norm in education politics.

I’m referring to the town of Sullivan lawsuit, which is starting to make it to the pages of the Sentinel. In this case, it was the report that the Hoffman’s lawsuit was moving ahead, and the news that 46 town residents have signed a petition asking the selectmen to end their own suit against the district.

The central tenant is (of course) about early retirement, which is really a non-issue at this point—assuming the district passes the new contract. ¹ The new contract removes early retirement (precisely what the Sullivan lawsuit it complaining about) and also has teacher’s paying more for health insurance.

There’s no way that the teachers currently receiving retirement benefits will lose them—the whole idea has always been to prevent more teachers from gaining it. That’s been granted in this contract—if the selectmen wish to end early retirement, vote for the contract.

It would save money and time.

But I think what most amazes me about this lawsuit is the line from Sullivan selectman chairman Richard M. Hotchkiss which ended the article in the sentinel:

As selectmen and as a town we have a right to sue anybody that we want, or take any legal action we want. It doesn’t need to be approved by taxpayers.

The central argument of the lawsuit (filed on behalf of the selectmen by Beth R. Fernald) is that the early retirement program was not validly approved by the voters, and therefore, not legal:

…she [Fernald] filed a petition in Cheshire County Superior Court, asking the court to prohibit any more spending in the district on early retirement until it is “validly” approved by voters…And, in her petition, Fernald argues that early retirement was never legal in the first place since, she wrote, voters weren’t informed of the benefit’s full cost.

It strikes me as really wrong for the selectmen to pursue an action without the consent of the voters when they’re initiating a lawsuit whose central complaint is that the voters did not consent.

If that sentence is confusing, then it accurately reflects the situation.²

Text of the Sentinel article is below.

School issues causing divide: Lawsuits piling up in town of Sullivan

SULLIVAN - The battle between Sullivan and the Monadnock Regional School District is heating up - only now, 46 Sullivan residents have jumped into the fray.

Chief among them is John E. Hoffman Jr., who recently submitted a petitioned warrant article, signed by 45 other residents, that takes the town’s selectmen to task for their recent actions against the school district.

The article asks voters to reconsider or rescind last year’s vote calling for selectmen to examine the feasibility of withdrawing from the district and create a committee to do that.

The petition also asks voters to withdraw a recent request made by selectmen to the N.H. Department of Revenue Administration to investigate spending in the Monadnock Regional School District, and to discontinue the town’s pending legal proceedings in Cheshire County Superior Court.

Hoffman could not be reached for comment.

In letters dated Oct. 22 and Nov. 5 to the N.H. Department of Revenue Administration and the N.H. Department of Education, respectively, attorney Beth R. Fernald - on behalf of Sullivan’s selectmen - outlined several charges against the district.

She claimed the district is charging out-of-district students at Monadnock Community Connections School less than the actual cost of their education. She also accused the school board of spending $400,000 in health insurance savings on staff raises and bonuses.

And in November, she filed a petition in Cheshire County Superior Court, asking the court to prohibit any more spending in the district on early retirement until it is “validly” approved by voters.

The early retirement benefit was originally included in the 2000-01 contract and gives veteran teachers the option to retire early while receiving a percentage of their salaries for the next seven years.

Opponents call the benefit prohibitively expensive. And, in her petition, Fernald argues that early retirement was never legal in the first place since, she wrote, voters weren’t informed of the benefit’s full cost.

Attorney Paul L. Apple, on behalf of the school district, has disputed Fernald’s claims, and the next court date in the case is at the end of February.

The district’s response - filed in Superior Court in December and signed by Apple and Superintendent Kenneth R. Dassau - also takes a swipe at Sullivan selectmen for initiating the lawsuit without first getting approval from the town’s voters.

“(T)he Selectmen are without authority to maintain an action not approved by the voters of the Town,” the district’s written response states.

Apple told The Sentinel, “There’s some cases that, in my opinion, suggest selectmen should have gotten authority from the town to initiate a lawsuit - most particularly a lawsuit in which the town is, in essence, suing itself as part of the cooperative (school district).”

The selectmen’s actions follow the town’s vote last March to investigate the feasibility of withdrawing from the Monadnock district.

At that time, voters authorized the selectmen to appoint a committee to do this and approved $25,000 to pay the costs of investigating withdrawal.

On Jan. 3, Hoffman filed a petition in Cheshire County Superior Court, charging the selectmen improperly dipped into this money to go after the district.

In an interview last month, selectmen Chairman Richard M. Hotchkiss said Sullivan’s legal fees were being paid from the voter-approved $25,000. Selectmen said they were first attempting to investigate whether any problems in the district could be fixed before deciding whether withdrawal was a good option.

However, in an interview Tuesday, he clarified this, saying money from the $25,000 was not being used for the court proceedings.

Some of the money was used for Fernald’s appeal for an investigation by the revenue department into Monadnock Community Connections and the spending for health insurance, according to Hotchkiss.

This “was part of the investigation, to get their input on the legality of that,” he said - and therefore paid for out of the $25,000.

Of that money, a rough estimate of $22,500 remains, he said.

The suit concerning early retirement in Cheshire County Superior Court, by contrast, is “a town suit. That has nothing to do with investigating withdrawal,” he said, and is therefore being financed by other town funds.

But Sullivan’s Web site identifies challenging the Monadnock district on early retirement is “a precursor” to setting up the the withdrawal study committee.

Donald G. Arguin, a Sullivan resident who opposed the original withdrawal warrant and signed the new petition, said, Hotchkiss is “going after his own agenda by trying to lump together these issues. … Whether he likes (Monadnock Community Connections) or early retirement, that’s not investigating leaving, that’s trying to justify leaving.”³

And according to Hoffman’s Superior Court filing, the committee selectmen were supposed to appoint to look at withdrawal hasn’t been formed yet, nearly a year after the vote.

“There was no timeline on (setting up a committee),” Hotchkiss said. “What are they going to do until you can hand them some data?”

A committee would likely be formed after the town was already “on the path” to withdrawal, he said, with the committee then hashing out how that might happen.

As for the authority of selectmen to carry forth a lawsuit without town approval, Hotchkiss said, “As selectmen and as a town we have a right to sue anybody that we want, or take any legal action we want. It doesn’t need to be approved by taxpayers.”

1 Which desperately needs to happen. The MRSD is one vote away from the cliff. The building is in rough shape, the facility needs updating, but right now, there’s a strong tradition of good teaching. If we have another year of the kind of attrition we suffered this year past, then there will be a point where there’s not much left. It’s nice to have a college in the area to bring in new blood, but do we really want the experienced teachers to have less than five year’s experience? ↺

2 I’ve left out discussion of some elements of the article, though they do deserve highlighting. For one thing, there’s no secret that this is now a prelude to withdrawing Sullivan from the district—much like Surry. Much like in Surry, this is being assisted by the Monadnock Taxpayer’s Association, even though the withdrawal of Surry raised district taxes. Something is obviously stirring in the kool-aid… ↺

3 Two things: One, Sullivan needs to draft Mr. Arguin to run for either School Board or Selectman—maybe both, but that might be a conflict of interest. Second, it’s amusing how much MC² comes up in these proceedings. I’m still amazed at how little people in the district understand what they have in the program—the precursor to education in New Hampshire. ↺

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Education, Monadnock Community Connections School, Monadnock Regional School District, Monadnock Taxpayer’s Association, School Funding

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