Months of work lead to receivership

WINSTED —  Representatives from the state’s Department of Education held a meeting at The Gilbert School on Tuesday, July 28, to talk about the state’s receivership of the school district.

More than 100 residents attended the meeting, which included a question-and-answer session with Dianna Wentzell, commissioner of the State Department of Education.

On June 30, as part of the state’s fiscal 2015-2016 budget, the General Assembly passed a bill that will provide state oversight to the Winchester School District.

The oversight is included in a larger 686 page bill No. 1502 “An act Implementing provisions of the state budget for the biennium ending June 30, 2017 concerning general government, education and health and human services.”

The bill outlines measures to implement state control over the town’s school district, including its budget, staffing and programming.

The state’s decision-making 

process

The first part of the bill outlines how Wentzell will appoint a receiver for the school district before August 1. An update on the appointment of the receiver will be online at www.tricornernews.com

The receiver will be the chief executive officer of the district and “... shall be vested with the duties, rights and responsibilities of the Board of Education.”

At the meeting, Wentzell did not announce the name of the receiver, but did say that the commission has already made its decision on who the receiver will be.

State Representative State Rep. Jay Case (R-63) introduced Wentzell to the audience.

“I would like to thank the parents, teachers and everybody for reaching out to my office in Hartford over the past six to nine months,” Case said. “Without your emails and phone calls, I couldn’t make these connections with the commissioner and her staff and then come to the conclusion that she came to when one day she said, ‘I need to do a receivership in your community.’ We had a tough conversation, but it’s something she felt needed to be done.”

Wentzell spoke to the audience about why she felt the state needed to step in with the receivership process for the school district and spoke about the process.

“It was a heroic effort over six months that got us where we needed to be to be able to support the community,” Wentzell said. “Over the past academic year the state Department of Education conducted a forensic audit of the Special Education Excess Cost Grant. This is a grant through our appropriations in our legislature where we are able to support local school districts by providing some support for the special education costs in the districts. When an individual student has reached a point where the cost of educating a student is more than four times of the cost of the usual student expenditure in the district, the district applies for an excess cost reimbursement. When the district applies, they need to substantiate what was spent on the child.”

Following the money trail

In the audit report that was issued on June 1 it was determined that, after everything was reviewed by the department, $1,256,345 was disallowed from the Special Education Excess Cost grant for fiscal 2012-2013 and $1,030,624 was disallowed from the grant for fiscal 2013-2014.

After some determination by the team on an adjustment as it pertains to a grant calculation, the team determined that, for both fiscal years, the district owes back $720,865, which will reduce the state’s Education Cost Sharing grant to the school district in April 2016.

“The state is now not able to pay claims that are substantiated,” Wentzell said. “With Excess Cost Sharing, we usually don’t have enough money to pay everything that is claimed. Even though the district requested over $2 million, the district only received a little over $700,000.”

Wentzell said that, by state statute, the state is required to recover the funds from the school district.

‘Significant concerns’ with the district’s programs

She did say that the repayment of the funds by the district could be forgiven by the state if the school district meets certain target conditions over the next two years.

“That payment was immediately due and obviously it’s a very large payment for any community,” she said. “This led us to conduct a review of the school district’s special education program. When we did so, we had legitimate concerns that required corrective action.”

Wentzell said that the state is now conducting a review of the school district’s nutrition program.

“That audit will be completed shortly, but we did discover some significant irregularities,” Wentzell said. “In each of these reviews we see similar and egregious issues. We have significant concerns. Sound fiscal procedures and appropriate department systems are not present and are not apparent in the school district. The concerns are significant enough that we believe it is important to step in and ramp up the systems.”

She said that, when the receiver is appointed, they will act as both the chief administrator and governance for the school district.

“In simple terms, they do the job of the superintendent and the board of education,” Wentzell.

Wentzell said she will appoint seven people for a board of advisors for the school district, with no fewer than three members who are residents of the town.

However, anyone who is employed by the town or the school district, or their immediate family, will be ineligible to serve on the board.

Wentzell said that, while a board of advisors will be appointed by the state, the board of education for the town will still exist.

However, she did not say whether or not Superintendent of Schools Anne Watson will be keeping her job.

The public’s views

There was heavy criticism of the school district during the public comments section of the meeting. The first speaker was Art Melycher.

Melycher, who read a pre-written speech, has been a vocal critic of the Board of Education for quite some time.

“I want to thank you and your staff for all the hard work you have done for the children and families of the community,” Melycher said to Wentzell. “The present Superintendent Anne Watson and present Pupil Services Director Nancy Taylor are hurting our special needs children’s lives and the community. Watson refuses to return phone calls to families or answer emails to families, The Gilbert School or the town. When FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests are sent to the business office, they aren’t answered. There is nepotism and collusion in the district which I will tell the receiver about. I also request that an audit of the funds be done for misappropriation of funds for personal use, meals, flowers, candy and hotel rooms on Alliance Grant funds.”

Melycher, who is the chairman of the town’s Commission for Persons with Disabilities and a member of the Planning and Zoning Commission, asked to be considered for membership to the school district’s advisory board.

The next speaker, Cheryl Bartley, who also has been a vocal critic of the board, spoke to Wentzell about her struggles with the school district.

“It has been a struggle for our family,” Bartley said. “We’ve been taking care of our grandson for the past six years because both of his parents are in the military. This past week was our grandson’s sixth week of his extended school-year program. His special education director, Nancy Taylor, called the schools to say that he could not go back to school because the school district is refusing to pay for it. This is an absolute outrage. With the help of some people, Nancy Taylor decided to change her mind. I want you to know that no parent, grandparent or guardian should ever have to go through this. I want you to remember this.”

Resident Kevin O’Donnell was very critical of the school district when he spoke during public comments.

“Concerning my son, the biggest mistake in my life is committing my son to stay in this school district,” O’Donnell said. “He is third grade going into fourth grade. He’s perfect in my eyes, and I wouldn’t change a thing. For three years I have been fighting, begging, urging, emailing. I have been at every PPT (Planning and Placement Team meeting). I have been taking off of work, and I am the sole supporter in my house. I’ve been lied to and misled. I’ve had things been withheld from me”

O’Donnell said after a long struggle he got the school district to pay for a functional behavior assessment for his son.

He proceeded to read from the assessment to Wentzell.

“When the students are called to recess he goes and lies on the mats at the gym and puts his hands in his pants rather than having somebody try to teach him how to interact with somebody,” O’Donnell said. “That has all been withheld from me. This has all taken me three days to read this because this has been so painful.”

Wentzell went up to the podium and interrupted O’Donnell.

“This meeting is being videotaped,” Wentzell told O’Donnell. “I want to make sure you know that. We’re always careful about privacy and information.”

“That’s fine,” O’Donnell said. “I’m an advocate. My son has been given no support whatsoever. The statute IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act) has not been followed in any way, shape or form. Anybody who has a special education child here, either run, move or educate yourself, because when you go to a PPT meeting they will not tell you what your rights are as a parent or what your child’s rights are. They’re going to mislead you and say how wonderful he is doing. It’s outrageous what’s going on.”

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