FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 2001

THE RECORD-REVIEW

Whelan takes Facilities Committee to task

BY, FRANK NARDOZZI

Bedford Centrral School Board Member Joseph A Whelan this week criticized the school board's Citizens Faclities Advisory Committee for closing its meeting on Feb. 6 during which decisions were made regarding the recommendations it will make to the school board on Wednesday, Feb. 28.

In a letter to the editor published this week, Mr. Whelan states, "It is essential to the maintenance of a democratic society that the public business be performed in an open and public manner and that Citizens of this state be fully aware of an able to observe the performance of public officials and attend and listen to the deliberations and decisions that go into the making of public policy."

Mr. Whelan stated that, according to an announcement made by the school board president, Dot Fallon at a school board meeting on Feb. 8.it was his understanding that the advisory committee had decided to close its meetings to the public for the rest of the month.

However. the chairman of the ,advisory committee, Homer Schoen, said Wednesday that no such decision had been made.

"We had one work session where we felt hat the nature of the material was such that the committee wanted, for that one session, for it to be for the committee only," Mr. Schoen said. "That was the only time. All of our other sessions have been open," he said.

Next meeting open

He said that the next meeting of the advisory committee was scheduled for Monday, Feb. 26, at which time it plans to go over its final presentation to be made to the school board two days later. That meeting will he open to the public, he said.

The advisory committee has been studying the condition of the district's school buildings and its projected needs to accommodate a growing student enrollment for the past 14 months.

Mr. Schoen said that the meeting on Feb. 6 was the one at which the advisory committee sought to debate what its final recommendations would be.

"The committee felt that there should be free and open debate and what would come out of' that would be our consensus. We thought that the nature of our individual positions along the way (to reaching that consensus) would not be fair to the free How of discussion among committee members in reaching their decision.

"It was felt that the deliberation leading to a final vote should not be a matter of individual perception, but of the committee as a whole," he said.

When informed that the advisory committee did not plan to have any more closed meetings before its presentation to the board, Mr. Whelan said that he was glad to hear that.

"Doesn't bode well"

"That's how vou have an impact, I guess. But I don't think that they should have closed the meeting on Feb. 6. That's not a good sign. That doesn't bode well when a committee takes the position that it's going to stay behind the scenes," he said.

There's a certain laxity behind closed doors. That's what the sunshine laws' are all about. People need to know what is the basis of their conclusions."

Whelan said that the whole investigative and deliberative process that was conducted by the advisory board "was more removed from the trustees than I would have liked.

"The subject really needs more broad understanding," he said. "This is not a big-picture committee. They are not involved in the budget process or knowledgeable about the bonding laws."

Calling the board's decision on a facilities bond issue "one of the biggest money decisions the district will make this year," Mr. Whelan said that the school board "can never delegate complete responsibility. It can't -transfer it. -It always has it."

He thought that the process of developing a "reasonable and affordable bond issue should have been more integral to the procedures of the school board,- he said.

School Board President Dot Fallon could not be reached for comment.