This is not really related to the poster story, but it popped up in a Google search on Hudson High and I just thought I'd pop it up here.
School board defies court ruling: Hudson committee's lawyer says superintendent evaluation is private matter
By Carolyn Kessel Stewart / News Staff Writer
Thursday, February 10, 2005
HUDSON -- To keep its superintendent's annual evaluation secret, the School Committee is amassing legal opinions it believes will show the schools' top employee evaluation is a private matter.
The School Committee decided Tuesday night not to make public minutes of a meeting during which Sheldon Berman's review was addressed.
Also kept under wraps are the reviews written by individual School Committee members, even though the records, which were requested by the Daily News, have been deemed public by the Middlesex District Attorney's office.
Richard K. Lodge, editor-in-chief of the MetroWest Daily News, said he was surprised by the School Committee's decision to ask the district attorney's office to look at the matter again.
"It seems the assistant district attorney's opinion was straightforward and what we believe is a correct interpretation of the law. We're disappointed the School Committee plans to delay the process, but we respect their right to appeal to District Attorney Martha Coakley," Lodge said.
The School Committee's lawyer, Bob Fraser of Stoneman, Chandler & Miller, advised the School Committee it would not be violating the Open Meeting Law or the Public Records Law by not handing over records.
Ultimately, the battle could be decided in court, because there is so little legal precedent for this situation, Fraser wrote in his opinion.
This is not the first time someone wanted to know what a School Committee thinks of its superintendent, said Michael J. Long, lawyer for the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents.
"The issue comes up a couple of times a year, typically when either a School Committee person or a political person chooses for whatever reason to expose or disclose the evaluation, or local media wants to pursue the point," Long said.
The MASS has also filed legislation that would allow a School Committee to conduct a superintendent's evaluation in closed session in certain circumstances.
Berman asked Long, who is retained by MASS, to look at his case. The town pays Berman's membership dues to MASS.
Fraser is hired by the town as legal counsel for the School Committee.
Both Long and Fraser cited a 2000 lawsuit to support keeping Berman's review private.
Under Wakefield Teachers' Association vs. School Committee of Wakefield, personnel records are defined as "employment applications, employee work evaluations, disciplinary documentation and promotion demotion or termination information pertaining to a particular employee." And personnel records are private.
"The language in the Wakefield case is crystal clear and beyond dispute," Long said. "I find it hard to understand how the clarity of those words evades the DA's office."
But Assistant District Attorney Sheryl Grant wrote in her opinion letter that because superintendents are hired in a public process and are reviewed by a governmental body, meetings during which their review is discussed must be open to the public, and the records from those meetings must also be public.
Fraser said, however, that because there was no deliberation, no "meeting" took place.
Grant wrongly assumed, he said, that School Committee members discussed Berman's evaluation. In fact, they only handed in their individual evaluations to then-Chairwoman Sheila Ansley, Fraser told the committee.
Even if they had had a discussion, Fraser wrote, that would still fall under the exemption of discussing negotiation strategy.
"It is hard to imagine a School Committee adequately representing the best interests of a town in setting contractual strategy with a current superintendent without discussing in some manner the performance of that superintendent," he wrote. Those records, in his opinion, may remain secret as long as the superintendent or any non-union employee is bargaining with the School Committee.
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