WESTPORT — The Westport School Committee, at its April 15 meeting, elected Nancy Tavares to serve as its new chairwoman, and heard a request from the teachers’ union that it be included in the hiring process of school administrators.

Committee reorganization

In the wake of the town election in which unopposed candidates Antonio Viveiros and Nancy Stanton-Cross won reelection to the School Committee (“We won by a squeaker,” Mr. Viveiros said), the board held its post-election reorganization.

Chairman Viveiros nominated Ms. Tavares to succeed him and the board was unanimous in its support. 

He said the current board has worked together well — “We don’t always agree but we respect and listen to each other.”

The committee voted its unanimous support for Ms. Tavares after she was nominated by the previous chairman, Antonio Viveiros.

Ms. Tavares, in turn, thanked Mr. Viveiros for his years of work on the committee and as chairman, and for “his dedication and commitment to improving our schools.”

Nancy Stanton-Cross was the only nominee to the assistant chair position and she, too, received unanimous support.

New principals chosen

Superintendent of Schools Thomas Aubin announced the appointment of three new principals in the district.

Kerri McKinnon was chosen to take over as principal of Westport Junior-Senior High School. She brings 22 years of teaching experience, Dr. Aubin said, and has ably served most recently as assistant superintendent and principal. She will relinquish the assistant superintendent post in July (the post is being eliminated in part to save money).

Kevin Aguiar has been named assistant principal at the high school. He has been a teacher and a principal for 15 years.

And Laura Charette, who has both teaching and administrative experience, was named principal of Westport Middle School.

Administrative hiring process

Before those appointments were announced, Norman Abrahamson, a high school history and president of the Westport Federation of Teachers, called on the committee to be more open to involving the public and the union in its selection of administrators.

He said he had previously requested that the Westport Federation of Teachers be involved in the interviews and hiring process for superintendent and principal positions.

“Going back to last spring, the School Committee has placed the superintendent and two assistant superintendents, a high school principal and an interim high school principal with no community involvement,” he said.

“I find this to be a pretty alarming trend in regard to transparency and I’m hoping that the two principal positions” will not be filled without the involvement of the union and the public.

There was no immediate comment from the committee, but later Ms. Stanton-Cross said she finds the criticism is unfair.

“There has been no lack of transparency,” she said, adding that the union and public were involved in the appointment process several years ago when Mitch Aho was named high school principal (“Prior to him we had a rotation of three principals.”) There was also, she said, considerable public input in the appointment of previous Superintendent Gary Reese, during which the message sent by participants is that they “want someone who will be visible and who was going to be stable and stay.”

Of the three appointments announced that evening, “My interview was watching them this year and not once did they fail,” Ms. Stanton-Cross said. “What better way to see this administrative staff be tested over and over again.”

Budget gap

The superintendent reported that the schools had just presented their $20,299,930 proposed budget for fiscal year 2022 to the Finance Committee.

The FinCom replied, he said, responded that it wants the schools to provide “four scenarios with cuts of $200,000 in each area” to close a gap of $804,247 that presently exists between the school proposal and what the town has in mind.

“This is going to be an ongoing discussion,” Dr. Aubin said, adding that it remains to be seen what sort of help may come from federal COVID relief funding.

“We want to thank the FinCom group,” he said. “It really looks like they are trying to work in a harmonious way to try to resolve what is a tough budget, not only for the schools.”

Ms. Tavares agreed. “I thought it was a different tone at FinCom. I think they appreciated our presentation and the situation we are in.”

But, said Ms. Stanton-Cross, we are still $804,000 apart and are going to need community support. If need be, “we’ll have to go to Town Meeting and express, as voters in this town, how important our community schools are and how important it is that we fund them appropriately.”

New school septic bill

School Committee members reacted with dismay to word that it seems to be expected that the School Department will pay a $10,000-plus bill for maintaining the new school’s denitrification system once it goes on line.

Mr. Viveiros said that they learned recently that, “Oh, by the way,” the company sent word that you owe over $10,000 for an 18-month maintenance contract. He said he would think such initial maintenance would be part of the installation, adding that its last minute arrival comes just as the schools are struggling with a difficult budget.

“What bothers me is the e-mail chain between the town and the School Building Committee,” Ms. Stanton-Cross added.

“They didn’t even talk to us and we have a huge gap in the budget,” yet they apparently expect us to pay for this.

“Nobody had the diplomacy skills to reach out to us … The cannot happen again.”