GREENFIELD — School Committee members will consider next month whether to censure Mayor Roxann Wedegartner for an opinion piece she wrote last month that disclosed her vote in an executive session.
“Executive session is confidential until the minutes are voted on by the body and released to the public, which hasn’t happened for that session,” explained Chairwoman Amy Proietti. “We did vote in public session on those contracts, but the mayor did not attend the public sessions that evening. Regardless of that piece, it is not appropriate to share an executive session vote outside of the executive session until the minutes are made public.”
Proietti made the motion to censure the mayor at the Wednesday meeting.
Proietti referenced Wedegartner’s “My Turn” column published on April 17 in the Greenfield Recorder [“Tight budget requires tought calls,”] in which she wrote that in an executive session of the School Committee, she voted favorably “on all settled contracts available to the School Committee.” Later that same evening, on April 12, School Committee voted to ratify contracts for several unions.
“I find it interesting Mayor Wedegartner has a ton of experience … and did not reflect enough in the writing of the My Turn to consider that revealing an executive session vote might be a violation of our confidentiality of the body and our due process,” Proietti said.
The discussion, however, devolved into a question of the agenda posting policy — a conversation that stemmed from Wedegartner’s concerns earlier in the meeting that the agenda posted to the School Committee website differed from the version posted on the city’s site. It was her understanding, she added, that the city website was the designated “official” site for public meetings notifications.
“It concerns me we have a revised agenda that doesn’t state what the revisions were,” Wedegartner, who serves on the School Committee, said. “It needs to, as you post it, state what the revisions are, so the public has adequate notice.”
Other committee members shared the mayor’s concern. Glenn Johnson-Mussad motioned to table the vote, given the vague nature of the agenda item, which was only included on the version posted to the committee’s website.
“I just feel like ‘censure a member’ is not specific enough of a description of an agenda item for people to be aware in advance of what is going to be discussed and to come and participate,” Johnson-Mussad said. “Also, I don’t feel I’ve had enough time to look into it and to learn more about it and what was written and how it lines up with what the School Committee counsel thinks about this and [whether it] was it actually a violation or not.”
Committee member Elizabeth DeNeeve noted how many times the agenda had been revised before Wednesday evening’s meeting. According to the agenda posted on the School Committee’s website, the agenda was revised three times after it was posted on May 5. The final revision was posted on Wednesday at 3:05 p.m.
The agenda posted on the city’s website, meanwhile, was last revised on Tuesday at 1:30 p.m. and did not include an agenda item to censure a member.
“I would really like clarification in the future about why items in the agenda ‘fall off’ and why things are revised so constantly,” DeNeeve said.
Proietti said while she appreciated everyone’s comments, the original version of the agenda included the item to censure a member. She added that if there were any changes to Open Meeting Law, the committee’s counsel would have shared that information.
In the vote to table the motion to censure Wedegartner, Proietti abstained, and members Susan Eckstrom and Kate Martini voted ‘no’ while members Jean Wall, Wedegartner, Johnson-Mussad and DeNeeve voted ‘yes.’
Reporter Mary Byrne can be reached at mbyrne@recorder.com or 413-930-4429. Twitter: @MaryEByrne.
