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April 2002
Teachers reach 'agreement in principle'
Posted Thursday, April 11, 2002
BY GINA MACRIS
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE -- Negotiators for the Providence Teachers Union and the School Board have arrived at an "agreement in principle" that will be put to a vote of the union membership at the end of the month, Mayor Vincent A. Cianci Jr. announced yesterday.
But Cianci released no details of the tentative settlement or gave any indication of changes that have been made at the bargaining table since teachers last turned down a contract proposal Jan. 22 in a divisive meeting marred by catcalls from a handful of teachers.
In another school matter, Cianci announced that he has renominated Makna Men and Leonard Lopes after receiving a letter from the School Board Nominating Commission saying they were qualified to serve on the School Board.
He had submitted the names of Men and Lopes to the Nominating Commission after the City Council rejected their appointment on an 8-to-7 vote, with some council members saying they would reconsider the two if they had been vetted by the Nominating Commission, as other applicants had been.
Cianci said he will now "hold them to their word."
Told that some people thought the screening process for Men and Lopes was a "sham," Cianci replied that "one of them is no longer a member of our community," an allusion to the Rev. Marlowe V.N. Washington, who is leaving Rhode Island for a larger congregation in New Jersey.
At yesterday's news conference, Phil DeCecco, president of the teachers' union, said meetings with rank-and-file teachers helped negotiators in the latest round of talks.
The union leadership has met with teachers in 8 to 10 buildings at their request to "field their questions and listen to their concerns," DeCecco said.
"That assisted us in negotiations at the present time," he said, but there have been "no conversations with anyone on this proposal."
The state mediator, Donald Driscoll, was asked why the public should have confidence that the teachers will approve the latest tentative settlement when they have twice rejected similar proposals and cited a lack of trust in Schools Supt. Diana Lam more than the proposed contract language itself.
Driscoll said the latest language was "chosen carefully by people who have taken great care to consult with people."
Also attending yesterday's news conference were Lam; Jeffrey Kasle, the city's labor lawyer; and Joseph A. Almagno, executive director of the teachers' union.
Since Driscoll stepped in as mediator last October, he has asked negotiators to refrain from making public comments on the substance of bargaining talks.
The union vote will be at a membership meeting April 30 -- the third such session in six months.
At the initial vote in mid-October, about 1,700 teachers overwhelmingly rejected a three-year pact, voted no confidence in Lam, and agreed to work to rule.
That posture, in which teachers have refrained from voluntary activities, has significantly slowed the pace of Lam's reforms, particularly in the area of balanced literacy, according to her deputy superintendent, Melody A. Johnson.
Yesterday, Cianci said the announcement of an agreement in principle represents "significant, solid progress toward a new contract for the teachers."
They have been working under the extended terms of an agreement that expired last Aug. 31.
Cianci said both sides believe that the agreement reflects a "fair and equitable contract" that "affirms our understanding of the dedication with which our Providence teachers enter their classrooms each and every school day"
He further characterized the agreement as one that acknowledges teachers' "proficiency, professionalism," and their "willingness to go the extra mile."
Although the contract proposals previously rejected would have given teachers raises up to 12.5 percent over three years, they said money was not the issue.
Rather, teachers said they did not trust Lam to make judicious use of the expanded managerial flexibility that the contract proposals would have given her and accused her in an ad campaign of trying to take "dictatorial control" over the classroom.
That was last fall. Since then, the union leadership negotiated several concessions, including elimination of the city's attempt to introduce a two-tiered health insurance plan.
It also got the School Board to back away from its signature issue --requiring teachers to attend 10 one-hour meetings after school during the course of a year without overtime pay.
But those concessions were not enough, as an estimated 900 of 1,500 teachers rejected the contract in January, even though the union leadership had recommended approval.
School complex's gas-alert system up and running
Posted Tuesday, April 9, 2002
BY GREGORY SMITH
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE -- The gas-monitoring and extraction systems at the Springfield Street school complex in the Hartford neighborhood are back on line, according to a state environmental regulator.
The systems were not working for a time, beginning in December, but there is no indication at this point that anyone was exposed to anything unhealthy, said Leo Hellested, chief of the Waste Management Office of the state Department of Environmental Management.
Two inspectors from the DEM visited the complex Friday and confirmed that the systems are functioning properly, Hellested said that day.
Because the complex was built on an old landfill, which could emit gaseous vapors from decomposing or hazardous materials, the state required the city to install systems to remove the subterranean gases and to monitor whether unhealthy levels of gas were escaping into the three schools.
Tests of indoor air quality, the vapors collected in below-ground systems, and groundwater were made as scheduled in September and December and showed that any unhealthy components present were within acceptable limits, Hellested said.
The tests were done by ATC Associates, an environmental consulting firm hired by the city. The results of tests done last month are not yet available, Hellested said.
"The latest results are positive. And the fact that the system is back up and running is positive," Hellested said.
Nevertheless, he said he still has questions about why the systems stopped working and for how long.
In giving assurances that the air quality remained safe, he said he was relying on data submitted to his office by ATC Associates but is waiting for a written report by the firm on the tests and the functioning of the systems.
Under a 1999 order by the DEM, the city is required to keep the systems running all the time and to submit quarterly reports on their operation and maintenance.
When Hellested learned that the systems were not functioning, he sent the city two letters. When there was no response to the first letter, the second letter warned of formal enforcement action, including the imposition of fines, if the city did not demonstrate compliance with the order.
ATC Associates told him orally, Hellested said, that blowers that are part of the gas-extraction system shut down because of a power failure and had to be restarted when the shutdown was discovered.
In addition, sensors that are part of the monitoring system needed to be recalibrated, according to ATC Associates, and that had to be done at another location. Monitoring stopped for an unknown period of time, according to Hellested.
The complex, formally known as the Pell Educational Complex, is at Springfield and Hartford Avenue. It consists of two middle schools, one of which has been dedicated to the late Governor Christopher and Lola Del Sesto, and an elementary school, dedicated to the late Superior Court Magistrate Anthony Carnevale.
In response to news that the systems were not working, Richard A. Skolnik, lawyer for the Providence Teachers Union, sent a letter to the DEM last week expressing concern. Skolnik asked for assurances that the buildings are safe.
"Under no circumstances can such conditions continue to exist or be tolerated for one day longer," Skolnik wrote.
Hellested said he telephoned Skolnik on Friday and reassured him. When the full reports are available, Hellested said, he promised to share them with the union.
Steven Fischbach, a lawyer who sued the city on behalf of parents regarding the safety of the school building site, said the DEM order was violated in three ways: The city has not kept the systems operating continuously, public safety officials were not alerted when gas alarms were triggered, and staff was not trained to respond to a malfunction.
Last Thursday, Fran Rotella, principal of the Carnevale School, sent letters to the faculty and staff and parents of the students saying that no methane or other potentially harmful gas has been detected in the school or at sampling points outside since the school opened three years ago.
The blowers were off for 10 days in December, she said. A few air sensors malfunctioned as recently as last Wednesday, but they were replaced the next day, according to Rotella.
Her letters quoted Adam Sullivan, an environmental engineer with ATC Associates, as saying: "We have had difficulty keeping the sensors working in a reliable manner. They are very sensitive."
The principal said she has arranged for more frequent air testing and for the training of school custodians so that they can immediately report malfunctions.
"Please rest assured that you send your children to a very safe school," Rotella wrote in her letter to parents.
Personnel office target of overhaul
Posted Tuesday, April 9, 2002
BY GINA MACRIS
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE -- A lack of a quorum forced school officials to cancel last night's regular bi-weekly meeting of the School Board, postponing a presentation on plans to reorganize the human resources office and other matters.
Don Zimmerman, a representative of Willmott & Associates, a human resources consulting firm, has drawn up a preliminary plan for modernizing personnel operations in line with recommendations made last year by the Council of Great City Schools.
Zimmerman was to have appeared at last night's meeting, but his report most likely will be considered at the School Board's next regularly scheduled meeting April 22, according to Schools Supt. Diana Lam.
Lam said it became apparent there would not be a quorum when two School Board members called to say they were not feeling well. Two other board members were already out of town at a national School Board conference, Lam said, leaving only three of the seven sitting members available to meet.
Zimmerman, the human resources consultant, was hired earlier this year to follow up on a report of the Council of Great City Schools which recommended that the school district hire a "visionary change agent and leader" to run personnel operations.
Zimmerman found that the current structure of the human resources office allows its staff to do virtually nothing but respond to outside demands.
The director is so involved in labor relations he has little time to supervise staff or plan for the future, and the 17 clerks who make up the backbone of day-to-day operations work in isolation from one another and feel unappreciated.
"Besieged by the demands of the district's work force and relying on outdated technology to respond," Zimmerman wrote, "they suffer from the perception . . . that they are not responsive" to the district's 3,400 employees.
The human resources staff "generally believes that they have been denied the resources necessary to succeed," his report said.
"Filing cabinets that don't lock, lack of training and little or no investment in contemporary office technology or furnishings are commonly cited deficiencies," the report continued.
Zimmerman called for a human resources office headed by four professionals: a senior executive director and three subordinate administrators, one directing each of three distinct functions:
Employee services such as benefits administration and records maintenance.
Employee relations, covering labor negotiations, the administration of labor contracts and grievances, discipline and discharge issue, workers' and unemployment compensation and compliance with certain federal laws.
Employee recruiting, retention and promotion, as well as placing substitute teachers and drawing up projections for staffing needs and the like.
A search for a new human resources director failed late last spring when both finalists withdrew, and another one has not yet begun.
For the last few years, human resources has had a series of temporary administrators, a factor that has "made it difficult to achieve a sense of continuity in the department, to identify human resources initiatives, and to obtain the resources to implement them," Zimmerman found.
"This observation is not intended to be critical of any of the past or present administration," he said.
But the amount of time the director must spend on labor relations may also contribute to a phenomenon in which the office staff define the way they do their jobs in terms of the union to which their employee "customers" belong, Zimmerman said in the report.
He said that mindset has generated different ways of doing the same thing -- handling employee attendance, for example -- and may have led to some employees adopting an overly narrow and restrictive view of their responsibilities unsupported by policy or formal practice.
Human resources workers themselves are unionized, something that is not likely to change, despite a recommendation of the Council of Great City Schools that their positions be exempt, Zimmerman said.
He indicated that unions representing the human resources workers are not likely to agree to eliminate them from their bargaining units.
As an alternative, Zimmerman recommended that as soon as possible, the district hire a confidential administrative assistant to the human resources director.
School annex on schedule
Posted Wednesday, April 3, 2002
BY KAREN A. DAVIS
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE -- Even though contractors are within four weeks of completing a West End elementary school annex, students are not expected to move into the building until next fall.
Alan Sepe, the city's acting director of public property, said that work on the 15-classroom annex on Greenwich Street will be finished by the end of April.
However, Sepe said he plans to seek permission from the state Fire Safety Code Board of Appeal and Review to allow students to finish the school year in their current location, rather than disrupt their studies by moving them.
The $4.5-million annex will serve about 400 kindergartners and first-grade pupils assigned to Charles N. Fortes and Alfred A. Lima Elementary Schools. Fortes and Lima are located in the Leviton complex, a block from the new annex.
Since September, those students have been attending school in a temporary location, a former parochial school on Harrison Street. The city was forced to build new classrooms because the Leviton complex -- a block of recycled brick mill buildings -- does not have classrooms on ground level.
In 1997, when the city began working to convert the old mills into two elementary schools, state fire officials warned that the city would violate safety codes if it housed kindergarten and first-grade students in space that must be accessed by stairwells, as is the case at the Leviton complex.
Safety codes dictate that newly constructed schools must place kindergarten and first-grade classrooms at the grade level of the land.
Last week, contractors for Dimeo Construction worked to install second-floor windows and wiring at the two-story annex in a residential neighborhood between Daboll Street and Potters Avenue.
Sepe said all 15 classrooms will be located on the ground level; the second floor will contain 5,000 square feet of office space.
Work on the building began in November. Sepe said a mild winter allowed the project to be completed this spring, even though budget issues delayed the start of construction.
Next, crews are scheduled to begin construction on a new high school on the city's South Side, off Thurbers Avenue. That project is awaiting approval from the state Department of Environmental Management because low levels of arsenic and lead have been found there.
School's gas-alert system broken
Posted Wednesday, April 3, 2002
BY KAREN A. DAVIS
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE -- Facing hefty fines by state environmental enforcers, city officials last month began repairs on the gas-extraction and monitoring systems at the Springfield Street School complex that had been installed to ensure the safety of students, faculty and staff.
The gas-extraction system had been shut down in December, and the monitoring system was broken, in violation of a 1999 state Department of Environmental Management order that requires the city to keep the systems running 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
The 10-acre site at the corner of Springfield Street and Hartford Avenue -- which houses a middle school and an elementary school -- has long been the subject of public scrutiny and environmental debate. As the city hurried to build the schools in the spring of 1999, residents questioned whether the site ---- a portion of which was once a municipal dump -- would pose health hazards for students and staff.
However, the DEM gave the city approval to build the schools, under the condition that it remove 20,000 cubic yards of solid waste, cap the contaminated soil with a protective cover and two feet of clean soil, and install an underground ventilation system and soil gas-monitoring system, to be checked quarterly.
On Dec. 19, Leo Hellested, chief of the DEM's Office of Waste Management, sent a letter to city officials asking why the system was not operating. The letter was addressed to Alan Sepe, the city's acting director of public property, who oversees the school site.
When Sepe failed to respond, Hellested sent a second letter on March 14, warning that the state agency would take legal action and "formal enforcement action," including levying fines of $1,000 per violation per day, for the city's failure to comply. The city had until Monday to provide an explanation in writing.
City officials did not return calls to The Journal yesterday.
However, Assistant City Solicitor John T. D'Amico Jr. sent a March 22 response announcing the city's intention of "acting in accord with" the remedial plan and compliance order issued by the DEM in 1999.
D'Amico also sent documentation verifying that ATC Associates Inc., an environmental consulting firm hired by the city, had just completed repairs to a worn-out blower used in the elementary school's gas-extraction system. ATC is still looking for a calibration company to fix and maintain methane-gas monitors at the site, D'Amico said in his letter.
Discovery of the shutdown and broken systems came on Dec. 5, after Steven Fischbach -- a lawyer for a group of parents who had sued the city in 1999, charging that the Springfield school site was unsafe -- went to observe the quarterly testing being done by ATC Inc.
"At the elementary school, the soil gas-removal system was shut down when we came to inspect it," Fischbach wrote in a letter alerting the DEM to the problem. Maintenance workers told testers that the system had been down for 10 days, Fischbach said.
An ATC representative restarted the system by pressing a reset button, Fischbach said.
The maintenance staff also told testers that methane-gas alarms "had been going off repeatedly since the building opened" and that calls to the company that installed the alarm had not been returned.
"When we got there [in December], methane-monitoring devices were beeping," Fischbach said yesterday. And, when testers went back on Feb. 28 for another quarterly check, the same devices "were still beeping."
As a result, Fischbach said he witnessed a number of violations. Among them, failure to operate the gas-extraction system continuously, failure to train staff about how to respond to a system malfunction and failure to notify public safety officials that the methane-gas alarm had been triggered.
"I'm not saying that this proves there are unsafe environmental conditions there," Fischbach said. "But they were allowed to build these schools if certain conditions were met. . . .
"Safety equipment is there to protect the children and staff and monitor gas levels 24-7 and it's not working. . . . something is wrong," he said.
Fischbach filed a lawsuit against the city, Sepe, the DEM and the Providence School Board in the summer of 1999, on behalf of the Hartford Park Tenants Association and several individual parents.
While city officials maintained that the low levels of lead, arsenic and petroleum found in soil samples could be contained, Fischbach's clients argued that the city's testing was not extensive enough and the site could still be hazardous.
After an emergency hearing in August 1999, Superior Court Judge Michael A. Silverstein ruled that the schools could open because the plaintiffs had not offered proof that the site posed an immediate danger to children. However, the judge ordered the city to monitor the ventilation/extraction system for harmful gases, test for lead dust inside the buildings, make test results available to plaintiffs and allow the plaintiffs to observe the testing.
Fischbach said he is troubled that the safeguards are breaking down or having problems within two years of the school's opening.
Fischbach said he believes that "if it weren't for the fact that we were at these monitoring visits, they wouldn't be doing anything about it."
March 2002 II PROTEUN
Posted Tuesday, April 2, 2002
REMINDERS
Address/Telephone Changes
Members are reminded that address and telephone changes should be reported to Ruth or Ellie at the Union office, as well as to the Office of Human Resources, which does not forward this information to the Union.
Blue Cross Representative
Our Blue Cross representative, Janice Sullivan, will be at the Union office from 2:30- 4:30 p.m. on the following dates:
May 16, 2002
June 13, 2002
Anyone wishing to meet with Janice should call Ruth or Ellie at the Union office to schedule an appointment.
BUILDING DELEGATE ELECTIONS
Article VIII - Building Representatives, Section 1, of the Providence Teachers Union Constitution and By-Laws states that "The membership of each school shall elect Building Representatives at least two weeks prior to the Biennial Meeting." Therefore, each school should conduct the established constitutional process for selecting its building representative by no later than April 24, 2002.
NEXT MEMBERSHIP MEETING
Wednesday, April 10, 2002
3:30 p.m.
Bridgham Middle School Cafeteria
1655 Westminster Street
CONGRATULATIONS
Congratulations to Mary Aquino-Dacey of Alfred Lima Elementary on being named Providence Teacher of the Year for 2002. Mary is a fifth grade teacher in the two-way bilingual program at Lima.
JOB SHARING
Patrice Martinelli, an early-childhood teacher (K-2) currently at Flynn Annex, would like to job-share another teacher's position for the 2002-2003 school year. Patrice does not need the medical package and may be contacted at 943-0672.
Mary Ellen Raposa, a fifth grade ESL teacher at Asa Messer Annex, is seeking to job-share either her current position or another next year. She needs the medical benefits and can be reached at 253-2923.
Arts school would nurture local talent
Posted Tuesday, April 2, 2002
BY GREGORY SMITH
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE -- To burnish its municipal image, Providence should exploit its strength as a center of arts and entertainment, architect Friedrich St. Florian urged City Council members last night.
St. Florian said the city can do so by building a high school for the performing and visual arts that he has been hired to design. Every state except Rhode Island and Alaska has at least one such school, council members were told.
Providence has 800 small businesses in arts and crafts, is one of the few medium-sized cities with a nationally recognized repertory theater, and has a history as a hub of costume-jewelry design and manufacturing, St. Florian said. Rhode Island is positioned to become a focus of video-making and filmmaking in the Northeast, he added.
A high school featuring the arts would become a way for Providence to nurture "homegrown talent," he said.
St. Florian and others made a pitch for support of the concept to the council Finance Committee at a City Hall meeting. The proposed school, to be located in the downtown Arts and Entertainment District, would have a comprehensive curriculum with a concentration in the arts.
The arts would include instrumental and vocal music, dance, visual arts such as textiles and sculpture, theater, and media arts such as video-making and filmmaking. Prospective students would have to undergo group auditions to gauge their aptitude and interest for enrollment, according to Joyce Stevos, the School Department director of social studies and the arts.
The committee had no formal reaction to the plan last night. But several council members wanted to know: Will the Providence Teachers Union be flexible about work rules and faculty credentials at a specialty high school of this kind?
For instance, the city wants to employ people with expertise to do some of the teaching even though they are not state-certified as teachers. And some faculty will need to work nights or weekends without special compensation, Councilman Ronald W. Allen said.
The school is being located in the Arts and Entertainment District in order to take advantage of the proximity of artists at Trinity Repertory Company, Providence Black Repertory Company, Rhode Island School of Design and other institutions. If the union won't be accommodating in utilizing the artists, then the new school does not make sense, said Councilman Kevin Jackson, Finance Committee chairman.
Schools Supt. Diana Lam said teachers have demonstrated great interest in the arts high school and that the subject has been discussed with their union.
There are no teachers who can satisfactorily handle all the arts disciplines, so specialists will be needed, Lam said. The labor union will insist on safeguards to ensure that the School Department "doesn't end up outsourcing (the work of) the entire school," she said.
However, the council members' concerns are well-founded, the superintendent said. She noted that the artistic director of the Boston Performing Arts High School is not a state-certified teacher.
"I'm certainly hoping that 'work-to-rule' " will have been terminated by September 2003, when the school is scheduled to open, Lam said with a smile.
Teachers are working under the terms of an expired labor contract and their union is involved in protracted negotiations with the School Board for a new one. In order to pressure city officials to reach an acceptable agreement, union members are engaged in work-to-rule, which is a tactic in which they abstain from voluntary activities not required by their contract.
Allen said, "The pivotal piece that I don't see here tonight is the union." He asked that a union representative be invited to the next Finance Committee meeting at which the school will be discussed, and city Administration Director Patricia McLaughlin agreed to arrange that.
There was no discussion of the cost or the exact location or layout of the school. McLaughlin said the committee would be given a presentation on those issues within a couple of weeks.
Council approval is required to finance construction of the school.
Schools seek 12.4% increase
Posted Tuesday, April 2, 2002
BY GINA MACRIS
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE -- A proposed state and local budget of $285,928,821, which falls short on revenue by $23,758,512, received its first public airing last night at a meeting of the School Board budget subcommittee.
The proposed budget is $31.4 million -- or 12.4 percent -- higher than the current one.
Mark V. Dunham, the schools' chief financial officer, put the state and local budget within the context of an overall spending plan that totals $316,213,526 when all sources of revenue are counted.
Dunham said yesterday's presentation was dedicated only to the part of the budget financed by unrestricted state and local dollars -- the portion that must be delivered to Mayor Vincent A. Cianci Jr.'s office by May 1.
Details on the rest of the spending plan will fall into place later this month, Dunham said.
Even so, last night marked the first time a budget presentation has cast the state and local portion within a broader perspective.
When Schools Supt. Diana Lam arrived in Providence in 1999, the state and local budget was developed in isolation from federal spending and private grants.
Lam pledged to integrate the separate budgets and to link spending with the district's goals.
School Board member Samuel L. Zurier said the local budget addresses the basic needs of the district while "new initiatives are largely from federal and grant money.
"We're always aggressively seeking private grants," he said.
The district will have to rely increasingly on federal and private funds, because Dunham said he sees a ""downward spiral in assistance from the city and the state."
He said he is "very concerned" about the built-in deficit of $23.7 million.
"In the past we could close the gap with additional state revenue," he said, but that option appears highly unlikely this year in light of discouraging estimates on state revenue.
Last year the city closed a $2-million gap by waiving debt costs on capital improvements the school district has made, but there are no assurances that option is available a second time, he said.
Unrestricted state aid to education would amount to $171,069,387 -- about $8.5 million more than the current allocation of $162,604,872.
Providence is losing the benefit of $3.7 million in state aid for school reform that has been channeled through the education commissioner's office for each of the last two years, Dunham said.
Governor Almond's budget would cut that amount to about $900,000 statewide, and Providence would get only $200,000 of it, he said.
Dunham said he is counting on a very modest increase in revenue from the city, which he has budgeted at $84,510,922. The current allocation is $84,263,710.
Other major sources of revenue in the overall spending plan include $20.8 million from federal entitlements, nearly 5.6 million from private sources, and close to $3.9 million in state money earmarked for literacy and professional development.
"The plan is to continue progress in literacy and math and parent and public engagement," Dunham said, as well as strengthening the administrative structure to support the schools.
The spending plan also calls for:
Expansion of two new high schools, one focusing on health and technology and the other concentrating on international studies.
The design of the performing arts high school, which is scheduled to open in the fall of 2003.
Continuation of other aspects of high school redesign.
The start of middle school redesign.
Implementation of recommendations from a community task force on high school dropouts.
The biggest increases in costs are for salaries -- $14,265,839 -- and benefits -- $9,360,123 -- including a hike of $5,174,988 in health insurance premiums alone, Dunham said.
He said the proposed budget contains enough money for the salary increases offered to unions at the bargaining table.
The city has yet to settle with teachers, who have been offered increases of 2 percent during the current school year, 7 percent next year, and 2 percent in the third and final year of the contract.
There would be a total of 87 new jobs in the next budget, including 13 teachers to staff expansion of the two new high schools, and 27 math coaches.
These coaches would help classroom teachers with strategies for teaching mathematics in the same way literacy coaches have worked with their colleagues on techniques for teaching reading and writing.
Funding for math coaches would come from $1.4 million in federal Title I money for disadvantaged children.
An additional $355,145 from Title I would pay for community liaisons working with the office of Family and Community Partnerships.
Meanwhile, Zurier said the new initiatives will be further explained at another budget workshop on Thursday. A similar meeting on April 11 will give an overview of the spending plan, and a general public forum on the budget will be held April 29, he said.
The School Board will meet in a special session on April 30 to adopt a budget request and send it to the mayor's office, Zurier said.
All the meetings will begin at 7 p.m. in the School Board meeting room at 797 Westminster St., the school administration building. The only exception is the public forum, which will be at the Lillian Feinstein Elementary School on Broad Street.
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