My Response to Eagle Tribune Reporting Error

Letter to the Editor:

In “BOE Reverses January Decision about Green Complaint,” published on Feb 21, Kristen Giddings reported that subsequent to the Board of Education’s Jan. 11 decision in my favor, SAU 55 filed an appeal. In fact, SAU 55 never filed an appeal.

Any reader of your article would infer from your reporting that the BOE’s action to rescind their Jan 11 decision and issue a new decision was as a result of SAU 55’s appeal. This is not true.

In fact, the Board of Education rescinded it’s original order in my favor and issued a different decision that was even more in my favor. At the Feb. 8, 2018 BOE meeting, the board heard a similar complaint to mine, Verville/School Administrative Unit #53 – SB-FY-18-07-000. Based on their decision in that case the board decided to treat both cases the same and so rescinded their previous decision and ordered both cases to be investigated by the Department of Education. This new decision saved me the pointless exercise of an SAU 55 public hearing that would only have resulted in another appeal to the Board of Education.

It is my contention that SAU 55 is in violation of RSA 194-C:5 with respect to setting SAU employee salaries, and the sooner the merits of this complaint are addressed, the better for Timberlane and Hampstead taxpayers. So far, thanks to the bottomless well of taxpayer money being used to pay legal fees, I have not had a chance to argue the material facts of my complaint which began in July of 2017.

I have not hired a lawyer through all this and there was no need for SAU 55 to use legal services either.

They simply have an aversion to following the law when it works in the interest of taxpayers and not their own.

My thanks go to the NH Board of Education for putting an end to the delays and dilatory legal arguments in order to finally grapple with the issue of a lawless SAU.

Donna Green

_BOE Reverses January Decision about Green Complaint___

Eagle Tribune Editor’s Note [from Feb 22]

This story has been updated to clarify that a notice of appeal was filed with the state Board of Education, but no official appeal was filed after the board’s January meeting.

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Could a kind reader let me know if the EAgle Tribune publishes this letter?  I’ve given up my subscription in favor of the Union Leader which is why, presumably, I can’t comment on the article online.