Election For Board Seat Not Held

The Mansfield School Board appointed a former board member to a vacant seat for which there was not an election for the seat. There are questions about the appointment by the board when no one runs for a board seat. The Attorney General has stated that if no one runs for a seat then the member that held the seat before the election can continue to serve until the next election. In this case this did not happen. Mr. Mathis, the replaced board member, participated in the September 21, 2009 board meeting and his votes were counted. If his ability to serve was against the law then his votes should not have counted. Because Mr. Sadoski did not vote his non-vote would be counted as a no then a number of motions passed by the board did not pass including the motion to accept the budget for the 2009-2010 school year.

Also, the newly elected board member did not vote for the appointment of the new board member and his vote was not counted as a no. The state law requires that an abstaining vote is to be counted as a no vote. In fact the new board member, Mr. Sadoski, is recorded to not have voted at all during the September 21, 2009 board meeting. A welcome to the board for Mr. Sadoski was one of the first actions of this meeting and therefore he should have voted.

At this time the Mansfield district is listed as being under fiscal distress and has no more than two years to correct the problem.

PCSSD Teacher Arrested

A teacher has been arrested and charged with four counts of sexual assault in the first degree. The teacher has been teaching in the district for eleven years. At this time the teacher is on leave from the district.

UPDATE:

Charges have been dropped against this teacher. The student in question was 18 at the time of the incident and as a result the charges would have been reduced to a lesser charge. Because of this the statute of limitations would have run out.