I noted the BOE agenda that was posted to the web atwww.woboe.org yesterday for the meeting of Monday night January 7, 2012 stipulates that a contract agreement was reached with the teacher’s union retro-active from July 1, 2012 and forward to June 30, 2105. Currently over 60% of the West Orange tax levy goes to the BOE and the biggest driver of BOE cost is the contract with the teacher. No details were released. For a vote that has huge fiscal implication for West Orange, the citizen should be brought into the process and be able to voice opinion on this. However, the lack of details makes citizen engagement in the debate difficult or impossible. The BOE members all promised to operate a transparent board of education when they won their respective election. This ramming thru a vote with no discussion on the details before the fact is the exact opposite of transparent. I urge to citizens to demand, that the vote to be tabled until detail are released and a debate can be had.
