I went to the West Orange Board of Education meeting tonight Monday, January 14, 2013. The contract with the teachers union will not made be public until tomorrow which is after the meeting and after the vote that passed five to zero. So we have a contract until June 30, 2015 and the public does not truly know what is in it and what it will truly cost. I asked directly to the board “under this contract what is the mean cost in salary and benefits per teacher would be?” I could not get an answer other than we don’t know at this time. Since I could not get a honest direct answer to a basic and fair question: this gives me a strong reason to believe that this contract was voted on without the Board Members having a true understanding of what is the contract is all about and what its implication will be on the taxpayers.
The labor attorney for the board Mr. Stern indicated that it would have been legally permissible to release contract to the public before the meeting as the West Orange Teachers Union voted on a few days before the board voted. In fairness to Mr. Stern he did question the wisdom or releasing the document before the vote.
So it my view the promises of fiscal responsibility and transparency made by Mr. Charles, Ms. Brill, Ms. Lab, Ms. Mordecai, and Ms Casalino while campaigning for the respective elections were broken in this meeting.
