What to do a about the problem of motorists breezing by stopped school buses?
School Committee member Fred Small is advocating a get-tough policy in which cameras would record the license plate of every driver who passes a bus picking up or dropping off students and reporting them to the police. He broached the subject at the School Committee’s Wednesday, Jan. 11 meeting. Small attended remotely via phone.
“If it’s ‘legal’’ for us to do this, I would love for us to be able to – it’s such a safety hazard and, for me, has no place on our streets, so to speak,” he said.
Superintendent of Schools Jeff Szymaniak asked, for clarification, if that entailed placing a camera on the red stop signs that unfold when a bus stops, which records the information and for the district to report to the RMV or police.
“Yes, and we would report every instance,” Small said.
Chair Christopher Howard said several other school districts are also discussing the issue, wondering how big an issue it is, suggesting that Szymaniak could talk to First Student and get the bus company’s view. He was also concerned the other districts were dealing more with city streets or multi-lane streets.
“I don’t know how much it happens here,” Howard said.
“Usually, we would hear about that, and I don’t hear a lot about it,” Szymaniak said.
Small asked if the committee could at least make a start by seeking a consensus among the police chiefs and school resource officers over the legality of such a move.
Member Steve Bois asked what Mass. General Law outlines on the subject.
“That would be the first thing, to allow us,” he said. “Obvioulsy, I don’t want to see anyone blasting past a school bus.”
Vice Chair Christopher Scriven said, while the district wants to do all it can to ensure the safety of students, he said he could not remember the last time he saw someone blow by a stopped bus.
Member Glen DiGravio said he has seen it happen
“All you need to do is look on social media,” Szymaniak said. “Every now and then somebody gets blasted for it. Our drivers would try to flag that license plate if they did, but we don’t have that device.”
Scriven suggested a survey of First Student bus drivers might be a good first step in gauging the extent of the problem.
“If you’re asking bus drivers what their biggest concern is, it’s going to be the motorists who have their head down on their cell phones as they’re driving by them,” Howard said.
Szymaniak said, while cameras are not a bad idea, he doesn’t know if he can contractually push First Student to do that right now, but said it was an issue worth bringing to the committee for discussion.
Member Dawn Byers said she recalled the issue might center around a statewide effort.
“I’m certainly in favor of getting more information about it, but I don’t think it’s something us independently would do,” she said.
Assistant Superintendent George Ferro said there are 24 states where the cameras are legal, but only 12 have taken any action to implement it so far.
“It’s called bus arm stop cameras,” Ferro said, adding he had just Googled it. He and Szymaniak said the district maps bus routes to try and avoid having students cross roadways to get on the bus. He added that the high school parking lot during morning parent drop-off is a bigger problem from a safety standpoint.
“It does get active in the morning,” he said.
Howard agreed more research can be done while the district asks First Student.
“I’m certainly all for the safety of our students,” Howard said. “To me, there’s other things to consider, too.” He mentioned yellow caution light violations and speeding in school zones as well as people texting while driving as examples. He suggested it could be part of a larger brain-storming session on student safety.
DiGravio said a pilot program of Small’s suggestion was conducted in Medford in 2011.
In other business, members of the Student Advisory Council spoke in favor of the budget line item to return foreign language to the middle school curriculum.
“Foreign language has been an invaluable piece of my education here at Whitman-Hanson and being able to continue foreign language into senior year and being able to take a college-level course before I’m even in college has been incredible,” said Riley Getchell, adding it would bring a higher academic standard to the district’s middle schools. “The grades below [us] haven’t been able to experience this and they’re most likely going to see the effects of this in their college applications and not being able to have that advanced level of foreign language.”
SAC member Emma McKeon has a younger brother in the Duval School who’s been asking her to teach him Portuguese because he has a friend who speaks the language. He wants to be able to speak with his friend.
“The elementary schoolers, which is surprising because they are at such a young age there, are really striving to learn these new languages, which I think is amazing,” she said. “It activates all of the different strategies in your brain and helps a lot.”
Khloe Drake agreed that languages help with cognitive abilities.
“Learning these languages at a younger age helps [students] be more fluent,” she said.
Noah Roberts, who said he surveyed other students over the summer on his Instagram account, touched on what he termed a language-adjancent issue.
“As our schools, and our towns in general, have become more diverse with [residents of] different backgrounds and cultures, I think there’s an increasing need to have some type of education on these different cultures to make these people feel more represented,” he said. “What I’ve had is just one basic monolith of a specific parts of American history and not much outreach besides that.”
He said it could also provide outlets for students of other cultural backgrounds to express how they feel.
Vice Chair Christopher Scriven commended Roberts for his work in bringing students’ concerns about inclusion to the committee’s attention.
School Committee members David Forth and Dawn Byers thanked the students for speaking their minds reminding the committee that the high school students were speaking from the vantage point of having had no middle school foreign language instruction because of budget cuts that were made in spring 2019.
Ferro said that Spanish and French were cut from middle school curriculum in 2003 and then, in 2009, it was reinstituted on a limited basis with both schools sharing a single teacher, later hiring another teacher so each school had one.
But, it was still a matter of selecting which students could take a language, Ferro said, because there were more students wanting to take it than there was room for in the classes.
“A lot of it became political, I’m just going to say, and a lot of it became an issue,” he said.

WHITMAN – Former Treasurer/Collector Mary Beth Carter is being offered the position of Town Administrator, it was announced at the Select Board’s Tuesday, Jan. 10 meeting.
The offer is conditional based on the outcome of contract negotiations.
“I have some slightly good news,” Chair Randy LaMattina said in making the announcement that interim Town Administrator Frank Lynam was making that recommendation. “Well, not slightly, I have tremendously good news.
He said Lynam had reached out to a “former employee – a great former employee,” who recently left, noting that the person “absolutely checks all the boxes we could possibly ask for” in a town administrator.
Carter, he said before mentioning her by name, is a proven employee.
“You know where her heart lies – with the town of Whitman,” LaMattina said. He added that she is very interested in the position.
Lynam called her the “best possible candidate out there right now.”
“I think her close to 20-year employment record here, her track record, her knowledge of the budget, her knowledge of our town, her commitment to our town, makes her [someone who] if she was still working for us I could just see this being a transfer from one department to another,” LaMattina said. “It makes sense,” he added, seeking a motion to offer her the position, which the board approved unanimously.
Both LaMattina and Lynam spoke of the struggle to find solid candidates in the town’s ongoing search for a full-time administrator.
Lynam said he reached out to Carter out of frustration with the results of the search.
“It wasn’t for lack of candidates, it was for a lack of qualified candidates,” he said. “Even when we had three to present, we lost one before we even came to the door, and at that point, we held off to try and assess whether this was the right way to go. I really made a leap in even calling her.”
Not only had Carter just left her position in Whitman, she had just accepted a job with the town of Norwell.
“It wasn’t an easy decision for Mary Beth to make, because the same qualities that make her a good manager and a good leader are the ones that challenge her to say, ‘Wait a minute, I just took another job.’”
He said that, if Carter accepts to offer, Whitman will be better off for it. Lynam noted he has worked with Carter ever since she began working for the town in 2005.
“She’s an incredible employee,” Lynam said. “She’s committed, she’s smart, she can do anything.”
He recalled having asked her several times over the years to take on tasks that would not routinely be the responsibility of a treasurer/collector, and without question, he could count on all the boxes being checked.
Vice Chair Dan Salvucci lauded Carter’s work ethic, noting she worked Fridays even though Town Hall is closed that day each week.
“If she needed to be, she was here on Saturdays,” he said.
LaMattina said the focus should be on obtaining a town administrator when Salvucci began outlining considerations for an assistant, should Carter agree to serve.
“I couldn’t be happier,” said Select Board member Shawn Kain. “I couldn’t think of a better candidate [and] I’m really excited that she was willing to come back and work for the town, I think it’s exactly what we need.”
Members Dr. Carl Kowalski and Justin Evans also enthusiastically joined in the endorsement of appointing Carter.
In other business, resident Ken Lailer spoke during the meeting’s public forum to thank for Select Board and Fire Chief Timothy Clancy’s their tributes last month to his wife Marie, who passed away while on vacation — and to ask Select Board, historical boards in town and people of Whitman to try to establish a Whitman historical museum, which he would like to be named in his wife’s honor.
Mrs. Lailer was a dedicated CERT volunteer for many years, beginning as an EMT before she even became a nurse. But another of her passions, he said, was Whitman and its history.
“Her passion was with the old buildings, the research and surveys to place things on national registry, to refurbishing the old cemetery stones in Mt. Zion Cemetery and even … [being instrumental in the restoration of the Toll House sign at Wendy’s,” he said. “I’m here, willing to assist and fulfill her vision, but I will need guidance,” he said.
He added that Marie had written grants for some of the projects on which she worked.

The W-H School Committee, on Wednesday, Dec. 21 discussed the points they want to address during meetings of the Regional Agreement Committee, as the towns’ select boards are also being asked to do.
“We kind of wanted to do it in executive session so both towns weren’t watching what your concerns might be, but we can’t do that,” said Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak. “What we’ like to talk [about] here, or get some thoughts, are what you would like us to focus on as a committee or what your concerns are in the Regional Agreement, so we can have those discussions.”
Fred Small suggested one item that would likely come up is the definition of a capital cost and what is considered an emergency repair vs an extraordinary repair.
“I think that needs to be defined very clearly, especially with the mold incident last year at Whitman Middle School,” he said.
Dawn Byers suggested a discussion of how to handle capital costs in general should be conducted, as some districts place the costs in their operating budgets.
“I think that’s step one,” she said. Transportation is another issue that she said should be discussed.
“I was waiting for that,” School Committee Chair Christopher Howard. “I knew someone has to bring it up.”
Beth Stafford said that the agreement needs to be reviewed more carefully, in order to determine specifically what it needs.
“Just in general, that, to me, has been a problem from Day One with the agreement,” she said.
Hillary Kniffen said language, which determines the makeup of the School Committee’s representation from the towns, should also be discussed.
“If we’re going to put population in, there should be a clause that says you can’t give one town a majority (equal to the 2/3 margin needed for some votes),” she said. “We don’t vote like that anyway, but that’s just going to open a can of worms that we don’t need to deal with.”
The Whitman Select Board had also advocated clarifying non-mandated busing language, including that involving reimbursement of costs, during their Tuesday, Dec. 20 meeting. They also want to include the the statutory funding method in the agreement.
The District also voted to increase the pay scale for Food Services employees.
The lowest position on the pay scale — substitutes — now at $14.25 per hour, will be increased to $15 per hour, in keeping with the state’s minimum wage. The change went into effect Jan. 1.
All other salaries in the department will also be increased by 75 cents per hour to “give it to everyone who’s working in Food Service,” he said of the raise.
The School Committee approved the increase at its Wednesday, Dec. 21 meeting.
“It’s difficult to retain people,” Business Manager John Stanbrook said. “We’ve got some very talented people and we’d like to give that as a raise.”
The increase would be $17,685 for the current fiscal year and $10,316.2 for the rest of the calendar year.
Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak reminded the School Committee that the Food Services budget is self-funded.
“There’s a significant amount of money in retained earnings in that fund,” Stanbrook agreed.
The district’s strategic planning consultant has indicated a willingness to offer a workshop to School Committee members sometime this month, according to Szymaniak.
Assistant Superintendent George Ferro said a group of administrators have already met with the consultant and are forming the rest of a larger team — including parents and students — and the consultant will also be meeting with stakeholders at the individual schools.
He will then discuss what the groups consider their top two or three initiatives, based on the information the meetings come up with, Ferro said.
“Then it’s [a question of] where do we want to move forward?” Ferro said. “It could easily be something where there’s an active participation, or it’s just hear your thoughts on what you think the next five years might mean or need of input for the district.”
Whitman Middle School Building Committee [Chair] Fred Small reported that he met with interim Town Administrator Frank Lynam, Select Board member Randy LaMattina, Whitman town counsel, Owner’s Project Manager John Bates of Colliers and MSBA Director Jack McCarthy and his staff, during which an agreement was reached for the town to maintain its longstanding lease agreement with the school district for use of athletic fields at Whitman Middle School.
“Santa Claus came early,” he said. “It was a brief, very nice meeting. [McCarthy] understands what the town’s concerns are, he ended up saying, ‘I don’t have a problem with that.’”
But Small said unfettered access during construction has been requested and something in writing outlining steps should a repair be needed in the future, MSBA would be able to have the unfettered access they require.
Small also said the MSBA Board of Directors have increased the allowable reimbursement per square foot for projects from $360 per square foot to $393 and site work reimbursement were increased as well. The per-square foot limitations are in addition to the overall reimbursement rates for communities.
“Towns and cities that are in project right now, with signed contracts with MSBA, are getting nothing,” Szymaniak said. “These are for future costs due to inflation.” The increases are tailored for towns like Whitman that have not signed a contract yet.
“We’re right in the right spot at the right time, because some cities and towns are down $10 [million] to $15 million in costs and have to go back to their towns to get those costs.”
— Tracy F. Seelye