Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak has pledged that he will “look at district-wide administration … anything that will keep teachers in their positions,” first if budget cuts must be made, he told the School Committee at its Wednesday, Feb. 13 meeting.

There is little he can do about the 2-percent increase in special education costs, he cautioned.

“I’d like for this committee to hear from the towns before I tell my staff or we’re looking at cuts first because I think that Whitman and Hanson are spots,” he said.

Whitman town employee unions have been asked to consider wage freeze in light of that towns’ budget crisis, according to Szymaniak, who attended a department head meeting there on Monday, Feb. 11. District Business Manager Christine Suckow and Facilities Director Ernest Sandland also attended that meeting chaired by Town Administrator Frank Lynam.

“Frank has met with all of the union reps in Whitman except one, and I don’t know which union — he didn’t say which one he did not meet with — about taking a zero-percent [increase], or a wage freeze for two years,” Szymaniak. “I know he had a conversation with WHEA about that.”

Szymaniak said the meeting with teachers’ union representatives, which was criticized by Hanson School Committee member Michael Jones, was not arranged through his office.

“We voted for you for this position — you work for us,” Jones said. “What you say we need, that’s how we vote. Frank Lynam doesn’t tell you, us, anything [about] what we do. I just want to be clear on that.”

Jones asked if Lynam was meeting with district department heads and Szymaniak outlined that the Feb. 11 meeting was a town department head session but that Lynam had met with the teachers’ association without his knowledge.

Jones and School Committee member Dan Cullity agreed that was wrong.

School Committee Chairman Bob Hayes said the committee would be “wreckless” to discuss beginning cuts to the budget before they receive numbers from the towns, stressing that their job is to advocate for students. He said he didn’t think anyone in either town is hiding numbers at this point.

While he came into the meeting prepared to discuss a transfer from excess and deficiency to help trim the budget deficit, Hayes said at the conclusion of the meeting he would rather the committee wait until they see where they are at when town budget numbers come in. School Committee members agreed.

“It’s just something that is kind of out there with our teachers, we haven’t had a conversation at all about taking any type of wage freeze,” Szymaniak said of the wage freeze discussed at the Whitman department heads meeting. “We haven’t had a conversation about anything about our contract yet as we don’t have any numbers from either town. … I already have some teachers that are concerned.”

Another Whitman department head meeting was scheduled for 10 a.m., Tuesday, Feb. 19. Szymaniak said he would bring back any further information to the School Committee at its next meeting at 7 p.m., Wednesday, Feb. 27.

“This is a level-service budget to provide the services we have in place, and I think we’ve been very creative in restructuring some of our units to make sure we can provide services to our kids in a different way than we provided last year,” Szymaniak said.

He said that police and fire personnel work very hard at high-risk jobs, but teachers also face difficult situations managing classrooms of 25 children while responding to parent concerns and directives from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE).

Szymaniak also offered School Committee members a line item-by-line item look at increases and decreases from the current budget to the fiscal 2018, ’19 and ’20 as requested by the committee.

Overall, the budget’s facilities, insurance costs and salaries, are up 3.6 percent, with special education costs up 2 percent, Szymaniak said.

“The bottom line at the end, stays the same, but as far as percentages, if you look at it … if you look at those numbers last week, it’s close to $1 million,” he said.

Some of the increases are; paraprofessional and special education salaries, the latter to increase some staffing to bring the district back into state and federal compliance; substitute salaries for an increase in the numbers of substitutes; cost of living for clerical salaries; school psychologist salaries; charter school and school choice costs and legal costs.

“When we talk about social-emotional pieces, the [number of] students that are coming in who need more than the average classroom teacher is growing at a need that is out-pacing what a school can do and that’s not just here — that’s everywhere,” Szymaniak said of special education, including $884,000 in out-of-district placements, and psychological services costs. “That last option is out-of-district and when I’m looking at an $800,000 cost, know that out-of-district placement can go anywhere from between $50,000 to $363,000 depending on if it’s residential or not.”

He said the school district’s legal firm can challenge a DESE recommendation for out-of-district placement, but must be relatively certain of success, because the district can be liable for legal fees for both sides as well as the placement if it is overruled.

A change in curriculum coordination represents a shift of focus to the elementary schools.

“If we feel we have a good case and we go to hearing, [I’m] all for it, but that’s still an attorney fee,” Szymaniak said. “We want to make sure we do the right things for our students and our staff and also [legal representation] keeps us away from litigation.”

Some of the decreases are: instructional materials and general supply costs; superintendent salary; contracted services transferred to facilities costs; and salaries in district transportation after a restructuring.

“Our teachers are busting their butts with not a lot of supply,” Szymaniak said. “We were shocked coming into this office at what little we give our teachers to teach with.”

School Committee member Fred Small said the current budget situation is similar to that of four years ago when Whitman voters were presented with two budgets on which to vote — one reflecting an override and one without, which would have created the need for the committee to vote on a reassessment.

“Knowing at least on the Whitman side where they’re at … do you envision taking a pencil sharpener, seeing whatever you can do to this budget that you’ve presented and having level services or close to level services …

“This is level right now,” Szymaniak said. “What I’d like the committee to do is look at what we need for our schools, listen to both town administrators about numbers of what they’re looking at in their towns … I’m not trying to disrespect the town administrators, but nothing has been presented to this committee in terms of where they’re at. I’ve heard override. I haven’t heard a number on a specific override.”

Assistant Superintendent George Ferro said in the last 10 years the budget has always be presented knowing there would be cuts before the towns’ numbers were presented.

“This time we decided to come out of the gate and say where we’re at,” he said. “We need the guidance to see what we need to come up with so we can end up there.”

School Committee member Robert Trotta said that, with the Town Meetings on May 6, time is growing short for hearing budget structures from the towns.

“There doesn’t seem to be a plan,” he said, noting his priority is maintaining class sizes and extra-curricular activities. “It seems like we’re trying to hang on as best we can.”

Cullity argued the school budget is more a same-services plan than a level services one.

“We should be at a better point for our kids,” he said.

“We need to look [voters] in the eye and tell them what we need,” Small said.

Szymaniak said he and Suckow met with a Collins Center representative on the creation of a capital plan in Whitman, saying he plans to come back on Feb. 27 about a new Whitman Middle School “down the road.” He said the Collins Center representative had commented on the district’s recent habit of kicking capital issues down the road.

“That doesn’t mean we’re going to do a statement of interest, it has to move forward, but we have more and more facilities issues at Whitman Middle and it’s something we’ve talked about, so I’m going to leave it to the committee to see where we’re at,” he said. “I do have growing concerns about the state of Whitman Middle School.

Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak told the School Committee that, during the government shutdown, affected parents with school-aged kids could be assured the district will do what it can to help.

“Please contact your principal,” Szymaniak said. “Our principals have been reaching out, seeing what we can do, but [families] might go unnoticed. Not everyone knows what mom and dad does for a living, but we are looking to make sure that if anybody is on furlough because of the shutdown, we’ll take care of the kids in the school.”

Szymaniak said that could mean efforts such as finding $10 to ensure a student can take part in a book fair.

“Those are the incidentals that, I’m afraid … they could miss out on because of the shutdown,” he said.

He said the shutdown has not yet affected services offered by the schools, but there has been concern noted in the national media over when the shutdown could start impacting school lunch programs.

Contracts extended

The School Committee voted to extend contracts with S.J. Services for custodial work and the First Student bus contract after Business Services Director Christine Suckow, at the committee’s direction, sought reconsideration of price increases.

Both said no and the contracted hikes of 3.5-percent increases for fiscal 2020 and 2.5 percent for fiscal 2021. For S.J. Services it is 3 percent in 2020 and 2 percent in 2021.

Both contracts go out to bid again in two years.

food pantry donations

National Honor Society adviser Ellen Galambos and NHS President Katelyn Molito presented checks totaling $5,000 divided between the Whitman and Hanson food pantries raised at the annual Miles for Meals 5K last fall.

“Volunteers like Mrs. Galambos and the National Honor Society have been helping us for quite a few years now,” Bruce Perry of the Whitman Food Pantry said. “They do a tremendous job, they do 99.9 percent of the work. … They’re just phenomenal kids and we just can’t say enough about what they do for the food pantry and for the community as well.”

“You can be so proud of the kids in the school system, because we’ve had so many kids come through and help us rake and pack and unpack and collect donations — and raise funds through their fundraisers,” said Christine Cameron of the Hanson Food Pantry. “You can be real proud of these kids, they are part of our future.”

HANSON — As a snow squall moved in ahead of a winter cold front Thursday, Jan. 10, a strange-looking tracked vehicle passed back and forth in the marshland of Smitty’s Bog.

The last time the vehicle had been seen working in the conservation area off Route 58, the town’s Conservation office received about a dozen calls from curious residents.

What on earth was going on here?

“What we’re doing is taking this area which was obviously all about cranberry cultivation and we’re restoring, as much as possible, to wetlands and their natural ecological function,” said Conservation Commission Chairman Phil Clemons. He described the process of removing invasive phragmities from the bog — the work being done by the vehicle owned by Solitude Lake Management of Virginia with offices in Shrewsbury, Mass.

The casual onlooker might not know the name phragmities, but would recognize the towering reeds with the fluffy plumes.

“This is part of the wetlands restoration management plan that the Conservation Commission, the town of Hanson and the Natural Resource Conservation Service have been working on,” Clemons explained as tall, dried phragmities fell before the “MarshMaster’s” cutting blade. “We’ve been spending seven years preparing a plan and now we’re finally starting to do it.”

The machine is used for mowing marsh areas because its extremely wide track spreads the machine’s weight over a wide area to avoid harming underground roots. It is less likely to get bogged-down in a bog, as well.

“It’s environmentally sound,” Clemons said of the vehicle. “It’s a good thing, even though it looks terrible and we want people to know that.”

An EPA-approved herbicide was sprayed on at least three acres of  phragmities-choked areas by Solitude Lake Management in September and, on the plant tops after the fluffy seedheads died back for the winter, the company was cutting down the plants. In the next growing season it will be much easier to find and treat what remains of the plants, Clemons said.

“Mowing [alone] wouldn’t do a thing,” he said. “It would probably just encourage it. There’s multiple steps over multiple years.”

The phragmities, a common reed, is an invasive species from other continents.

“We never used to have it around here until a few decades ago,” Clemons said. “When I was growing up there was none of this in Hanson. It comes in and takes over a wetland and wipes out all the other native plants.”

Cattails, lilypads and other native plants have all paid the price of the phragmities’ success in the region, according to Clemons. It also has few animals feeding off it. The plant’s “impenetrable mass” chokes shallow water bogs and natural marshes, with negative effects to stream flow and native wildlife.

“Nothing eats it,” Clemons said, noting phragmities is one of 100 plant varieties that are now illegal to sell in Massachusetts. “It is a wolf in environmental sheeps’ clothing. It’s an environmental disaster, is what it is.”

Removing the phragmities will permit the return of native plants that want to come back and insects, fish, amphibian and bird species that use that wide diversity of plants can also return.

“They will get much more benefit from that diverse mix of vegetation instead of a solid wall of junk.” Clemons said.

Common in alkaline habitats, phragmities also tolerate  brakish water and is associated with larger methane emissions and greater carbon dioxide uptake than native New England salt marsh vegetation that occurs at higher marsh elevations, according to plant researchers in a 2015 environmental report. Both the state and federal governments have policies that seek to control the spread of phragmities wherever possible.

“The only thing is, it’s difficult to control and this will be a multi-year task,” Clemons said.

Federal funds are paying for the project.

“At the moment, we’re working and the contractors are working, I’m sure they will catch up with us,” he said of the potential financial impact of the federal government shutdown.

BROCKTON – Daniel Nash, 33, of Whitman, who was found guilty of raping a woman at a Jan. 25, 2014 house party, was sentenced to serve five to seven years in state prison on Thursday, Dec. 13 in Brockton Superior Court, announced Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz Thursday.

Nash was found guilty of two counts of rape, one count of indecent assault and battery on a person over 14 and one count of photographing an unsuspecting person in the nude.

Judge Robert Gordon presided over the five-day jury trial ending in a guilty verdict Dec. 3 and sentenced Nash Thursday. Nash asked for a two-year custodial sentence through his Brockton-based attorney Joseph Krowski, Jr., while Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Sprague asked for eight to 12 years in custody.

Gordon sentenced Nash to serve five to seven years in state prison at MCI-Cedar Junction (a maximum-security prison in Walpole), to be followed by two and one half years in the house of correction, suspended for two years. After that, Nash will be on probation for three years under the conditions that he stays away from, and not have contact with, the victim; that he wears a GPS monitoring bracelet; that he registers with the state Sex Offender Registry Board and that he undergoes sex offender treatment.

A representative for the district attorney’s office stated that the commonwealth was satisfied with the sentence.

Nash, a former State Street Bank account manager, held a birthday party at his Whitman home in 2014. The victim, his then-fiancée’s sister, arrived at the party and stayed overnight. The following morning, the victim woke up and called Whitman Police to report that she had been sexually assaulted by a person at the party, believed to be Nash, and the victim also believed there was a video of the incident, according to the release and court records.

Whitman Police investigated and interviewed Nash, who eventually admitted to the assault. Nash consented to a search of his cellphone by Whitman Police where a video of the incident, which he had attempted to delete, was located, court records also state.

The ADA, Sprague, first read the victim’s impact statement into the record, saying to the judge that the victim was too emotional to address the court even though she was present.

The victim asked, several times, for the maximum sentence, “not a slap on the wrist,” through the ADA.

Sprague herself asked for a sentence greater than those suggested by the Superior Court sentencing guidelines, noting several aggravating factors in the crime, including that the defendant was especially vulnerable because she was intoxicated at the party.

“The defendant did not express remorse for his actions … He, in fact, tried to blame the event on the victim’s flirtatious behavior with him earlier in the evening and his own intoxication, which was greatly exaggerated. The defendant then denied these allegations to the victim’s family, causing a termination/alienation of the family relationships and bonds the victim had with her mother, stepfather, and sister,” stated Sprague in a sentencing memorandum.

The defense relied heavily on Nash’s lack of a criminal record in arguing for a lenient, but custodial, two-year sentence. His attorney, Krowski, noted that he had never been in a fist fight, never had a detention in school and didn’t even have a speeding ticket. He said the incident was “an aberration in Mr. Nash’s otherwise impeccable record.”

“One moment in time … cannot define a man,” he stated in a sentencing memorandum.

He also argued that Nash was engaged to the victim’s sister at the time of the crime, and they got married despite the pending charges. The victim’s parents also attended the trial in support of Nash, he said.

“They recognize that the crimes were truly an aberration, completely inconsistent with his character as a caring husband and loving son-in-law,” he stated in his sentencing memorandum.

He also said that about 50 letters had been written in support of Nash.

The arguments did not particularly persuade the judge, who in a somewhat rare move, according to court personnel, handed down a written, six-page sentencing ruling which he read to the court, after deliberating for about 15 minutes following the victim impact statement and hearing from the two opposing parties.

“In arriving at its sentencing decision, the Court has placed greatest emphasis upon the truly egregious nature of the offenses themselves,” Gordon stated, describing in detail the crimes Nash committed, and that “[a] more appalling mistreatment of a member of one’s own soon-to-be family is difficult to conceive…”

The judge noted that “[a]s for the victim’s character, the Court finds that the evidence at trial intensifies rather than mitigates its judgement of the Defendant in this case … this woman was especially vulnerable to Mr. Nash’s brand of predation. Far from lessening the blameworthiness of his actions, these facts mark the Defendant as a bullying exploiter of the powerless, convinced that a victim in a distressed condition was somehow not entitled to even the most basic protections of the law.”

Following that, he added, “It is, perhaps, true that no person should ever be judged to harshly for their single worst moment in life, and I am reminded of this trope as the Court contemplates a proper sentence for Mr. Nash. That said, there are boundaries of human decency which, once crossed, require due reckoning in a society that strives for justice. This is, sadly, such a case.”

Finally, he noted that the law authorized him to sentence Nash to up to 20 years’ imprisonment on each offense of rape, but that the sentence was in line with the Superior Court sentencing guidelines for someone with no criminal record.

WAREHAM — Matthew Will, 37, of Halifax, owner of Five Star Discount Roofing, was in Wareham District Court Friday, Dec. 7, facing six larceny-related charges stemming from two Middleborough Police Department complaints alleging he took deposits by check for roofing and household contract work from six residents of the Oak Point 55-plus community in Middleborough, cashed the checks but did not start or complete the work as promised.

Will faces similar charges in Plymouth District Court, stemming from Kingston and Hanson allegations.

These charges are in addition to a long list of others, including a separate case also stemming from alleged crimes at the Oak Point community, in which Will is facing 15 counts of larceny over $250 by false pretense. A pre-trial conference was conducted on that case after the arraignments on the latest charges.

Judge Douglas J. Darnbrough presided over the proceedings, to which Will had been summonsed. His Plymouth-based attorney, Jack Atwood, pled not guilty on his behalf. At one point, Will attempted to address the judge, but Atwood stopped him from speaking, bellowing “Be quiet!”

Police and court reports paint a picture of a once reputable roofer unable or unwilling to keep up with the amount of work he had committed to, and the Middleborough Building Inspector, Robert Whalen, alerting police to complaints about Will while continuing to issue building permits despite warnings from Oak Point residents.

Whalen, in a phone interview Dec. 10, stated that disputes between contractors and homeowners are outside of his jurisdiction, but that in an effort to protect the community, he contacted Detective Simonne Ryder, of the Middleborough Police, regarding Will when Whalen had received about ten complaints.

As of press time, Will is facing a total of one count of larceny over $1,200 by false pretense, two counts of larceny over $1,200, 19 counts of larceny over $250 by false pretense, one count of larceny under $250 by false pretense and one count of forgery of a document.

There are 23 area households in three communities claiming they have been victimized to date, who have lost a combined $153,197.34 in monies given for work not done, with individual losses ranging from $695 to $15,569. Most of these victims are over age 55, and many are quite elderly, according to police reports. The alleged victim who lost the most money is 78 years old.

Grievances against Will date back to at least 2017, according to public records. But by late May, 2018, enough residents from Oak Point had lodged complaints to catch the attention of the building inspector, Whalen, at which time authorities noticed Will’s insurance and building licenses had expired, according to police reports.

The detective opened a weeks-long investigation into Will on May 22, but police took no action on the inquiry until early August, by which time the number of alleged victims had grown and multiple police departments were investigating Will.

The report also stated that the building inspector was dealing with the issue, personally inspecting jobs and warning residents not to give 100 percent deposits as some residents had been doing.

Some residents were attempting to sue Will in small claims court for their losses, while the investigation was in-process.

The building department was giving Will five licenses at a time because he said that he had 30 open jobs in Oak Point, records say. The report states that he was only able to complete a handful of those jobs over the course of a few weeks and had effectively disappeared by Aug. 1, 2018.

Between June 21, and the day before Ryder’s first complaint was written on Aug. 2, there is no record of any follow-up by the detective on the matter in court files. The alleged victim in Kingston hired Will on July 15, and the alleged victim in Hanson hired him on July 31.

Whalen said that he reported Will to the Southeastern Massachusetts Building Association, which should have notified other local building inspectors about Will, according to Whalen.

He will next be in Plymouth District Court on Wednesday, Dec. 21, at 9 a.m. for two pre-trial hearings. The three Wareham District Court cases have been continued to March 4, 2019, at 9 a.m. as well for pre-trial hearings.

Will cannot be reached by phone or email and the investigation in Middleborough is ongoing, police said.