The Ellwood City Area School District’s Board of Directors voted to hire Elizabeth Tomon for a building clerk position at Perry Lower Intermediate during the July 11 combined regular meeting.
Board President Jennifer Tomon abstained from voting as Elizabeth Tomon is a relative. Elizabeth received “Yes” votes from Board Vice President Jean Biehls and Directors Erica Gray, Kathy Tillia, Kevin Boariu, Robyn Nicklas and Dr. Claire Fauzey. “No” votes were cast by Directors Kathy Galbreath and Norman Boots.
Elizabeth’s hiring followed nepotism policy votes during both the May and June regular ECASD Board of Directors Meetings. A motion was made at the May 9 meeting to vote to suspend Board Policy 304.2 Nepotism for the purpose of hiring Elizabeth Tomon for that building clerk position. At that time, the motion was voted down. Tillia, Galbreath, Boots, and Boariu voted “No.” Biehls, Fauzey, and Nicklas voted “Yes.” Gray was not in attendance. Jennifer Tomon abstained from voting.
A majority of the “No” votes during that May 9 meeting came as a surprise to Superintendent Dr. Wesley Shipley, who had surveyed the board via email in advance of the meeting, to gauge the perspective of the board before the official public vote. He said at the time of his survey, all of the board directors but one indicated that they supported suspending the policy and one board director did not respond to his inquiry.
Despite voting down the suspension, the Board still moved ahead with a motion on May 9 to hire Elizabeth Tomon, who ultimately was not hired for the building clerk position at that time. She did receive “Yes” votes from Biehls, Fauzey, Nicklas, and Tillia. However, it requires five “Yes” votes (a majority of the board) to pass. Gray was not in attendance. Again, Jennifer Tomon abstained from voting.
In a turn of events, The Board voted to eliminate Policy #304.2 – Nepotism during the June 17 Regular Meeting.
The meeting agenda had the revised policy grouped with a motion to approve numerous other policies for first reading, but Director Fauzey asked that the nepotism policy be separated from the group, at which time she made a motion to eliminate the policy completely. She received a second from Biehls who also voted “yes” along with Gray, Nicklas, and Jennifer Tomon. “No” votes were given by Tillia, Boots, and Boariu. Galbreath was not in attendance.
The move to ultimately hire Elizabeth did not come without discussion among the Board and comments from the public.
Galbreath said she has a couple of concerns regarding the hiring of Elizabeth Tomon. She said her first concern is that she believes that procedure was not followed through in the hiring process. According to Galbreath, the Board didn’t follow policy 003 in the hiring process.
“Procedure changes must be voted on by the board in a majority vote,” she said. “This has nothing to do with the person, it has to do with procedure.”
Her second concern is what she said she believes is a violation of the Sunshine Law. She said the Board’s vote to eliminate the nepotism policy was a violation and that the policy was on the agenda for a first reading not a removal.
“That is a clear violation of the Sunshine Law,” Galbreath said. “We’re not talking about a little tweak in the agenda. I don’t think it’s ethically or legally correct.”
Gray disagreed with Galbreath, saying that the concern is a personal vendetta and stated that the Board followed direction from its Solicitor Christoper Voltz.
Voltz said the board was within its legal boundaries all along the way of the process, motions, and votes during the May 9 and June 17 meetings. Although he was not in attendance on July 11, his colleague at Tucker Arensberg Attorneys John Hosa said that he and Voltz discussed the matter prior to the July 11 meeting and that procedures were followed and no laws were broken.
“This was done procedurally,” Hosa said.
And when Lisa Nardone, a member of the public, again questioned the legality of the complete removal of the nepotism policy, he maintained his stance.
“I’ve stated my position.”
Although Director Boariu accepted the legality of the removal of the nepotism policy and that the board must hire the best candidate to serve the students, he said that he isn’t sure why the board didn’t entertain changing the policy rather than completely removing it.
“I believe we missed an opportunity to edit the policy,” Boariu said.
Despite any possibility that allegations or insinuations could be made that Elizabeth Tomon was hired because she is related to the Board President, Shipley said that Elizabeth Tomon was the preferred candidate for the position all along the entire process following a paper screening and an interview with Perry Lower Intermediate Principal Frank Kealy.
Shipley explained the process of hiring support positions during the May 9 meeting. He said those positions are advertised internally, in newspapers and media, and listed on job boards. Candidates are then paper screened, interviewed, and recommended by that position’s supervisor. He said because of the need to immediately fill those positions, candidates are sometimes hired retroactively. He added that Board President Tomon was not involved in any of the steps of the process of Elizabeth’s interview or screening.
Shipley said that when asked a second time who the best candidate was for the job, Kealy said Elizabeth Tomon was the best candidate.
Nardone has been outspoken regarding nepotism and was shocked when the policy was removed on June 17. At that time she said she has been attending meetings for six or seven years and she has never seen the decision made so quickly by the Board regarding policy without public discussion.
“This is not the way things go down,” she said. “Something about it seems dirty.”
She spoke again on July 11.
“You guys bank on our ignorance, and that’s how things get slid through,” she said. “I wish the amount of time that was spent on this topic was spent on education. I wish that’s where our energy would go.”
Nardone also questioned the Board’s vote to hire Desiree Burns as director of pupil services at a salary of $110,000 and a vote to create a dean of student affairs position at a salary of $47,000.
“We have lost focus,” she said. “We need to focus on education not adding to administration.”
The district added an Act 93 Director of Educational Programs position in November of 2023 at a salary of $120,000. That position was filled by Dr. Amy Anderson.
Galbreath, Boariu, and Boots voted “No” to creating the dean of student affairs position.
“We need to hire another math educator,” Galbreath said citing what she feels are low math scores in the district. She said the district needs more educators to help students. She also cited that she doesn’t want to add that burden to taxpayers.
Shipley argued that the dean position will impact a lot of educational spaces including academics.
Other motions passed:
- Motion to approve the May 23, 2024 Special Meeting Minutes and the June 17, 2024 Combined Meeting Minutes.
- Motion to Approve General Fund Accounts Payable Report.
- Motion to Approve General Fund Treasurer’s Report as follows:
- WesBanco Checking $ 651,892.01
- PLGIT GF Prime / Term $ 25,182,558.15
- Tax Accounts $ 801,739.97
- PSDLAF $ 1,453.01
- PA Invest $ 1,404.50
- Total Cash and Investments $ 26,639,047.60
- Motion to approve 2024-25 Harris School Solutions renewal.
- Motion to approve Additional fall coaches for the 2024-25 school year.
- Kail Ketterer – Assistant Soccer Coach
- Frank Colao – Assistant Jr. High Football
- Motion to approve Pam MacMurdo as the head teacher at North Side Primary for the 2024-25 school year.
- Motion to approve the following teacher mentors for the 2024-25 school year:
- Mandie Szakelyhidi for Sierra Denholm.
- Tracy Craig for Patrict Tatman.
- Motion to approve the following changes to Activity Sponsors for the 2024-25 school year:
- Mykkia Daufen to replace Mogran Prokovich as Assistant Varsity Cheerleading Coach
- Katlin Franciscus as Jr. High Cheerleading coach.
- Cassie Hulick to replace Kevin Dimeo as Club Hope Sponsor.
- Motion to approve the following facility requests:
- EC Little Wolverines is requesting the use of Helling Stadium to play their Tri-County home games on Saturday, September 7, Saturday, September 21, and Saturday October 12, 2024 from 12:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.
- Motion to Approve Disposal of list of technology department items in accordance with Policy 706.1.
- Motion to Recognize Booster Groups as affiliate organizations of the Ellwood City Area School District for the 2024-25 School year:
- Wolverine PTO
- LHS Blue Band Boosters
- Hall of Fame Committee
- EC Football Boosters
- Ellwood City Baseball Boosters
- EC Cross Country Boosters
- EC Track and Field Boosters
- EC Wrestling Boosters
- EC Soccer Boosters
- Motion to approve the The School at McGuire Educational Services Agreement for the 2024-25 school year at a cost of $64,898.77 an increase of $146.04 from 2023-24 and the Extended School Year (ESY) agreement for 2025 at $307 per day, an increase of $21 per day.
- Motion to approve changes to the secondary student handbook for the 2024-25 school year.
- Motion to approve Cray Youth and Family Services Project Search Agreement for 2024-25 school year for one student at a cost of $13,390.00 an increase of $1,790.00 from 2023-24.
- Motion to approve the following policies that have been on display since the last board meeting:
- Policy #222- Tobacco & Vaping Products
- Policy #227 – Controlled Substances/Paraphernalia
- Policy #323 – Tobacco & Vaping Products
- Policy #351 – Controlled Substance Abuse
- Policy #707 – Use of School Facilities
- Policy #815.1 – Use of Generative Artifical Intelligence in Education
- Motion to approve two foreign exchange students with the Academic Year in American (AYA program from Italy and Germany) for the 2024-25 school year to reside with a district family.
- Motion to approve the Reel Adventure: A Hands-On-Fishing Seminar fishing excursions which will be to local waterways within a thirty minute ride from Lincoln High School one day a week from July 22, 2024 through August, 2024, one or more days a month (up to five trips) from September 2024 through May 2025 and two days during June 2025.
LOL
We need more funding for education not more wasted money on useless appointed staff and created positions. entire school board and shipley need removed!