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Date: 8/23/2023
WILBRAHAM — The School Committee again took up the issue of the athletic Booster Club on Aug. 17.
Superintendent John Provost said that he and School Committee Chair Michal Boudreau had met with the most recent president of the Booster Club, Ronald DeCurzio, and former president Michael Flynn.
Because DeCurzio and the members of the Board of Directors have all resigned and were unwilling to continue to work on behalf of the Booster Club, DeCurzio said the organization would dissolve and the roughly $200,000 in Booster Club accounts would revert to the athletic department. Provost said DeCurzio specified that Turf@Chaug was a separate organization that would like to continue its work. Provost praised the Booster Club for the money it has raised over the years.
School Committee member Bill Bontempi said DeCurzio had requested his presence at the meeting with Provost and Boudreau but that he was not notified of when it was occurring. Boudreau told Bontempi his presence was not necessary, and that the meeting was called to discuss next steps.
Bontempi called the Booster Club “generous” and “productive” and said it was created to eliminate inequity in athletic funding at Minnechaug Regional High School. Bontempi said the “School Committee needs to step forward,” and that there had been a “lack of respect and lack of recognition from this body.” He said DeCurzio had always spoken about how the Booster Club is responsible to the School Committee, and “now that there’s been a hiccup” the School Committee is stating it is not responsible for the Boosters.
The “hiccup” Bontempi referred to involves parents who raised about $15,000 for the hockey team and became upset and concerned when the money was not deposited into the account for the hockey spirit group, a subsection of the Booster Club that is dedicated to an individual team, for an extended period. DeCurzio later said the check it received, for just over $12,000, had been misplaced in the wrong mailbox. Several parents have since spoken out about the lack of transparency and accountability by the Boosters.
Caruana and School Committee member Sean Kennedy both pointed out that, despite what DeCurzio has said in the past, the School Committee is not mentioned in the athletic Booster Club’s bylaws, as a parent organization or otherwise.
Everyone present agreed that for the athletic program to properly function, a Booster Club was required. “We don’t want Susie the soccer mom collecting $15,000 and putting it in her personal bank account,” Assistant Superintendent for Finance, Operations and Human Resources Aaron Osborne said. He said the School Committee can accept the existing funds as a gift and direct them to go in the athletic revolving account, but he would need to check with the state regarding whether the funds could then be deposited into the account of a new iteration of the Booster Club.
Bontempi said dissolving the Booster Club was the “wrong decision” and asked for permission to reach out to DeCurzio to “alter this trajectory.” It was agreed that the board members would be asked to consider rescinding their resignations for the purpose of naming a new board. However, if that were not successful, a new Booster Club would need to be created. Referring to whomever heads the athletic Booster Club in the future, Bontempi said, “We need to make it crystal clear we have their back.”
During the public comment period, a resident said that she and others in the community were willing to “step up” and serve on a new athletic Booster Club, including writing new bylaws and fundraising.
Principal Stephen Hale said football was slated to start on Aug. 18 and the remaining sports programs were scheduled to begin on Aug. 21. Teams had been instructed not to fundraise because, without the athletic Booster Club, there was no structure in place to handle the money. If all spirit groups begin the year with $0 balance, he said there would be a feverish fundraising push to bring the accounts to their previous level, and it would oversaturate the residents and businesses in both Hampden and Wilbraham.
Capital items
The School Committee voted to request two separate articles for the capital expenses be added to the warrants at the fall Town Meetings in Hampden and Wilbraham. The first warrant article will include mini-split air conditioning units and a boiler, totaling $179,000. The air conditioning is needed because there are students that require climate-controlled environments as part of their individualized education program, special education plans the district must follow. A cracked heat exchange in one of Minnechaug Regional High School’s five boilers was identified in April, Osborne said it was decided at the time that the school could “limp along” on four boilers until funding could be requested in the fall.
Bontempi asked if the boiler replacement would fix the cold water in the locker room showers, which several people have spoken to him about. Osborne said it was the “first I’ve heard of it,” and that the boilers are specifically used for the heating system and the hot water is separate. He said he would check into the issue.
The second article will request $129,000 for project/monitors and an updated camera system. The camera system is original to the building and some locations do not have camera coverage. Caruana asked if the cameras still worked. Hale said, “It depends on what you wanted me to do with them.” He threw out a couple of examples, saying that if there was a hit and run in the parking lot, “I can tell you it’s a blue car with four doors,” but cannot zoom in to see a license plate. If a fight breaks out in the school, Hale said he can see it is “a student with a green shirt and blue jeans,” but not their face.
District reconfiguration feedback
Provost said that all six of the planned school district reconfiguration listening sessions have been completed and that several themes had emerged. He said the number one issue people wondered about was how the eighth grade would work at the high school. People also questioned how the regional agreement would be restructured. Other parents were concerned that older students would expose eighth graders to mature behavior and content before they were emotionally ready. Provost said a few members of the community felt that the loss of middle schoolers at Green Meadows School was “engineered by the district,” while others were concerned Hampden students may “lose their identity.”