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NORWALK, Conn. – A sign hung on the closed door of a key room at City Hall Wednesday night, informing the public that the special meeting of the Norwalk Board of Education's Finance Committee had been canceled.
But the committee chairman says he knew nothing about it. "I came to City Hall prepared to discuss the deficit issue and had copies of my research to share with the public," said Steven Colarossi, who is a lawyer.
Members of the committee were expected to investigate the cause of the recently uncovered $4 million deficit. They were also expected to discuss options, some of them laid out in five plans Colarossi circulated before the deficit came to light.
The sign was a mistake, he said. "The meeting was called to order at 7:31, but there was no quorum," he said in an email. "A sign was put up that the meeting was canceled, but it was done in error."
He wouldn't comment on the motives for putting up a sign that would deter the public from opening the closed door, where a public meeting was expected to occur and board members were attempting to make a quorum so they could address what one parent called the "dire straits" the school system is in.
"I have no comment as to why Jack Chiaramonte told Superintendent [Susan] Marks to put up a sign indicating that the meeting had been canceled," he said by email. "I had not been informed that anyone had suggested that the meeting was canceled. I did not authorize that the meeting be canceled."
"It's just a major misunderstanding," said Chiaramonte, the school board chairman. "What's the big deal?" Something came up, and he has a paying job that takes precedence. Rosa Murray, the other person on the three-person committee, could not make it. Chiaramonte pointed out that she has been arriving at meetings late because of her other commitments.
Chiaramonte said he had suggested having the meeting Thursday. "How can you have a quorum with one person?" he asked.
The next meeting of the Finance Committee will be at 7:30 p.m. next Wednesday in Room A300 of City Hall, Chiaramonte said.
Comments (6)
Drewt008
Hi Jack how are you?
Nobody is saying the $4 Million shortfall is only his fault. He is not the only one on the board who missed it. It seems a number of BOE employees either missed it, or went out of their way to conceal it until almost the end of the school year.
His problem is asking "What's the big deal ?" If he has to ask, he doesn't understand his responsibility to the public to manage the largest budget in the city. He will be surprised to learn there is more to it than getting his name in the paper..
Hizzoner the mayor prides himself on keeping up with what is going on and he seems to have missed this $4 million dollar fiasco, and never noticed that big commercial charter boat tying up the visitor's dock at Vets' park and blocking part of the federal channel for the last year or so.
Wait! I'm sorry did I miss Jack's joke? What was it? And Anti Semitic are you freaking kidding me? I hear worse things in music, TV, radio then Jack has ever said. And for the record he is more committed ever to our children (remember them) and finding out what happened with the 4 million shortfall and making dang sure this will never happen again. I am pretty confident knowing Jack well that he means what he says. This is a huge problem but not one that can be hung directly on his shoulders that is totally unfair. But like he said on Thursday and has the support from the Mayor that all parties will be working together to solve the problem and are constantly working for more savings. And as a parent & tax payer I will personally hold there feet to the fire to make sure this is getting done.
I just wish we had some more Shekels from ECS that would truly help us out and be treated fairly like other school districts around the state!
Did he seriously have the audacity to say, "It was just a major misunderstanding....what's the big deal?"? Wow.
I agree with everything Old Timer said. To add to that, what about the people that took time away from their families and other commitments,etc. to attend the meeting only to be turned away because of a supposedly erroneous 'meeting canceled' sign on the door?
BOE chairman Jack Chiaramonte cancelled the meeting and had the collossal nerve to ask "what's the big deal ?". Is he kidding ? Is he a Norwalk taxpayer ?
The big deal is a just revealed FOUR MILLION DOLLARS ( $4,000,000) hole in the current BOE budget, with a projected shortfall in next year's budget of SIX MILLION. That.may not be a big deal to him, but it is a very big deal to the rest of us.
If it is a real number, and we are expected to fix their (BOE's) mistakes, that is TEN MILLION coming out of our pockets. Does he intend to "borrow" from the pension fund and then blame the unions for a shortfall there ?
We are now hearing that this unfunded expense is nothing new, and has been covered by surpluses in other accounts in the BOE budgets for years, but now they have run out of surpluses. With all the money we spend on the third floor at City Hall, don't we have a reliable honest book-keeper ?
Apparently not..
Jack Chiaramonte should have been removed from his position a year ago when he made his anti semitic "joke". Since the board is to busy to attend a meeting to address the "missing" 4 million dollars they all should be removed from the positions they hold as they all are all a waste.