001like to call tonight's General School Board meeting to order. Before our Pledge of Allegiance, I'd like to give an update on our independent investigation with Jamison as well as another critical update for the district. Number one, Dr. Yanni was placed on administrative leave as of 5 p.m. this evening. Dr. Malone will be acting as substitute superintendent. Notifications have been sent to staff and the community just prior to the meeting starting this evening. So with that, I also noticed there's a number of people during public comment number period one that are more appropriate for period two. So I, if it's not an agenda item, it's for period two. You will get your opportunity to speak, but not necessarily during public period comment one. So when we get to that, I'll just take it person by person.
002All right, so we can stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Oh, I'm sorry, the one I also didn't update, I'm sorry. On the investigation itself, we do expect to have some report from Dr. Dalton to the board sometime mid to end of May, at which point we will thereafter share what we can when we are able. Mr. Eidfog, roll call. Here. Present. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Present. Mr. Diazio, announcement of any executive sessions, please. Thank you, Mrs. Gibson. Good evening. The board has met an executive session a number of times since the last board meeting. There were executive sessions held on March 31st, April 10th, and April 24th. The topic of those three executive sessions was matters of personnel related to the ongoing investigation at Jamison Elementary School. The board also met immediately prior
003to tonight's public meeting, also April 24th, to discuss the Act 93 negotiations, to discuss the equal pay litigation matter, and to also discuss matters related to collective bargaining with the district's transportation staff. Thank you. Before I turn it over to Dr. Malone for the superintendent's report, I would like to take this opportunity to recognize Julian Lee. Julian Lee is a 12th grade student at Central Bucks High School South. Julian designed to the April lock screen around the theme of adaptable innovators, and in Julian's words, my submitted piece aligns with the theme of adaptable innovators by illustrating a problem-solving journey. The artwork depicts a character attempting to build a watering system for her flowers with discarded pipes and a roll of duct tape highlighting her iterative process. Despite setbacks, her persistence leads to a functional contraption
004embodying the spirit of adaptability and of an innovation. So I'd like to take this opportunity to say congratulations to Julian, and I believe we have a video. Yeah, and we're also gonna bring Julie up for a picture and a certificate. Each winner each month gets a sponsored certificate to the restaurant of their choice, and Julian has chosen Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers as his place, so if you come up real fast, picture. ...adaptable innovator because of how it shows the process of problem-solving as shown by creating an invention that can redirect water and store the water from rain. And though she has setbacks, as depicted by her various tools thrown about, she'll eventually be able to succeed in making her contraption come to life. Well, my main inspiration to my art piece is April's association being
005a rainy month, but also the start of spring. I've been really into art for like pretty much my whole life really. My sister had also won a contest too previously, and also I'm really just proud of her that she's about well being able to win and also about appreciating just how well she's also just a really good artist and talented herself too. I mean being adaptive innovator is important as the journey to create and problem-solve requires plenty of instances to adapt, try different methods, and with good resolve and ability to keep trying and be open minded to different methods, one could eventually succeed in reaching their goals. Congratulations again. And then Dr. Malone, any recognitions that you'd like to... Sure, I do want to start, yeah sure, I do want to start with our fine
006gentleman over here representing our high schools. If you mind giving your name and the updates you bring to us tonight, we'll start with CB South. Hello everyone, my name is Luca Jancic, and just to clear things up, no I'm not a basketball player for the Lakers, but I am a student at CB South, and I'm honored here today to represent my school, but also give you some important events and news that have happened at CB South. So to start, most importantly, we have junior and senior proms starting on in early May for juniors and late May for seniors, and also we have our CB South annual Titans Connect prom that is scheduled tomorrow night. Titans Connect is a peer mentor group for students looking for opportunity to make new friends and socialize, and also on
007Monday we have our unified track home meet at South at 3.30 p.m. Now last month it was mentioned that CB South students were planning on attending the HOSA State Leadership Conference and Competition in Lancaster, and we are happy to share that sophomore Dia Gouda was elected to serve as Eastern Vice President on the Penn-HOSA leadership team. Dia is one of only seven students achieving this honor out of thousands of student memberships. This is a remarkable award, and we congratulate her for this. Now earlier today at CB South, we hosted a community partnership luncheon. The purpose of the luncheon was to continue to share information about CB South's internship with local businesses, and we're also hoping to continue this development with our partnerships throughout this year and next year as well. Now we also want to
008mention CB South sophomore Alexis Cho had founded the Good of Green Club this year. With Alexis' leadership, she and others have partnered with Barclay Farmers Market, Flux Space, and CB South Life Skills Program to grow lettuce using hydroponics techniques, and just recently the group harvested lettuce equivalent to 144 heads of lettuce, which were all donated to the Barclay Farmers Market. It is amazing the hard work and dedication Alexis has put in to help the farmers market and the CB South community. Now just to transfer over to the sports side, CB South wants to give a huge congratulations to the CB South eSports Valorant team with Christian Boxowitz, Ryan Bin, Braden Nickham, Max Polniakoff, and Alex Pang for earning first place in the Spring 2025 Independence Conference. A lot of practice and hard work led to
009them to this amazing achievement they have received. And finally, CB South No Place for Hate rolled out its first project recently as well. Members of the community met with representatives from the ADL for training this last week, and they discussed ways in which we can strengthen the CB South community. I just want to congratulate again all these students and the hard work they put in to these events and competitions to help out the CB South community. Those are all the important events and news that happen at CB South. Thank you. Good evening members of the school board and my name is Dan Curran. I'm a senior at CB East. I'm here tonight to report on and share some of the amazing events we have going on at the best Central Parks High School. Many people
010around my school community might know me as one of the four hosts of our morning show, Patriot Prime Time. As a co-host and subsequent member of the media crew, it is my job to research and report about all the wonderful activities, club meetings, school events, and major news that is happening at or around East. Because of this, I find myself getting a very up-close and in-depth view of many of our events we report on. One of our big April events we had at the very beginning was our Patriot Players production of Anastasia, which had its opening night April 3rd and was an amazing show. As a member of the media crew, we are responsible for filming the play, but really that job is pretty easy because they make it look so easy. I know you
011know school plays are nothing unique to CB East, but I think the dedication and you know rigor that the Patriot players have is one of a kind. On top of that awe-inspiring performance of Anastasia, East Student Council held another minithon the next day on April 4th after you know they had gone and done opening night. Minithon is an amazing event focused on raising money for children suffering with life-changing diseases, and while many of my fellow students and I danced and sung and played games, we were able to raise over $16,000 for four diamonds and the cause of minithon. For this event, I was honored to actually be the DJ, and as someone directly involved in the event, it was truly fun and inspirational event experience, and I had a blast being a part of it.
012Overall, the beginning of the month was a bit hectic for a lot of people, including myself, but it was a great start to the month and a wonderful precursor to the many events we would have during the rest of the month. As the month continued, my fellow Patriot primetime members got to report on the detailed and remarkable work for our school's newspaper, the Patriot Paper. We're very good at naming things if you know that. We continue to support fitness and unity by bringing awareness to our weekly fitness squad workouts and unified Friday breakfasts. Both events happen every week and help participating students grow both physically and socially in ways schools usually don't offer. More recently, our Operation Eternal Gratitude or OEG club raised over $400 to support their future endeavors with their first-ever push-up day.
013This event was spearheaded by Every Donahoe, and it encouraged teachers to sign up and then pledge that they could do like 25 push-ups or something, and that gave the students the ability to donate to OEG, put it in certain jars. I donated five dollars to Dr. Waters himself. He ended up doing 95 push-ups. I think he got around 50, so he overachievered. But that was the push-up day contest, and it was truly amazing as OEG used those funds to directly send support packages to those members overseas in the military, and it helped sponsor events like this upcoming one I'm DJing again on Tuesday, which is our Travis Mannion Workout Day, where we build awareness for the Travis Mannion Foundation. As April ends, our last full month of school begins, EAST will be having its final
014Fantasmagoria Coffee House of the year, an event focused on art and music, where students are able to share their artistic talents in a safe and sportive space. As you know, as we mentioned, sports are also ending. One sport in particular is track, which I know a lot of our EAST students, a lot of my friends, are at the Penn Relays right now competing, you know, in a national event, which is pretty cool, and the tennis and lacrosse teams are both ending. Overall, April was a month stacked full of amazing and fun events for students to get involved in and make memories, and as many of my friends and I began to count down the days until we can no longer call ourselves CBE seniors, we'll look back at all these memories and appreciate the opportunity
015we had to make them. Thank you everybody for your time, and I wish you all the best. Thank you. My name is Landon. I'm from Central Bucks West. I'm currently a junior, so I'm a little bit behind compared to them. I still have a little over a year left, but we're getting there. In our arts department, at the 2025 BCCC 30th Annual High School Art Exhibition, we had three students who were recognized for their outstanding creative abilities. We had William Yan, who was a sophomore, who won first place in the digital media category for his Maria Travel Poster created in graphic design and illustration with Ms. Mazenga. I actually personally took her class. Unfortunately, I'm clearly not as good as they were. This piece showcases his mastery of Adobe Illustrator, typography, and design techniques. His
016work was also selected for an art gallery display at the Art Walk in Doylestown Hospital in the fall of 2024. Naomi Santo, a junior, received a Digital Media Honorable Mention for her artwork, and it was for A Dream, which was a captivating digital composition created in digital imaging during the Surrealism Unit. Using photography, she skillfully blended multiple photographs while incorporating reflections and shadows. A Dream was also featured in the Phillips Mill Youth Art Exhibition in January of 2025. Emma Munich, a senior, received the first place combined media prize for her artwork propaganda, Not the Solution, for a fabulous four-part linoleum printmaking series using multiple ink layers and four unique designs. Emma showcased amazing technical and conceptual skills in this incredible piece. For our plays, we do have the Harlequin Club, which is doing Cinderella, which
017is the first week of May, so that's coming up soon. In our music department, we had our West Court Street acapella participate in the Acapella at Rock Festival at Council Rock North High School. The event brought together high school acapella groups from the greater Philadelphia area for a fun day of songs and workshops with industry professionals. And this evening, Street Chord performed in a junctionated concert. Huge congratulations to all Chord Street singers on an amazing performance, and a special congratulations to Senior Alyssa Cookie for winning the Outstanding Vocalist Award and Junior Buck as Madeleine. I know I'm a friend of his, and I can never do that last name right, I'm so sorry, for winning the Outstanding Vocal Percussionist Award. We also have a congratulations to our Senior Van Urquia on his acceptance to the
018Pima Allstate Orchestra in the viola section, Senior Brian File on his acceptance to the Pima Allstate Choir in the Bass Two section, and Sophomore Abanoff Meddy on his acceptance to the Pima Allstate Choir in the Bass One section. These musicians went through a series of successful auditions throughout the school year to get to this point. Acceptance into Allstate is an incredible accomplishment that reflects strong dedication to musical excellence, and we congratulate them. In our technology, we have a congratulations to Gavin Gross. He was an, he used an open-ended project in our new pilot course called Physical Computing to build wire and code in Ironman mask. The mask can open and close several pieces of the mask, just like in the movies, with over six servos motors and over 40 soldered connections. Gavin's mantra is, you
019control the robots, don't let the robots control you. And at MBIT, we have Matthew Hood and Matthew Levesque. Both students at the Middlebuck Institute of Technology have captured first place in the 32nd Annual Greater Philadelphia Auto Technology Competition held earlier this month. 24 area high school seniors put their automotive skills to the test in this year's hands-on technician skills challenge, competing for more than a million dollars in scholarships and prizes. Hood, a senior at Central Bucks East, and Levesque, a senior at Central Bucks West, walked away with more than $290,000 in scholarships and prizes collectively. They were led by their instructor Robert Schwartz and were sponsored by, and were sponsored in the competition by Keystone Volvo Cars of Doylestown. And news from our West alumni, we have Lance Zhu, who is a 2024 CV West
020graduate and biotech program participant, had been named Goldwater Scholar. The scholarship is the oldest and most prestigious STEM research scholarship for undergraduates in the United States. Lance was the first sophomore to be nominated by John Hopkins University. That's all I have for Central Bucks West. Thank you. Gentlemen, I know you have a lot on your plate. You have homework to do, so you might want to get out of here. Thank you. Oh, and Julian. Yes, of course. All right, so first on our updates here, we're going to update the 8th. So previously shared on April 11th, community email, a decision was made to pause the update, the 8th capital project at the April 10th finance and operations committee meeting. The pause impacts every one of the eight schools. We want to reiterate that the pause
021reflects the district and board's responsibility to analyze and respond to market trends and be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. It is not a response to discussions about the futures of Doyle and Linden. We are committed to addressing the school's facilities when time is right and will continue to create excellent educational experiences for students. You can access the full message about this development from our home page and the project website. So comprehensive planning. The district is currently operating under a comprehensive plan that runs from July 1st, 2023 through June 30, 2026. Even though we are in the midst of this plan, it is time to start planning for the development and approval of our successor plan. PDE requires all districts to develop and approve a comprehensive plan every three years. We are calling our next plan,
022which will span July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2029, central bucks vision 2030. Next week, we will bring together a range of stakeholders to begin the evaluation of our current plan and the development of vision 30 or 2030. The plan needs to be approved by the board and submitted to PDE no later than March 1st, 2026. Prior to approval, the plan needs to be on display for at least 28 days. As we work to create this new comprehensive plan, we will ask ourselves, what do we want to accomplish by 2030? How will CBSD be better in 2030 than it is today through continuous improvement efforts? How will we accomplish what we set out to do by 2030? More information about the planning process and opportunities for community involvement will be shared in separate communication to
023be sent out to the community in the upcoming weeks. Next up, you'll see on the agenda tonight, approval of 2023-2024 school year audit report. The board will be asked to approve the audit report for the 2023-24 school year. The auditors reported that the district's financial statements present fairly in all material respects. The respective financial position of the governmental activities, the business type activities, each major fund, and the aggregate remaining fund information of CBSD as of June 30, 2024. We will have approval of the 26-27 district calendar. With input from various employee groups, we're happy to have developed and now recommend a district calendar for 26-27 another year later, hopefully giving our families plenty of time for planning. This is especially important for 26-27 school year as we propose bringing students back prior to Labor Day
024on August 31st. Labor Day is late in 2026, falling on September 7th. An extra student week also gives us a head start on what will be first year of realignment and helps us ensure we meet our state required 180 days of student days while keeping the last day of school in early June, June 11th. Graduation is set for June 10th. We're also able to offer a more traditional spring break with this calendar. You'll also see approval of construction projects related to realignment. The board will be asked to approve multi-prime construction projects for construction work at CB West related to realignment at a total project cost of approximately $16.2 million. I'll remind the community that information related to realignment can be found at our website www.cbsd.org. There will be agreements for school resource officers, SROs. Lastly,
025we are pleased to recommend the board approval to agreements on tonight's agenda that will ensure the continued service of school resource officers at South and West. The SRO agreement for South is with Warrington Township and the SRO agreement for West is with Central Bucks Regional Police Department. Both agreements are from April 19, 2025 to April 18, 2027. The SRO agreement for CB East is in place till whenever the district will work its renewal important to that service. Finally, on slide six, here tonight in our audience, we congratulate Dr. Helen Zaleski. Following a thorough search and interview process, it is my pleasure to recommend Titus Elementary's very own Dr. Helen Zaleski as CB's next assistant superintendent for elementary. Her appointment is on tonight's agenda for board approval. Congrats, Helen. Prior to her current position as principal
026of Titus, Helen served our students as a Spanish teacher and as a house principal at CB West. I got to know her well in that role. In her new role, she will provide leadership and guidance to all 15 of our elementary schools, ensuring that we provide the best possible education for all of our students. We also congratulate Helen for recently defending her dissertation, thus I called her doctor, and earning her doctorate, an achievement completed while successfully interviewing for the position. So she interviewed while defending, taking a break, and coming back. We will now begin the process to identify the next principal for Titus. The community should rest assured that Dr. Zaleski will finish the school year at Titus. She's not going anywhere, Titus people. She will also be instrumental in transiting a new leader for
027the school community. Congratulations, Helen. That concludes the report. That brings us to our first period of public comment. Persons wishing to make public comment were required to register prior to the start of tonight's meeting. If current CB students register to speak, they will be permitted to do so first. Please note that the first period of public comment is for agenda items only, except for our students who may speak about any topic. Public comment is not intended to be a question and answer session. When you begin your comment, please indicate which items you are speaking about. Regarding the minutes that appear on the agenda, comment is limited to approval of the minutes, not their content. If your comments are not about agenda items, you'll be asked to stop speaking, and you will be permitted to speak
028during the second period of public comment. If a question is posed, the individual may be referred to the superintendent for follow-up. When your name is called, please approach the podium and begin by stating your name and municipality. Each speaker is allotted three minutes. You will be asked to cease your comments at three minutes. We kindly ask that all comments be directed to the board as a whole rather than to individual members. We appreciate your cooperation in maintaining a respectful environment. Please be considerate of all speakers and their opinions, including those that differ from your own. Thank you for your understanding. For those that signed up for the first period of public comment, it appears as the only one was an agenda item topic, so the remaining individuals will be called during the second period of
029public comment. Ms. Jennifer Horan. Good evening. My name is Jennifer Horan. I am the proud school counselor at Titus Elementary School. I am honored and privileged to speak to you tonight about our amazing school, Titus Elementary School principal, Helen Sklamisalewski. I am so proud to speak on behalf of my fellow educators and staff here with us. I think there are about 20 of us and 70 some others who were not able to be here. Here we go. I'm usually not nervous, but I am tonight. On the agenda tonight is a special consideration that means a lot to my colleagues and me. It is the approval of Dr. Helen Sklamisalewski as our next assistant superintendent for elementary education. Had you asked the Titus staff three years ago what we thought of Helen Sklamisalewski as an educator
030and leader, I'm pretty sure none of us even knew who she was. She lived in the secondary world, which often feels worlds away from our life in elementary school. We found out during November of 2022 that this Mrs. Zaleski would become our new Titus principal. In true Titus fashion, we embraced the change and welcomed her to our family, which she calls a slice of heaven on 6-11, and we're wearing that on our t-shirts tonight. We learned very quickly who Helen Sklamisalewski is as a person, educator, and leader. She is real, hardworking, fair. She loves coffee. She is wicked smart, compassionate. She is also no-nonsense. She is fun. She loves music, loves to dance and sing, even at assemblies. She is kind, and most importantly, she is human. She holds her teachers, staff, and students to
031a very high standard. She celebrates our victories and supports us when we fall, either professionally or personally. Helen deserves to be the assistant superintendent for elementary education. She is truly the best person for the job. She will be a guiding light to our elementary administrators, faculty, staff, students, and families. She is a change agent, and we are so proud to say we are the staff who showed her the elementary way. Whenever Helen welcomes families to a Titus event, she begins with, good evening. I am Helen Sklamisalewski, the proud principal of this great school. Tonight, we are thrilled to say we are Titus Elementary School, the proud faculty and staff of the new assistant superintendent for elementary education. Helen, we wish you happiness and success in your new role. After witnessing the change you brought to
032Titus in such a short time, we are so excited to witness your impact on the Central Buck School District, and especially on our elementary schools. And please know that no matter where you go, you will always have a home at Titus. Godspeed, friend. Thank you for sharing that. It was much appreciated. Next on our agenda is approval of our school board minute meetings from the March 20, 2025 meeting. Do I have a motion to approve those minutes? So moved. Second. Moved by Ms. Foley, seconded by Ms. Reynolds. Any comments or comments or questions about these? Okay, all in favor of the approval? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion carries 9-0, which brings us to our school board reports, and we will hear from Ms. Foley first from our education committee. Okay, first up, we'll talk
033a little bit about the things that we move forward to the board tonight for a vote. We had some great presentation from the Neurodiversity Alliance Group and partnership with Delaware Valley University. There were Pupil Services Director Alyssa Wright, Unami Principal Brian Loving, Heather Harrington of Delaware Valley University, and John Cruz of the Neurodiversity Alliance, who was our virtual presenter who encountered some technical difficulties, presented to the committee about starting a chapter of the Neurodiversity Alliance at DelVal this coming year at Unami. Super exciting work. And the remainder of the things that we kind of went through at committee were approval of a variety of different resources. The science supervisor, Mary Courtney, presented to the committee the adoption of the Discovery Education Mystery Science textbook for grades K through 5. This helped to put us in
034alliance and compliance with the new STEELS standards in Pennsylvania, one of the reasons we needed to get new textbooks. We also adopted the TCI grades 6 through 8 and 9 through 12 social studies text. We looked at a new AP Spanish text, and all of these had a variety of different groups of teachers who looked and piloted, or I shouldn't say piloted, looked and critiqued other resources, and these are the resources that we landed on. Our new AP text, World Languages in K through 12, ELD Supervisor Stacy Gray presented to the committee approval of this textbook, the TMS AP Spanish Language and Culture textbook for grades 10 through 12. And we approved a new software pilot, Summit K through 12 and Boost. Stacy also presented to the committee regarding approval for these two progress monitoring
035pilots for our ELD classrooms. Probably the more popular thing that comes through this committee every year was the 2026 and 20 through 2027 district calendar, and the committee agreed to move version, the version two calendar to tonight's board for a vote. And we had a small staff conference request, a $70 staff conference request that was moved through, given there was a timing conflict, and it occurred before tonight's meeting. That's all I have. Ms. Zendanovic, oops, my microphone's off. Ms. Zendanovic, an update from our policy committee. Thank you. The policy committee met on April 10th, Thursday. We had a discussion on a number of policies that are on the agenda tonight. We had first three policies for membership, and that was basically changing information in our policies to reflect the new three voting region model. Field
036trips was a new policy. We didn't have a field trips policy, so that is a new policy. We also reviewed the policy, it's 420, 249, sorry, for bullying, cyber bullying. There were no changes needed, but that policy needs to be reviewed on a regular basis in preparation for the upcoming audit. The second read policies that we looked at, there were no substantive changes to those policies, but we did want to review them, and we know that as part of the special ed plan, they will be renewed more formally again. The other reason that we looked at those policies is we wanted to ensure for both transparency and clarity for the public and frankly for the board members, that we had a heightened level of awareness around some of the administrative regulations and policies that lie
037underneath some of our special ed policies. So Ms. Wright and Dr. Gany worked together to develop the administrative regulations so that we can make them public, so that a lot of the, you know, we ensure that they align with state and guidelines that we need to follow, and that we can share them with the community so that everybody is aware of the policies and the regulations that we have in the district. I think that was it, and our next meeting is May 8th, so that is the policy update. Thank you, and Mr. Herring was unable to chair our finance and operations committee last month, or this month, because of a work commitment, and so Ms. Sendanovich will be giving us the update on from that committee as well. Okay, this is an easy double shot
038because they're both on the same night, so I'm on that committee with Rick anyway. Thankfully, the committee met on Thursday, April 10th, right after policy. Thankfully, Dr. Malone covered a lot of stuff that I have to cover, so this could be short. We covered many items that are on the agenda tonight under business operations and finance. Under operational support, the new facilities use regulations. They were revised and discussed. They're on the agenda for meeting tonight. The new guidelines that we have for that about how we allow other organizations and groups to use CB facilities has worked out really well, and our operations team has done a great job, Mr. Hanna and Mr. Spencer, in tweaking them to make sure that they continue to work well and include things like people who are using our facilities
039have insurance, so that there's no liability for the district. We have a number of building maintenance and operations issues. The other highlights were, as Dr. Malone mentioned, approval of the contract for realignment and additions at CB West. The two SRO agreements for Warrington at South and CB Regional at West. Ms. Hauser was nice enough to really walk us through that whole process of how the approval and how we ensured that we do have a SRO at West. With the pause of the Update the Eight, as Dr. Malone discussed, we do have some work underway. For Lyndon Doyle, we were looking at some architectural alternatives and HVAC alternatives. We decided to, just for the HVAC portion, to kind of hold off on that until we pick the project up. Per our folks in operations, a lot
040of things in that industry change over time, so depending on when we pick it back up, we should have plenty of capability to revisit those things to make sure we're looking at the best alternatives for those buildings. For business recommendations, there's a number of them on the agenda for this evening, and a lot of them are fairly self-explanatory. The business information items that we covered, the Update the Eight, again Ms. Hauser gave us an update on that, and Dr. Malone touched on that already. Then we talked about something new that was kind of initiative driven by a couple of our board members. We're trying to explore the possibility of a tax rebate program for certain community members to get a rebate on their school tax, so we're trying to figure out the viability of that
041and if we can actually make it happen. Did I miss anything on that, Mrs. Reynolds? No, you got it. You got it, and we'll be talking about it again in the next Finance Committee. Right, okay. The next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, May 8th, and that is the report for our committee. Thank you, Ms. Sanganowicz, and now Ms. Foley, an update from the Bucks County Intermediate Unit, please. Okay, the Bucks IU meeting was held on Tuesday, April 15th, where the ongoing great work of our Bucks County IU team and students were celebrated and highlighted, including the expansion of the Fab Lab efforts to expand their STEAM initiatives. There was celebration of National Literacy Month as well in March, and we also celebrated our school social workers during National Social Workers Months. For this report, I
042want to make sure I specifically highlight an issue that came up at this month's board meeting because I think it's something the community be interested in hearing about. Since 2015, the BCIU, the Bucks County Intermediate Unit, has been the federal grant recipient for the federal Head Start and Early Head Start programs in Bucks County. Currently, the BCIU serves approximately 362 children and families through the Head Start and Early Head Start program in early learning classrooms and family homes located across Bucks County. The program also employs approximately 85 staff members who provide critical early education, daily nutrition, and family support to these young learners, ensuring children are school ready and families are engaged. The federal Head Start grant generally runs in five-year cycles. The BCIU was renewed for another five-year grant in 2020. The five-year grant
043expires on May 31, 2025. The Bucks IU submitted a renewal application on January 2, 2025, and to date, the BCIU has received no updates from ACF regarding the status of the application or any planning guidance for the next program cycle. Because the BCIU has not received any notice from the Office of Grants Management, Administration for Children and Families, or also called ACF, and or the Federal Office of Head Start, the BCIU has reached out to our federal legislators, U.S. Representative Brian Fitzpatrick, U.S. Senators John Federman and Dave McCormick requesting assistance. The BCIU has also reached out to our state legislative delegation, our three Bucks County Commissioners, Governor Josh Shapiro, and local Bucks County School Superintendents, as well as the Bucks County IU Board, notifying them that their current grant expires at the end of May
044and asking for their assistance and advocating for continued grant funding. Absent any notice of an award, the Head Start grant funding program expiring, we would have no choice but to close the program, as the IU would have no authority to continue to operate Head Start classrooms and serve early Head Start families and students. Knowing the importance and value of this program to our Bucks County early learners and their families, our Bucks County IU Executive Director and members of the administrative team are actively advocating every day, attempting to get information and a better understanding of the federal government's intentions. You can be a voice too in this community if this is something you think it's worth fighting for. Contact your federal legislators, U.S. Representative Brian Fitzpatrick, U.S. Senator John Fetterman, and Dave McCormick and advocate for
045the continued grant funding of the Head Start program, which serves some of our youngest and most vulnerable children in Bucks County. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Fowler. Ms. Smith, an update from Bucks, Middle Bucks Institute of Technology, MBIT. Sure, everything is going smoothly at MBIT. We had students attending the SkillsUSA state competition last month and 16 of our students did receive medals and seven of them are gold medals, so they're heading on to the national event in June later this year. One of our students, Kaia Crowley, was named as the 2025 SkillsUSA Pennsylvania Outstanding Student of the Year, so that was quite a recognition for that student, and I had the honor to attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony for our new welding lab. We've been working for a couple years at MBIT to double the space
046of the welding facility, so now we can have 32 students training in welding instead of 16. It's a beautiful space, very well designed. We had a great attendance that morning, former students, the students themselves, some local legislators, and then some board members, and everyone's very happy to finally cut the ribbon. We had scheduled it back in February, and we got snowed out that day. The students have been in there working since the fall, but this was the official date, and it was a good celebration that day for MBIT. That's all. Thank you. Ms. Hauser, the finance. Thank you. Before I get started, I just wanted to make mention that the May 8th meeting will be the meeting where we present the proposed final budget for approval on the following full board meeting, and then the
047final final budget will be presented at the finance and operations committee meeting on June 4th, I think it is. It's the Thursday of the first week of June, just for at that finance and operations committee meeting, just so everyone's aware. Having said that, administration is seeking approval for item 6B through 6I. Can I get a motion? Motion. Motion by Mr. Duggar, second by Ms. Foley. All in favor? Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. Other board action items, I guess there's Dr. Malone. I want to separate out a couple. So the administration is seeking approval for 7B. Second. Motion by Mr. Duggar, second by Ms. Reynolds. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. We have another item here. Administration is seeking approval for 7C. Sorry. Can I get a motion to
048approve 7C? So moved. Second. Moved by Ms. Sandanowitz, second by Ms. Smith. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. Congratulations. Congratulations, Dr. Splennett. A very warm welcome and congratulations to you, Dr. Zaleski. I'll continue? Yep. Okay. Happy to have another Z around personally. Thank you. Okay, so administration is seeking approval for items 7D through K. Can I get a motion to approve D through K? So moved. Second? Second. So moved by Ms. Reynolds, seconded by Mr. Duggar. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. And for operations, Mr. Spencer. Thank you. Administration is seeking approval of operations items 8B through 8K. Do I have a motion to approve items 8B through 8K? So moved. And a second? Okay, so moved by Ms. Sandanowitz, seconded by Mr. Kimikata. All
049in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. Thank you. Ms. Wright, special education? Yes, administration is seeking approval of special education items 9B through G. Can I get a motion to approve items 9B through G? So moved. Moved by Mr. Pepper, second by Ms. Foley. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. Ms. Wright, student services? Administration is seeking approval for a student service item 10A. Motion to approve item 10A. So moved. Second. Moved by Ms. Reynolds, second by Ms. Foley. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. Education items? Dr. Malone? Administration is seeking approval for education items 11B through F. Can I get a motion to approve items 11B through F? So moved. And moved by Ms. Foley, seconded by Mr. Duggar. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstentions? Motion
050carries 9-0. And for our policy items, Dr. Malone? Administration seeking approval for 12B and C. So moved. Motion to approve 12B and C. So moved. Moved by Ms. Sandanowitz? Second. Seconded by Ms. Reynolds. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion carries 9-0. Field trips, Dr. Malone? Administration seeking approval for field trip items 13B through D. Hi, can I get a motion to approve items 13B through D? So moved. And a second? Second. Moved by Mr. Herring, second by Ms. Smith, maybe? Okay, thank you. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? All right, motion carries 9-0. And before we go to human resources, I have some retirements to announce. We have four retirements to announce this evening. We have Sally D'Amico, who is a library teaching assistant at CB East with 31 years
051of service. We have Joseph Jablonski, building utility, who had 20 years of service. Susan Steinmetz, a transportation assistant with three years of service. Colleen Wipplinger, who had 15 years of service and our total years of service that are retiring, 69 years in the district. So we wish them well and congratulations. And Mr. Freiling, human resources? Administration is seeking approval of agenda items 14B through I. Do I have a motion to approve items 14B through I? Motion. Second. Motion by Mr. Duggar and seconded by Ms. Andanowicz. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Abstain. Okay, motion carries 9-0-1. 8-0-1. 8-0-1, sorry, I can't do the math on the fly. Thanks, Ms. Andanowicz. No worries on the math guy, remember? Any other reports or information from you, Dr. Mullen? All right, that brings us to our
052second period of public comment this evening. Persons wishing to make public comment were required to register prior to the start of tonight's meeting. Please note that public comment is not intended to be a question and answer session. If a question is posed, the individual may be referred to the superintendent for follow-up. When your name is called, please approach the podium and begin by stating your name and municipality. Each speaker is allotted three minutes. You'll be asked to see your comments at three minutes. We kindly ask that all comments be directed to the board as a whole rather than to individual members. We appreciate your cooperation in maintaining a respectful environment. Please be considerate of all speakers and their opinions, including those that differ from your own. Thank you for your understanding. I'm gonna, do we
053manage to pull? Okay, great, so I'm gonna start with my list. I think I have it all in order, so. That's okay, I can read from the screen or look at this one, so I'll be good. Thanks, thanks, Mr. Jaffe. All right, so Mr. Tony Arjona. Good evening, my name is Tony Arjona. I'm from Doastown Borough. I'm reading an email from James Pepper to Central Buck School District Lawyers Edward Yasio and Kyle Summers sent today, April 24th, 2025. Counselors, in light of the information that has recently come into my possession, please advise directors Zdanowitz, Karen Smith, Rob Dugger, Rick Herring to retain the following relevant records in their possession. Bullet points read as follows. One, any and all communications, including text messages, emails, signal chats, and any other communications between any of them, individually and
054or collectively, and the following people from November 13th, 2024 through the present, Kara Alderford, Miriam Mahmood, Tabitha D'Angelo, Tracy Suetz, Dan Allegerman, David Kahn, Rayward Roberts-Vamales, Dr. Mark Harfman, Steven Yanni, Nadine Garvin, Rob Freeling, Dave Heineman, Steven Albert, and Christine Truinsky. Bullet two, any and all communications, including text messages, emails, signal chats, and any other communications that contain the word Pepper with anyone in their possession. Expect additional document retention requests at a later date. Obviously, do what you want, but at this stage, I would advise these particular clients of yours about the limits of qualified immunity, i.e. what is at stake for them personally if, when it is established that they were aware of the cover-up of child abuse and nothing to stop it, and did nothing to stop it. Some members of this board
055have a history of spoliating evidence, especially Ms. Smith. Please advise your clients about the consequences of spoliating evidence, especially if they do not have qualified immunity. Please also advise them that we are not toothless in the toothless world of Sunshine Act violations. In this world, there will be real consequences if people destroy evidence. Thanks, as always, for your kind attention. Those mentioned in this email have had a hand in playing politics with children, students of central bucks, and it's evil. Thank you. Mr. Mackhouse, if you could hold on one second. I have a Leslie Watson on my list from public comment period one that didn't make it to this combined list. Is Ms. Watson here and still wishing to speak? Okay, thank you, Ms. Watson. Mr. Mackhouse? I'm Ed Mackhouse. I'm from Buckingham, a former
056teacher, engineer, scientist, and I was speaking about individual education program. No teacher is perfect, and no parent is perfect, so we're all going to have problems. So I think it's good for the parents to get together to try and solve the problems between the children, and then I've been 20 years attending, and on the open week, attending the classes of all my children and grandchildren, and I respect all the teachers. I never saw a bad teacher. I saw very good teachers, but no teacher is perfect and can handle every child in every situation, so I think the health and safety and welfare of the children is the highest priority. As far as like autism and stuff, I'm a scientist. I engineer and study it. We have Robert F. Kennedy Jr. who had problems at one
057time, and he overcame them, and I think he's in position to make America healthy, wealthier, and wiser. We need to be wiser. We spend $300 million a year on autism, and as a result, we have the highest rate of autism in the world, along with Kennedy. So we need results. We're in $2 trillion in debt. We shouldn't be paying scientists and all to, like on the climate hoax, $1 trillion a year on the climate thing, whereas the fossil fuels is the most efficient, can last a year, a hundred years. That's the most efficient and the last thing. We're paying a trillion dollars a year just on interest on our debt. We need to take care of everyone. We need to have a safety net, but we also have to have people work, and we can't
058make the medical bills, Medicaid, $1 trillion a year, $2 trillion that borrow money to throw it into the wind. We have to be smart, make people wiser, like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., transgender surgeries and million dollars on illegal immigrants and stuff. We have to make Americans safer. We don't have the ability to take in a billion people in America because it's more wealthy. We need people to have our values, to put the welfare of our children and our society above the financial needs. So we have financial forces. Everyone wants vaccines or medicines that'll cure everything, but the responsibility for our health of ourselves and our families, mostly on us and what we eat and do, and then we need the government to back us up and to ban products that increase sickness, make us 13
059years the average American is sick, which it has to stop. Thank you. Art Larson. Good evening, everybody. I have two subjects to talk about, hate and taxes. So we saw right here, you're bringing back the Anti-Defamation League, No Place for Hate Program, which is nothing but a front for organized crime run by the Bratham and Crimson again. I ran into them in the school board meetings back in Ableton in 2008, and they said, when we get control, I'm one of the first ones going into camp. You know what the police said to me? Yes, the mafia. Be careful. So now you're bringing that program back in again. I understand cyberbullying and kids being bullied, but they don't bring the Chicago Senate to get a solution to that. The other part is the Annenbergs, okay? The
060same part of the Chicago Senate. They were a component of Atlantic City to set it up. The same ones that own that media there, the Philadelphia media. If you want to have media here, get some media that's not run by the Chicago outfit. Taxes. We saw from Herring, who's in control of the finance committee there. Oh, if we pay that multi-million dollar lawsuit, oh, the insurance company paid for it. Well, look what's happening in Florida after the insurance company paid for all they established in stores. You know, the rates are going up through the roof. Tara. Tara says, when I asked her about, you know, having some contribution to what's happening with finance, oh, I can't be involved, right? Now she's going over to Montgomery County to North Penn School District, where they've been fighting
061for years not to have a second school, high school there. I just talked to the county supervisor in Montgomery County. He says, out of Jack up their school board, the rates in that community by 5% in addition to the 5% to pay for the new courthouse, okay? So that's a big issue. The third point is we saw what's happening with private equity, okay? We see what happened in Crozier Hospital. We see what's happening with Joanne Fabrics, both owned by Leonard Wagner, one of the Michael Millican felon boys with the Ivan Boesky scandal. Them and UCLC, Jeffrey S. These private equity guys are chomping at the bits. You guys, this school district, is there experimental tests to see if they can take over schools in this country and tax the living heck out of us? I'd
062like to give this information if somebody wants to see it and can actually look at it and enforce it. Any volunteers here? Sir, if you want to leave it on the side table there, we'll pick it up on the way out. Over there? Okay. Done. Anusha Viswathanen. Good evening, everyone. My name is Anusha. I'm from Doylestown. The last few weeks have felt extraordinarily heavy as a parent of a child who has special needs. First of all, we ourselves are at a moment where my child is changing, growing, and challenging us in new ways. And then it's IEP season. And as someone who is data driven, I value the importance and power of a well-designed IEP. Still as a mother, there's something about dissecting your child's capabilities into their smallest atoms that is inexplicably hard. And
063I always worry, will he be seen as a series of behaviors to be controlled, or will he be seen as a whole child differently capable, but with a worldview still worthy of consideration? And he's seen that way in Kutz, our homeschool. He's seen through the lens of humanity and goodness when he is succeeding, and more importantly, even when he is struggling, still whole, still good. I feel lucky to be a Kutz parent, but every child, and especially children who are different or marginalized or vulnerable in some way, deserves to be seen in that lens, a humanizing lens. I think this is the heaviness. In the last few weeks, autism and autistic people have been spoken about in dehumanizing ways, that autistic people prevent this country from being an exemplary nation, that they denigrate the vigor
064and robustness of the populations. These are not my words. These are quotes from our HHS secretary, that they don't pay taxes or find love. Talk of building a registry of people, not building support for people, not funding IDEA, not expanding SSI, not fighting for respite care, not real dignity for people with disabilities. This is not a humanizing lens. When my child was younger, I got these notes about how he was mocking teachers or being willfully defiant, or that he did not receive access to the sensory room because of his behavior. I cannot describe how painful it was to read these reports, to know that the adults around him saw him in this way, not as a struggling bewildered child, but a willfully misbehaving one. I cannot imagine reading a 75-page document describing in grim detail
065the dehumanizing way my child was treated. It was gut-wrenching. It was a wound to these children, to these families, to this community. We need expertise to advance the future of all of our children, especially those who need special assistance. But more than that, we need safeguards to address when those programs do not go the way they should. And we need a culture shift where we have people empowered to report and speak out when things are not going the right way. Thank you. Michael Henry? Before I get into what I wrote, just in case no one else covers it, I just want to put it in the air to balance it out. We should find ways to support transgender people and not blame them for budget problems. But anyway, let's get into what we're all here
066to talk about. We've all read the report. So instead of talking about the report specifically, I'm talking about some dates. Dates you won't find in the report because they're in my email inbox. Because while the report goes through January, the lies didn't stop there. My child's in the classroom in question. Since we now know that the staff in the room was preoccupied not doing their job, here's even more people who didn't. January 30, 2025, I asked principal Dave Heineman about the plan to protect my child from a student in the class who continuously hit my kid all semester and on that day hit three times and pulled hair. Dave said, please know that I will continue to do everything I can to get you the answers you need and help make sure this does not
067continue to happen. January 31 from Dave Heineman, the next day, we are looking to plan so that we can prevent this from happening in the future as best as we can. Later, January 31, the same day, my child was hit by the same student. My point of view to Dave was to get my child moved out of the classroom. He said, they don't do that. February 3, 2025, that's when I had a video call with Dr. Yanni about what was going on in my child's classroom, how we can keep my kid safe, but also just what are the details around everything with the accusations, investigations, because we all know safety of these kids is what's paramount. That's also the day Dr. Yanni spent an entire video call lying to my face. Here's what I was
068told by Dr. Yanni on the video call. He said the police said the witness was unreliable and couldn't specifically recall things. He reported everything from his personal email that day because he wanted to get the reporting quicker and it was able to do it if he did it from his personal account. He said that the main issue found with the whistleblower was that it was a personality conflict with the staffer and the teacher in the room. So I asked him, I said, why not tell your side of the story then to the public? Well, it becomes that story is BS and it's made up and he didn't share that side of the story because it was all lies. And one of the many times I talked to the principal who echoed the personality conflict lie,
069I asked Dave Hyaman if there were cameras and he lied to me about what was on the footage, footage that by the way has allegedly disappeared. I asked Dr. Yanni again about the future of that classroom and what was told, all these elaborate plans with the new full-time aid stepping in to help. Meanwhile, just last month, March 25, my child was hit again, had a huge red mark on their face and because the aid that was supposed to intervene and protect them was fooled by the student walking in a different direction and couldn't stop my kid from being hit. So now I was following up on that because I'm worried the next step is going to be my child coming home with a black eye and I got a response from Vice who was looking
070into it because like I said my point of view now was well my kid's not coming back to the schools, we have a concrete solution on safety. From Vice to my email, well Mr. Hyman's email didn't provide many details about the situation where your child was hit in the head and hair pulled. I'm gonna run over, I'm telling you right now. So the new report mentioned many times where Dave didn't provide information. From the report, principal Hyman witnessed the students hitting each other in the classroom. Later on in the report, staff telling principal Hyman that the hitting in the classroom was out of control and his response is it is part of the student's diagnosis. Interesting he says that because all the times I spoke to Dave he said dealing with an autistic support classroom
071was new to him. What's funnier is Dave told me he never saw anything and on that January 30th email I read to you all here he said he was doing everything he can to make sure this doesn't continue to happen. That's the key takeaway, he didn't provide details, police weren't given all the details, parents weren't told what was going on in this classroom. I had to ask my own questions about why my child is flinching all of the time when another student gets close to them. It's a miracle my child has made so much progress despite of all this. Ignore what RFK Jr. says, children with autism are not a burden. We've been purposely left in the dark this whole time and now this parent has the spotlight and is standing here in front of
072you and this parent has had enough. It's time, no need for more investigations, no need for more findings or further process. Dr. Yanni told me on that video call how stressful it was having so many people calling for his job every time he walks out the door. Well, Dr. Yanni prayed on my emotions during a stressful time with my child and manipulated me into actually feeling bad for him. Well, Dr. Yanni, now I'm calling for your job. You should resign, administrative leave today, I wrote this yesterday so that's step one, but honestly he should be fired, they should all be fired. If he had any brains he would have resigned already before it got this far, if he had any heart he would have resigned already because the guilt should have been too much. He
073shouldn't be allowed back and same goes for anyone who knew about this. Dave Lineman's leave needs to be revoked and he should be fired. None of you should still be in your positions, none of you should be working with kids, all of you should be ashamed and embarrassed. My child can't speak up but I'll speak very clearly to you all and to anyone who has lied about what happened in that classroom. You're disgusting. I moved to this area specifically for the school district to ensure my kid got the best help and what have they gotten? Neglected, abused and that's just what we know. What don't we know? What happened in the classroom where if it happened in any other classroom a kid comes home and tells their parents about what happened during the day? We
074have no idea what actually went on other than what's obviously been pulling out in the report but like what else don't we know? Who knows the progress that these kids could have made if it was just a normal environment and not this toxic one? Well, here's what I do know. I know that if you support these people and protect them and defend them then you are complicit. These people are snakes, they're liars, they're weasels, they don't preserve protection. Jim Pepper's son deserves protection. Every kid in that classroom deserves it. Every kid in that school does. Now it's time for these liars to get what they deserve. It's time for change. Tick-tock. Jessica Steinberg. Good evening everybody. Hi, my name is Jessica Steinberg. I am extremely nervous. Hi, Anusha. Your sentiments were exactly what I wanted
075to say but you said them really eloquently and you came prepared. I thought, I sat on my porch at 6 30 this evening not even a thought of coming here. I saw Jim on the news report and my heart broke and I said I'm coming. My son Brody is in sixth grade at Pine Run in autistic support. He's been in autistic support since kindergarten at Bridge Valley. I have had a fantastic overall experience with the school district. I moved here to put him in the best schools when he was diagnosed too. Life is not easy. These past couple weeks have been horrible with the media and the government and what's going on. It's really hard for us as parents. You want to have your kids in a classroom on a bus and a program with
076an aid who you trust. It's the only thing you have that can get you through your day as a parent. If you don't trust your bus driver, your aid, your teacher, you have nothing. And it's broken. I have had the good fortune of having really wonderful teachers and really wonderful aides. How's Brody doing? Brody's good. He's good. Brody's had really great fortune of having great people around him but I have rose colored glasses on all the time. I'm a nurse. I feel really positive that people are going to follow the right process. As a nurse, I'm a mandated reporter. I know what it means to be a mandated reporter. You see abuse, you report it immediately so it doesn't continue. These are children but don't have a voice that aren't able to defend themselves. My
077son comes home from school, he's got a bruise. I assume he did it too hard. His cup comes home full of water. I assume that they filled it five times during the day because he likes to drink water a lot. I don't know now and everything's questioned. I want to believe the best in people. It's who I am innately. I had some transitional changes during Brody's tenure in elementary school and I wasn't happy about a lot of it. I reached out to Jim. I reached out to all of the administration. Jim is the only person who wrote back to me. He called me up, tried to help me. Nobody else cared. Nobody else wrote back to me to get to even just be empathetic to me and what was going on with Brody at the
078time. I just plead for everybody here. Autism is just a very unique disorder where you need to have trust of the people that are around your children. If you don't have it, you have nothing. My son's about to go to middle school. I'm really excited about it but I'm also insanely nervous. I envisioned him graduating from this school district and I can't tell you that I have full confidence that I feel comfortable with him being here with this cover-up. I just, Jim, I'm so sorry this happened to your son. If this was my son, I would be devastated. We are. I'm devastated that you and your wife, you have my full support. Thank you. And just please, please do better. I said this in the letter when I wrote it to Luca Ball last year.
079I said do better for these kids and it's not happening. Petter Cox. Good evening. My name is Petter Cox and I'm a retired army officer and I spent my entire life defending law and order in this nation. Mr. Pepper, I apologize to you for what happened to your child. I have two topics of discussion tonight. Topic number one, the teacher and the EA do not need to be put on leave, studied and whatever. They need to be fired immediately. They need to lose their licenses in the state of Pennsylvania and they need to be criminally charged with abuse of children and they need to go to jail for a very long time. As far as the district administrators that failed to do their job, the principal needs no mercy either. He needs to be gone
080on the street looking for a new job as a garbage collector. End of discussion. The other members need letters of reprimand in their personnel files with a warning that if anything like this or anything else ever happens again, they're on the street. End of discussion. Now, second subject and it's an interesting one because I saw a commercial on TV today that drove me to come here and it had to do with a school in Rhode Island and it tied me in to MBIT and what my family went through with MBIT and it was not negative. It was just simply MBIT is not big enough to handle the needs of this school district, particularly given the massive loss of jobs in industry because of AI and the massive increase in the industry looking for people that
081are technically qualified to do things. My daughter went to school at MBIT to learn how to become a cosmetologist which drove her into what's going to be her real trade which isn't taught at MBIT but should be. How many here ever got a job that started out at 200 bucks an hour and within one year is at $400 an hour? Anybody in this room? No. You know who gets it? Tattoo artists. $400 an hour. It cost me $4,600 to do my daughter's arm from her hand to her shoulder. We don't teach it. What about mechanical engineering, automotive engineering? My son tried to go to MBIT. It wasn't big enough. They didn't have room. Hey, we just went from 16 to 32 welding students. Still not big enough to cover Bucks County. My son is going
082to a place called Penn College of Technology, part of the Pennsylvania State University System, and he's going to graduate with a bachelor's degree in automotive engineering. Now we talked about all these schools that have got excess space that we can move other things into. Hey, let's start a tattoo artist class but put it in a school that's got excess classrooms. How about moving the computer science and technology out of MBIT into another school so you can add more mechanical engineering, more law enforcement, more of the other technical skills that need a shop. Instead of shutting down schools, building new schools, renovating schools, let's alternately use the space that we have to help our student population meet the needs of what is going on in industry today. Go up to Ivyland. There's factories up there that
083are short 20, 30, 40, 50 people per shift. How many people here know that there's a factory in Ivyland that's the only one in the world of its kind, and it's short 40 employees right now? It manufactures the cannon plugs that Boeing, Lockheed, and every other aircraft manufacturing company in the world uses for all of their airplanes, and there's only one of them in the world, and it sits in Ivyland, and it's short employees. So let's look at what we can do with MBIT, expand it, put some of the stuff that doesn't need to be able to weld stuff or turn wrenches into space in schools that is vacant, and move on. Thank you. Marian Davis. Davies, sorry. It's Davies. Sorry about that, Marian. Okay. Well, I guess I'm here. I don't want to be
084here, but I couldn't help but speak up. I was dismayed. I read the entire report. I hope that everyone in this room did, and really, really saddened to read the further catastrophic failure to protect the least amongst us in this school district. To all the teachers and union members that are present, thank you. Many more have not spoken up. Where were you? I have four kids in the district. I loved all of our teachers, the administrators. We had a wonderful, wonderful experience here. I'm saddened that these families have not enjoyed the scene. Interesting that for many months on end a few years ago in this room, sitting board members were quick to take to the streets, have their posters, advocate for children who wanted affinity flags in the classroom, even compared it to child abuse
085when the board tried to pass a classroom neutrality policy. And, you know, many in this room compared, again, compared it to child abuse when actual, in fact, horrific child abuse to the most vulnerable disabled children occurs. The same board members and teachers and union reps remain silent. What was worse was to read in that report that there was a union member that was pressuring. They weren't giving a directive. They were recommending key players not to cooperate with interviews. That is, has to be criminal. Dr. Yanni should not return at all. Now, of course, we're paying a taxpayer paid leave for him. He should not be returned. He should be fired on the spot, and you board members have that responsibility. The other board members didn't speak up regarding the at the other meetings in November,
086December, January, or March. Why this gentleman here, Dr., excuse me, Jim Pepper was here. There was other parents of the children involved, and none of you made a statement about it. None of you. Silence is acceptance. Do the Central Bucks School District community a favor. Withdraw your candidacies for reelection and find something else to do. Thank you. Betty Santoro. Good evening. Betty Santoro, Warrington Township. I'm a retired educator of 37 years. During my career, I served as a teacher, a principal, director of special education and pupil services, and director of elementary education. I am currently a candidate running for the school district school board. First and foremost, my heart aches for the students and families who endured the abuse, negligence, mockery, and discrimination in the autistic support classroom. I applaud Mr. Pepper for bringing this
087matter to light and continuing to seek justice for his child and all the children in that classroom. We all read the report published yesterday by the DRP. The allegations are now confirmed through a thorough investigation by the Disability Rights of Pennsylvania. The handling of this child abuse case was mishandled from the beginning. Dishonesty, poor communication, misleading information, not following child abuse reporting from those who saw it firsthand don't understand it. Cover up by the staff and administration, lack of action by the administration and board from the classroom level to the building administration level to the district administration level to this board. What do we see? We see a broken and flawed system. Where is the accountability? Where is the transparency? The majority of the board sitting up there ran on transparency. Relationships are built on
088trust and now that trust is broken. What immediate action will this board take to correct the mishandling of this child abuse? What assurances can you give the families and all families of special education students that their children are safe and in the care of well-trained and competent staff? In fact, that statement applies to all children in the Central Buck School District. Abuse is abuse. There is no place for abuse in the Central Buck School District or any district institution or organization. The board needs to step up and act. Not next week, not next month, now. Thank you. I'm sorry. I skipped ahead. My apologies. Shannon Martin. Our policy no longer allows the seating of time. Just totally. Okay. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. Instead of. Yes. My name is Amanda O'Connor from Jamison Township. As a Jamison
089mom of two and a former teacher, I've been following the allegations of abuse in our special ed classrooms at Jamison with growing rage. I've quietly offered support to a friend involved and privately at, excuse me, advocated transparent communication with our Jamison community. I've been clinging to patients through like many of you with this, but I've worn dangerously thin waiting for the district's independent investigation, believing in a system that should protect our children. The disability rights Pennsylvania report released yesterday obliterated what little faith remained. It's beyond horrifying and devastating betrayal to the trust we owe our children. I sobbed as I read the report in the detailed 70 plus pages. Each page got worse and worse. I couldn't believe how many people were involved and allowed this to continue and the many opportunities to intervene that
090were missed. This hits especially close to home. My brother-in-law was a Central Bucks student. He is a disabled person. He is non-verbal, a traumatic brain injury. He went through Buckingham Elementary, Lenape Middle School and graduated from CB East and was in this district his entire life and everything was wonderful. The support we received from our family was amazing. I knew this little boy from nine years old to now. He's a 32 year old man and we couldn't thank this district enough and it doesn't seem like that legacy of great care for our disabled students has continued. As a former teacher and a trained mandated reporter, I never witnessed an environment so toxic that adults look the other way as children were abused but that's exactly what happened here. I'm deeply troubled by those who saw
091this cruelty and chose to stay silent and I also understand that this was a systemic failure where administrative support for teachers vanished. I would like to applaud the PCA for speaking out under such distress. I feel that everyone should feel safe and supported when they speak up against child abuse. As a mother, my heart is bleeding for these families. I cannot fathom the anger and helplessness of the parents discovering that their children who were unable to voice their own pain suffered unspeakable treatment from those entrusted to care for them and now our district must act. You took a first step tonight but we need to see much much more. We need immediate safeguards to protect every child in our special education programs and a comprehensive overhaul of reporting procedures so no staff member ever feels
092silenced again. We need a culture of change and central bucks because this is not the first time that abuse has gone on and has been dismissed. This is about the most fundamental obligation as adults, protecting children that we entrust in our care. We must resolve that such failures never happen again on our watch. Thank you. Thank you. Fania Carlitsky. Fania Carlitsky, Warrington. I'm speaking tonight not just as a concerned member of this community but as someone who believes we all have a moral responsibility to protect the most vulnerable among us, our children. I am disgusted, I am in shock, and I'm sad by what the people in charge have allowed our district to become. What happened in that classroom wasn't just a breach of protocol, it was a betrayal of trust, a failure of humanity,
093and an outright violation of students' rights. You cannot continue to lie to us when you say you care about all children and you only want what's best for them. Each and every one of you that had a hand in knowing and keeping silent or even worse covering this up clearly cannot care about children and truthfully shouldn't be involved with anything to do with children. The teacher and educational assistant involved in the abuse and neglect and neglect must be held accountable in every way possible. We cannot allow individuals who have harmed children or allowed harm to happen to remain in a position of power over any children ever again. But it doesn't stop there. All of administrators who enable this behavior, who look the other way or fail to act, they too must face consequences. And
094because Dr. Yanni was directly involved, I am calling on this board to take action. Real action. Not silence, not stalling, not PR statements. Every person who knew and kept quiet needs to be fired. Every person who tried to sweep this under the rug needs to be fired. This is a moment for courage, for justice, and for once putting children first. Anything less is unacceptable. Do the right thing even though I know for some of you that doesn't come naturally or easily. I'm hopeful that the few sitting up there that I know still have a moral compass will do what's right for this district. Thank you. Diana Lagerman. Diana Lagerman, Warwick Township. For years, I have said that CPSD desperately needs a cultural overhaul. For far too long, administration has systemically intimidated and dismissed their teachers,
095enabled or directly participated in inappropriate behavior, and deliberately looked the other way when convenient. For far too long, a pervasive culture of fear and anxiety has strangled this district. This toxic culture bears significant responsibility for the horrific situation where child abuse has been allowed to fester, where both teachers and administrators who violated trust continued in their roles working with our most vulnerable children. This cannot and must not continue. A complete overhaul is absolutely necessary. When we said save CPSD, we weren't simply referring to rescuing our district from the previous damaging board. We meant truly save it to transform it into something better. We must fundamentally change the culture. How many more allegations will it take? How many more instances of abuse? How many more reports must surface before this district finally purges itself of the
096sickness lurking beneath the excellent test scores and impressive college acceptance rates? As a teacher, I have repeatedly put my job on the line to protect my students. I have done whatever it was necessary to ensure that every child in my classroom and in my school building is safe. And while I believe that anyone too afraid to report abuse has no business inside a school building, I also understand that many educators are working for leadership that prioritizes reputation over safety and under policies that punish rather than protect those who speak out. Teachers are caught in a toxic web and CB needs to dismantle the culture of intimidation that prevents good people from doing what's right. Despite whatever narrative about me may circulate in certain corners of the district, I have consistently and vocally opposed all injustice.
097I have always stood on business. I have closely followed every article and waited for a proper investigation which appears to be finally here. I am profoundly appalled and disgusted by everything that has come to light. I want to offer my deepest sympathies to all parents caught in this nightmare. I am truly deeply sorry that so many people you trusted catastrophically failed you and your children. This failure is reprehensible and inexcusable. They should be held accountable. I recognize our current reality has politicized virtually everything, but the situation transcends politics entirely and anyone claiming otherwise is being is themselves being political. This is fundamentally about human dignity, human rights, and the safety of our children. I firmly believe those involved in abuse and negligence must face appropriate consequences. Afterward, after you do that, I urge the board
098to focus intensely on transforming culture in CBSD. The focus must be on creating systems where educators feel empowered and protected when they report concerns. Only by addressing these fundamental cultural issues can we truly protect our students and support the many dedicated teachers who want nothing more than to keep their children safe or their students safe. These failures cannot continue to happen. We need a culture built on genuine trust and strong professional relationships. Our children, parents, teachers, and staff and the entire CBSD community deserves nothing less. Thank you. Excuse me. No, we are not going to have comments from the audience. I expect a quorum while people are speaking. Please do not interrupt people who are speaking during public comment. Please do not jeer. Applause is acceptable. Jeering is not. Please. We're all adults here. Thank
099you. John Daughtery. Never seen this man without a hat. I've never seen this man without a hat. I look good, don't I? No, honestly, I mean, I had two daughters go through this district and they're both very successful, so thank you for that. I gotta say, as a father, I have two daughters and Mr. Peppers, I can't tell you how much respect, admiration, and integrity you have sitting there with all this going on with these folks. I mean, seriously, I personally, as a father, you know, I didn't do much to have kids, maybe five or ten seconds. My wife did the work and for all you women sitting in this room that think this is not a disgrace, how dare you? How dare you? If you have any respect, right? Mrs. Peppers, are you here?
100I don't know. God bless you. God bless you. For every woman in this room who loves their child, the love of a mother is like nothing a guy like me could understand. So every woman in this room that respects their child or a child's life, stand up and applaud. You know why? Because there's only a man and a woman that makes a child. No matter what most of you knucklehead say, and you over there at the end, I know you in the blue tie. Jason, I never want to talk to you again in Cornerstone. Don't ever talk to me. You have a great day, and God bless Jim Peppers. Are we saying our name and, you know, you got to reset? Vonna DeArmond Plumstead? I don't know. Jim, you know I'm here to support you.
101I'm here to support all the parents and kids who have been affected by this. We have been coming here for months now, and I have stood up here in the past and said I don't blame the board, but you know what? You had a chance to take some actions, and you didn't do it, and I don't know why. And after reading the report, it's just horrifying. So you give us evidence that none of that is true, or you do something that you should have done months ago, okay? It just, it shouldn't happen. This shouldn't happen, and things need to be fixed, and you guys are responsible for that. On another note, Mrs. Gibson, I hope that you would stand up for me like you stood up for Ms. Legerman, because I've been jeered and shouted
102down many times, and maybe you'll get the chance to do that. I find it absolutely hypocritical and disgusting the stuff that she said. She stood up here in front of Jim Pepper after she, during a political campaign, used information about his child against him. Disgusting. I am angry for you, Jim. I'm angry that she would dare to do that, and tweets about the children she was teaching, and information, I mean about the parents. They were absolutely horrifying. So there was, I mean, just please don't get up here and say things that you know are not true about yourself. If you're going to come up here, be honest. You know, bringing up saving CBSD, please. Save CBSD, or get out, get off the podium, and let people who are running, who cared, like the ones standing
103up here, let them up there. Thank you. Paul Caldorro. Good evening. For those of you that don't know me on the dais, if I squint reading or read close, I apologize. I have an eye disability. My name is Paul Caldorro. My wife Anne and I have four children that were born in Buckingham Township. One of who has graduated from Central Box, and the other one is in the special needs program. She's 17. We've had ups and downs, but nothing that comes close to this. In the nearly 30 years that I've been a member of this community, I've come in front of this board two times. This is the second time. And it's been about a critical issue, and that is advocating for those with special needs. No matter your background, you could be black or
104white, you can be straight or gay, you can be old or young, you can be able-bodied, you can be disabled. All of these groups of people have one thing in common. They could either verbally protect themselves, or they can get others to help them and advocate for themselves. People with intellectual disabilities, or I like to say communication disabilities, because they have it up here, they just can't get it out. They know exactly what's happening. They're the only group of people that cannot stick up for themselves. The only group. They need us to speak up for them, especially when a parent has to bring them to a school district. We rely on you. You're like, they're supposed to be like another parent watching out for them. That's what we expect. That's what we hope, and that's
105what we count on. As a former teacher who has an education degree taught elementary and middle school, the first thing on the first day I was told, the first thing was that if I think there is abuse, or if I know there's abuse and I don't speak up, not only am I morally culpable, but I am legally culpable, either criminally or with the current school district, that you would be out. It was the first thing I was taught. The allegations at Jamison Elementary this week shocked me, and as a parent of a child with special needs, it terrified me and my family. As a member of this community, it made me furious, furious about something so horrific that could happen to innocent children, and yet as a person of strong faith, I'm going to remain
106hopeful, hopeful that this board, and I mean all nine of you, okay, will look at these allegations and when everything comes out, that you're going to hold the abusers accountable. They hold positions of power, much is given, much is to be expected. I'll finish up in a second. We need to assure this never happens again. We cannot tolerate it. It's funny. You could be seven years old and use a finger gun, and you'll probably be suspended, okay? We don't tolerate that, but we're going to tolerate kids literally being abused and tied up and things I won't even say in front of people here. So, I need this board going forward, all nine of you, and if you're not going to support it, you need to, we expect as a community to know why, that you
107and the law enforcement, this is not just for you, it's for law enforcement, people that run law enforcement, we need them to hold people accountable, because if you don't say anything, you are part of it. Just to finish up, Director Pepper, thank you for being the advocate for the special needs community that obviously we need here, and to the families in you, Anne and I stand with you, and we know you're going to work through this, because you're a strong character. Thank you, board. Mr. MacHouse, you've already had your opportunity to speak, so I'm going to go to Ms. Cannon, Deborah Cannon. Deborah Cannon, Warrington Township. I don't know why it's Warrington. So, the DRP report has recommendations and next steps. Based on the findings and conclusions set forth, DRP makes the following demands and
108recommendations to the district. The teacher and EA should be appropriately disciplined by the district and relevant governing bodies for their abuse, abuse, neglect, they were neglected, and violations of just simple rights to exist of those students in the classroom. The staff should be immediately placed on leave so that they cannot return to the classroom pending the implementation of appropriate discipline and any process related to such implementation. Administrative staff involved in these issues as detailed in the findings and conclusions should be subjected to appropriate discipline as well. As Dr. Yanni was directly involved in these issues, such discipline should be likely coming from the school board. Administrative leave is fun, isn't it? If this were Microsoft, he'd be fired immediately. You would not need a school board. Administrative leave is, though, because we are here, the
109first step in holding those accountable, but it isn't enough. We're forgetting the union members. We're forgetting everyone who turned a blind eye to what they saw and knew was wrong. We'd like to have to wonder if on November 20th there was a video in Jameson Elementary that would have clearly shown this abuse of Mr. Pepper's son because of your 60-day policy, 60-day retention policy of elementary school security footage cameras. It's gone. I will make a suggestion to make that change in your policy committee for this very reason, if you truly care about the safety of all children. I too find the comments of Mrs. Legerman hypocritical when she was participatory in trafficking strictly confidential information about Mr. Pepper's other son. Mrs. Smith, you orchestrated that. I'm going to end with this. April is National Child
110Abuse Awareness Month. Every 11 seconds, a child is reported abused or neglected in the United States. One in 10 children will be sexually abused before they are 18. For every incident of child abuse reported, it's estimated that two incidents go unreported. Hearing statistics like these is hard, hard to comprehend, and even harder on our hearts. Shying away from a difficult subject like child abuse doesn't make it go away. Silence about child abuse allows the perpetrators to continue hurting children, and that is exactly what every one of those who need to be held accountable did. They allowed the children to be continued to be abused. Thank you. Jana Rotuno. Jana Rotuno, Chalfont. I was wondering where Dr. Nadine Garvin is since Dr. Yanni recently said that her impact will be felt for years to come. He's
111right, but not the way that he thought. Because during her DRP interview, she refused to answer the question, was what happened in the classroom at Jamison Abuse? Why would she refuse to answer that question? Because if she said yes, she would have been, by her own omission, complicit in the cover-up of child abuse. And if she said no, she would have embarrassed herself even further than she already has. She will eventually be asked that question under oath, and she won't be able to refuse the answer when it happens. She'll have to answer either yes or no. Or what is more likely, she'll probably assert her fifth amendment right against self-incrimination. Whatever way she answers it, she's an embarrassment to this community. She's an embarrassment to this district, and Mrs. Pepper was right. Her career here
112ends in disgrace, and we are paying her why she's sitting around, not here. Daniel Grabanowski. Mr. Grabanowski. Good evening. Dan Grabanowski, Plumstead Township. It's interesting, it wasn't that long ago that I remember all of the, they wanted to chase the last board majority out for their actions. In fact, I remember it seems like they wanted to tar and feather Dr. Lukenbach. But now this mess that we have now is incredible, and it's this board majority that owns this. I just want to comment on the April 23rd, 2025 investigative report by the Disability Rights of Pennsylvania, the DRP, as it outlines disturbing, deeply substantial allegations of abuse, negligence, and discrimination against non-verbal children with disabilities at Jamison Elementary. These findings paint a very damning picture of institutional failure within the central black school districts, and not
113just within the classroom, but across the entire governance and support structure of the entire district. I just want to welcome Dr. Zielinski, and I hope that with you step into this role that you can bring some order to this. What remains equally troubling is complicity enabled by the silence and influence of the Pennsylvania State Education Association, the PSEA, alongside the National Education Association. I'm a union member, I'm a past union member, I support the unions, but not only have they remained silent about the claims of abuse as documented in the report, the union actively worked to shield those accused of harming our most vulnerable children. Staff were advised by union representatives backed by these powerful organizations. This is right, this is in the report, page 71, I believe. They were advised not to speak with
114the investigators, which union actions fostered a culture of silence that enabled the continued abuse. This obstruction flies in the face of the PSEA and the NEA's purported mission to support and protect students, educators alike. Think about that. I praised the teachers and staff members who came forward and spoke despite being told, recommended not to speak or participate. Worse still is a politically motivated protection racket that helped maintain the status quo. Neighbors United, a political action committee funded in part by the PSEA and NEA has used its influence to help elect school board members who have chosen silence over student advocacy. The board members supported by neighbors united have not only failed in the past to demand accountability, but in some cases they knowingly participated in downplaying the abuse and allowed misleading information to be shared
115with the public and the police. I do credit the current board for taking these actions regarding Dr. Yanni. Unfortunately, the silence of the board elected officials is not neutral. It amounts to complicity to protect the status quo. These are children who cannot speak for themselves. Some are nonverbal, relying on devices that were allegedly tampered with by the staff. The disabled students depend upon students, upon adults, not only for the care, but for the protection. When those adults fail them and the union and political operatives work to shield the guilty, then it falls upon the public demand or reckoning. And I will end with this. We the public, we demand the immediate removal of any staff implicated in the DRP findings. Two, that we demand we ask for a public center of board members who have
116failed to speak up on these allegations. And finally, I'd ask for a full independent review of any union involvement in suppressing this investigation. Thank you. Joan Stabean. Joan Stabean. Are you okay? Thank you. I didn't see you stand up. Good evening. First, let me say I'm a little bit shocked by what I'm hearing this evening. All I can do is pray to our Lord that these children are safe and that this all gets resolved and that you guys do what you do best. I have faith in you. Now the reason I came this evening was my name is Joan. I'm from Jamison, Warwick Township. We were hoping that you'd considering offering property tax rebate to the seniors and low income, if financially possible, without raising property taxes. This property tax rebate is being offered by
117other school districts, such as Council Rock and Centennial School District in our area. I thank you if you can look into this. There are a lot of people that I'm sure could use the help. But, you know, if it's financially feasible, that's why I came. But also, I learned a lot tonight. I'll be praying for everyone, especially the kids. Thank you. Good night. Mike Christensen. Good evening, board. My name is Mike Christensen from Warwick Township. I just want to go over a few of the items that the DRP concluded from their findings. The information provided by the PCA to the district was credible and corroborated by other credible school staff. Second, the teacher and EA subjected students in classroom to abuse, neglect, illegal restraints, and adverse treatment for which the district is also responsible. The
118district subjected the students to disability discrimination. Third, several mandated reporters at Jamison and in the district failed to file a child line report. The child line reports filed by Dr. Yanni on behalf of the district were delayed, incomplete, and misleading. The fact-finding investigation conducted by the district was flawed. The process for investigation of a child line report related to suspected abuse of a student by school staff is confusing at best, and here led to inadequate investigation. A culture of fear and retaliation among staff at Jamison and district administration interfered in the appropriate protection of students in response to the allegations of abuse. Thank you. Catherine Semish. Hi, I'm Catherine Semish from Doylestown Borough, and the first thing I want to say is welcome, Helen. It's nice to see you here, and I know you'll do
119a great job. I didn't prepare remarks. I usually do, but I wanted to listen, and the first thing that I want to say, and I nobody is okay with what happened. It's a tragedy, not only personal to the children and the families who endured it, but to the entire community. That such a thing could happen in any school under any circumstance is tragic, and as we seek to find out what happened, the, excuse me, I would, could I please be, would you be so kind? Let Ms. Semish speak, please. Okay. We need the fullest accounting, not merely to hold accountable those who ferociously screwed up, but in order to understand how this could possibly have occurred. I personally would like to pin a medal on the chest of the whistleblower. My understanding through the grapevine,
120and this is not official, is that there were many people who were aware and afraid to speak out and who tried to speak and couldn't get anywhere. That is a very serious concern. When I first met Dr. Yanni as a career teacher in CB, I was then retired. The first thing I said to him was, in CB there is a culture that information only flows one way. It flows from the top down. Teachers find it very difficult to get anything said out of their buildings, and I think that may, I don't know, I don't know how this could have happened, but it did, and we have to take steps. Not only the accountability, that's important, but also prevention. Thank you. We've asked mom. Hi. I really had something prepared to say, but most everyone has
121said it, so I'm not gonna make you sit here and listen to the same stuff. I do want to be here for Mr. Pepper, you and Lisa. Thank you for being brave, and as well as all the other parents who came today to speak out. Thank you for making the decision, obviously, tonight between me leaving my house and coming here. That decision could have been made last time I came and spoke in January. You had the same authority then and the same information then that you have now, and I've been through reports and investigations. They don't need to take six months, so that's troublesome, but reading through the report, something else that was troublesome is that it was indicated that a lot of the special needs administration was unaware of what was going on in
122this cover-up, so that's concerning because I've seen our special needs department and what they've done to turn around protecting children, and I know there are a lot of good teachers and a lot of good support staff and a lot of good administration that would have never allowed this to have carried on the way it did had they been involved from the very beginning, so the problem with not handling it appropriately is that trust is broken and then more trust is lost, and that can't be, you know, it's really hard to repair, so thank you and, you know, we hope this gets fixed. Thank you. Brings us to our board comment opportunity of the evening, so I will open up the the floor, but I had a few things I needed to say or wanted to
123say first. First, generally, thank you for your comments this evening, for the decorum, for the most part this evening. I genuinely appreciate it. It's a tough topic for people to come here and talk, and I do appreciate that everybody was, by and large, respectful of the speakers that were up here, and I do thank you for that. The abuse that occurred at Jamison is horrific, unexcusable, and I don't stand for it. Up until this point, I have not spoken much at all about this, and if that silence was taken in any way to be complicit or that I didn't see that this abuse was happening, I sincerely apologize. This abuse happened. I have never questioned it. I have advocated for leave of personnel. I have advocated for change, for an investigation, and I've tried to
124do it through due process, and in that I have not spoken, and that was my reason for not speaking. It was not for any other reason other than trying to respect the process of what we are trying to go through. I intend, as a board member who has one single vote, to continue to advocate for accountability, told every single person accountable who committed the abuse, covered up the abuse, and otherwise was complicit in this abuse. That was absolutely horrific and no child should have to go through. These issues hit close to home for me for personal reasons that I will not share because this is not my time to tell my story, but they hit close to home for me, deeply close to home for me. I appreciate everyone who came here tonight and shared
125what you had to share. I will do everything I can to make sure that those accountable will be held accountable, and I will also do what I can to repair whatever trust was broken by me or this board or this district, and you have my promise that I will try to work with this community to heal, move forward, and make things better for our students and most importantly our staff because even though this incident happened, I genuinely believe it's an isolated problem with two very bad actors and our district at large. This is not what our district stands for. This is not what I experience in our district and our other very valued staff, very valued educators, valued PCAs, and other people who work with and for our students every single day. I intend to
126work hard to fix whatever happened to make this happen, to create the culture where there wasn't reporting of this abuse, to create the abuse as it occurred, whatever it is. I hope that our investigation will shed some light on what those next steps are so that we can figure out how to prevent this from ever happening again because no child, and it was not just Mr. Pepper's son, although obviously he had been the main focus, there were other children in that classroom who may not have been directly abused, but were abused by the fact that they witnessed the significant abuse of their classmates. So again, I will do everything that I can in my power to fix the situation and I appreciate your time tonight. Thank you to everyone who came and spoke. Mr. Pepper?
127A couple things. Without the support staff union, this would have been buried. The principal wanted to fire this heroic woman and the support staff union stepped in and prevented that. I have always been a union man, always, and this is why. I think I'm the only person in this room who has been a member of a union, voted to strike, and walked the picket line. So I am very much a union man. Now, what about the teacher's union? The teacher's union was disgraceful, totally, completely, and utterly disgraceful. They tried to strong arm teachers who had direct knowledge of the abuse of the children in that room, which of course included my son, who was target number one, and they tried to frustrate DRP while they conducted their investigation. So I think that's very important to
128know that. It's not a union, non-union issue. The one union performed beautifully. The other union performed putridly. I'm wondering if they're going to start a campaign again to try and undermine DRP. We'll find that out. Now, it's interesting that we hired a new assistant superintendent, and I don't know her. I hear nothing but nice things about her, but I considered voting against her not because of her, but because of the people that were at least in part involved in hiring her, namely Dr. Garvin and Dr. Yanni. I blame, of course, both of them for the cover-up of the abuse of my son and the other children in that room. Why did this happen? Any parent of a child with special needs knows that things like this can happen. We get up at three o'clock in
129the morning and stare at the ceiling worrying about that, like I did this morning. But why did it happen? I think there was a culture that was inculcated by Dr. Garvin of protecting the principals. I think Dr. Garvin wanted to protect Dr. Heineman, or Dr. Heineman, right, Mr. Heineman. I think there was something inappropriate going on between my son's teacher and Mr. Heineman. What that was, I don't know. I've seen that word several times in several different contexts. And rather than protect my son and other children in that room, Dr. Garvin protected Mr. Heineman. That is outrageous. That culture continued into the spring when Karen, strictly confidential information about my son, was disclosed by a principal to Garvin and Yanni. Information was gathered about my son and run to Dr. Garvin and Dr. Yanni. Bad
130information about my son. Information neither of them had any right to. They sent my son and three other defenseless children back into that room to be abused and did not care. They lied. They covered up. And at every turn, including this afternoon, Dr. Yanni has lied. Now if someone would say, well, Dr. Yanni is going to sue you, bring it. Come get it. Everything I have said has been true and born out. We knew the truth of everything that was material to make a decision to put all of these people out on leave in early January. Which begs the question, why weren't these people put out on paid leave pending the outcome of Lee Dalton's investigation? I don't know. I will say that Mrs. Foley, Mrs. Reynolds, Mrs. Gibson, and Mr. Kim Okada wanted these
131people out. Do the math on the other people that did not. Those people failed my son. Those people failed the other children in that room. And they should be embarrassed. Please no comments from the audience during board comment period. The idea that somehow, some way, people who are involved in the cover-up of this horrific abuse should have stayed in their job for a millisecond longer than they did is outrageous. I have no idea the machinations that went into putting Dr. Yanni out on leave this evening. No idea. I am out of that discussion because of a perceived conflict of interest there. And I have honored Mrs. Gibson's request to remove myself from that process. But the idea that we are here today with another six weeks, eight weeks, waiting for Lee Dalton's report to confirm
132everything we already know is ridiculous. Dr. Garvin will be fated at the end of May for her 33 years of wonderful contributions to this district. And she'll be looking on us fondly in her retirement. Dr. Garvin broke her contract. Her contract said that she had to stick it out through July 31st. She broke her contract. That's a material term in the contract. Why? And then we're hearing that we may not hear from Lee Dalton until June. Regardless, this can never happen again. There is a putrid culture, and I'm directing my comments to the new assistant superintendent, there is a putrid culture that Nadine Garvin has cultivated with certain principles in this district. And you will have to address that immediately, immediately. There's some weird cult of personality that played a very big role in the
133cover-up of the abuse. And I always go back to this, always go back to this, because sometimes it gets lost, at least in my own mind, that sent my son and three other children back in the room to be abused. And if it was up to Dr. Yanni and Dr. Garvin and you, Mr. Freiling, at least he had the courage to show up tonight, my son would have been restrained multiple times today for 20 to 40 minutes at a clip. He would have been left nude on a filthy bathroom floor, etc., etc. I will never get over this, ever. And all the people, and some of them are sitting up here with me, that allowed it to continue and allowed these educators to stay in their job, I will never, ever forget it. And I
134do believe there's another story there that I am going to work on finding out why four people stood together so strongly and kept these people responsible for this horrific cover-up of horrific child abuse in their jobs. And I thank everyone for their support and for the people that came tonight. Thank you and I stand with you. Can I, Ms. Reynolds? I echo everything that Susan had already said. My heart goes out to you, Jim. I've been a very strong advocate. I know I haven't spoken out, but for the same reasons that Susan explained there are legal reasons why we can't speak on certain matters and we have to abide by that process. However, I'm speaking out to the best of my ability now within what I think is going to be appropriate. So Jim and
135Jessica, I don't know if she's still here, but, and Anusha, and I think it was Mike, my heart goes out to you and all the parents of the families that are in that classroom. But speaking as a mother of two children in the district, I want to begin by saying how outraged I am and have been at this, that this situation occurred in our district. The reports from the Jamison special education classroom, particularly, particularly the findings in the DRP report are horrifying and heartbreaking. And like many of you, I'm not only deeply disturbed by what's come to light. I am furious and I have been working hard and pushing back and speaking up and speaking out and you can shake your head. People can shake their head, but there are many people who absolutely know
136that is not the case. Our students, especially our most vulnerable, deserve to be protected, respected, and cared for, always. When that sacred trust is broken, the harm is immeasurable, not only for the children directly impacted, but for their families, our staff, and our entire community. And let me be clear, the pain this is causing among our incredible teachers and support staff, especially those at Jamison who show up every day with a, with heart, skill, and compassion is very real and deeply unfair. The actions of a few must not and do not define the many. I'm grateful for the strong leadership now in place at Jamison under the interim principal, Mrs. Dowd. In light of the DRP report, the board has taken decisive action and Dr. Yanni has been placed on paid administrative leave effective immediately,
137pending the outcome of the ongoing third party investigation. And let me be absolutely clear, the board takes all allegations seriously. And when the facts more in action, we do act. Accountability is not optional. It is essential. And in moments like this, words are not enough. Action must follow and it has, and it will continue to follow. If, if you know me, you know this, I will always fight for what is right, no matter how difficult or uncomfortable that may be. I am not here for politics or public perception. I am here to protect kids, advocate for what's right, and demand accountability. My actions will continue to reflect that full stop. I am committed to doing everything in my power to make sure the situation is continuously addressed with the urgency and seriousness it demands. While
138no individual board member can act alone, we are a board of nine. I will keep pushing for strong, decisive steps that center the safety, dignity, and wellbeing of our students above everything else. Thank you for holding us accountable. Your anger is valid, your voices matter, and we hear you, I hear you. I'll be staying after tonight's meeting to speak with anyone who wants to talk, as long as it doesn't compromise the ongoing investigation. You're always welcome to reach out to me directly by phone or email. Thank you. Please no comments from the audience. Any other board member who wishes to speak? And with that, can we get a motion to adjourn? Oh, you did. You wanted to speak. I'm sorry. Excuse me. No comments from the audience, please. Yeah. The decorum tonight has been respected.
139As I said, can we please let it continue for the last few minutes of the meeting? It is now board comment time. It is not time for any comments from the audience. I really appreciate that respect. I really do. Please. Miss Foley, you said you had something you'd like to say. I just, there's a couple of things. I'll try my very best to keep it brief. First of all, I want to apologize to the families in this community that feel devastation and heartbreak. I am sorry. As a board director, I am also devastated, not because this is stressful, because it's hard to deal with. I signed up for this. I am sorry. And I mean it from the bottom of my heart. It's important to me that you hear that. After reading the report yesterday,
140I, some of it was not news. Some of it was. And I had to really sit and reflect on how utterly disgusted and furious I am. Disgust, frustration, grief. My heart breaks for the families involved and the families of the children. The accusations from this report of misconduct as it relates to the district's personnel have not been overlooked, to Heather's and Susan's point, and are being taken very seriously. All of this could have been avoided. It should have been avoided. There are safeguards in place. So events like this never happened. In healthcare, we call them never events. This is a never event. In 17 months that I've been on this board, we've had to combat countless repercussions for decisions and actions that weren't ours and some that were. And we will continue to do that
141while we serve our terms. We're a cleanup crew board. There's a lot of work to be done. I'm not talking about prior boards. I'm talking about years of things in this district that we want to improve upon. A cleanup crew board doesn't, is not an insult to the people that came before me. I've never been disrespectful to the board that came before me. I've never used that. Please in the audience, please allow Ms. Holden to speak. I'm not interested in convincing people who are committed to misunderstanding me, but I am interested in explaining myself to the public. I didn't run for a board seat in this district because I thought it would win me fans or score me friends. I did it because I believed in public education and I wanted to protect it. But
142most of all, I cared about children. I'm an aunt to an eight-year-old autistic child who has lit up my life in more ways than you could ever imagine. This hits at a lot of levels, personal for me. This district does carry a legacy of excellence, but it absolutely has an informal reputation for dysfunction. I would be foolish to believe that I could turn all of that around in my short term, but I think this might be the messy middle where real change starts to happen. And just because the district isn't perfect doesn't mean and the work is hard does not mean this isn't worth worthy of effort, of love, of commitment, of time, of grit. I will do all I can as a board director to identify any weaknesses or deficiencies within the district in
143the time I have left to try to turn things around here. On the issue, on this issue and far beyond it, my apologies to the families involved, including you, Jim. I know. Please, please, please stop commenting from the audience. I will have to clear the room. Please. I've asked nicely. I'm imploring you. Please just respect the rules of this meeting. Thank you. Ms. Foley. That's all I have. Thank you. Does any other board member wish to speak? Do I have a motion to adjourn the meeting? So moved. I have a second. Motion by Ms. Foley. Second. Ms. Reynolds. Second by Ms. Foley. This meeting is adjourned.