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I'm not suggesting that a fix was in. When the results are released we may learn that under the circumstances the contract has many positive aspects.

And while I agree it is not unusual for governing bodies to assign a small number of representatives to attend contract negotiations, but in instances where the number of board members is so large that not much could be accomplished in direct negotiations with all the varying conflicting opinions sounding off at one time.

However the WSC is made up of only 5 members, small enough that that should not have been an issue.

During the last great contract dispute that I participated in as a member of the School Committee, we at various points in the process, through a mutual agreement with WTU leadership, instructed the administration to form sub-committees of directors, principals and teachers with specific expertise in areas of contention to meet without the involvement of a majority of WSC members to suggest different options to resolve the issue.

Those options were then presented to the ENTIRE school committee and WTU negotiating committee. No decision or tentative agreement was ever inked on any issue and on the entire contract without the direct consist of a majority of the WSC present at a negotiation session.

At other times we held executive session meetings to discuss negotiation strategy with all WSC members. Now since one current WSC member, Backus, who is a member of a union, has publicly shown her total disdain for the Superintendent and the administration, that option probably couldn’t be used since whatever confidentiality needed between the administration and WSC would be compromised by her leaking information to the WTU. But even if that was true there are legal ways to get around that issue.

The bottom line is that all members should have been present at that mediation session or the 7 Am planned executive session should have been held to present all the agreed upon language to the entire WSC and a vote taken to announce a tentative agreement had been reached.

And I will reiterate, if any member of the WSC had “checked out” of the process and provided a rubber stamp vote to whatever was agreed upon at a future mediation session, then that in my book is a dereliction of duty and that member should have resigned months ago.

As a footnote in history, two members of the WSC did resign during the last great dispute because they didn’t want to continue to participate in the negotiation process and two new members were elected in a special election to represent the committee in future negotiation sessions.