PROCESS SOUGHT TO FILL SCHOOL COMMITTEE VACANCY

By Maria Kopicki  and Toni Cunningham 

Amherst School Committee member Eric Nakajima submitted his resignation last week, effective on March 1, and a process for filling the vacancy is now being developed by the Town Council and the remaining four members of the Amherst School Committee.

The Amherst Town Charter outlines the process as follows:

“Within 45 days of said vacancy occurring, the President of the Town Council shall call a special meeting of the Town Council and the remaining members of the relevant board, committee, or authority, if any, to fill the vacancy. Notice of said vacancy shall be published for a minimum of 21 days prior to the meeting at which the vacancy shall be filled.”

At the Town Council meeting on February 24, Town Council President Lynn Griesemer presented a draft process that proposed a joint meeting of the Town Council and School Committee for Tuesday, April 14 at 6pm (when the Amherst School Committee is already scheduled to meet).  The proposed process also stated that the successful candidate would need to secure a majority of votes from each body. 

Nakajima was re-elected to the School Committee less than four months ago. His February 20th letter of resignation stated that his new job as Director of Government Relations with the Massachusetts Teachers Association would pose a conflict of interest with his role on the School Committee. In addition to serving on the Amherst School Committee, Nakajima was chair of the Regional School Committee, was liaison to the Town Council, served on the Joint Capital Planning Committee, and was also the School Committee representative on the Fort River Feasibility Study Building Committee last year. 

Two other candidates ran for School Committee in the November 2019 election but did not win seats: Katie Lazdowski and Lauren Mills. The results of that election were covered in a previous Indy article.  At the time of the posting of this article, neither has made an announcement about whether they will seek to fill the vacancy through this upcoming process.

A meeting of the Amherst School Committee scheduled for February 26th was canceled, purportedly due to a lack of quorum, meaning that three out of the five members were unable to attend. On the agenda was a discussion of the process for filling the vacancy and a review of the role’s responsibilities, with the intention that the School Committee would provide input to the Town Council before the vacancy is posted. The meeting was to be Nakajima’s last. It has been rescheduled to Monday, March 2 at 6pm, after Nakajima’s resignation takes effect.  

The School Committee faces a number of time-sensitive and important issues in the next few weeks, including launching an MSBA process for an elementary school building project, hearing a report on moving 6th grade to the Middle School, and finalizing the elementary and regional school budgets for fiscal year 2021 (FY21). The proposed budgets are approximately $24 million for the elementary schools and $32 million for the regional schools.