Navigating The Sordid Past Of Concord’s School District Charter

CONCORD, NH — In November, Concord voters who live in the SAU 8 school district will go to the polls to elect a new Concord School District Charter Commission.

The vote for a new charter commission is a requirement, approved by the prior commission which decided a 10-year review of its work would be in order. When elected, the new members will review, revise, or establish a new charter, or leave the one that is in place as it is. The members will determine its own rules, hold public hearings, and take input from the public. A preliminary report will be expected in the first 170 days with a final report within 231 days. The recommendations will be placed before voters to approve or reject in the November 2022 general election.

But what will be lost on some voters, especially newer residents or those who only read a newspaper between 2004 and 2011, is the long history of malfeasance and collusion that assisted in keeping New Hampshire’s only autonomous school district in place for more than 70 years.

Analysis: This report is derived from dozens of documents and information compiled which were published on a limited basis despite being shared with media outlets at the time.

At the forefront of the most recent battle for participatory democracy rights for Concord parents and taxpayers was a $90.8 million elementary school consolidation project that consolidated elementary schools from nine to five. The project warehoused most of the city’s young children into larger class sizes in huge buildings and ended neighborhood schools under the false auspices of saving money, which never occurred, while also tearing down several historic, structurally sound buildings, as well as the sale of a number of schools at below market value.

After November, the new charter commission has the ability to play, once again, an overinfluencing role in another major school district project the community has mixed feelings for: A new middle school, with a price tag of between $60 million to $80 million, while taxpayers in Concord are paying some of the state’s highest per-thousand assessment rates and will still be paying the new elementary schools for another 20 years.

Some often ask, How is it that Concord residents who live in the village of Penacook as well as all of the towns immediately surrounding the capital city have direct-democracy over their school budgets and building projects but nine of the 10 wards of the state’s capital city do not? The history goes back decades with political landmines set in place to keep city residents as second-class citizens when compared to hundreds of other communities in New Hampshire.

A Multi-Decade Battle For Voter Rights

About 70 years ago, Concord residents voted on its school district budget each and every year.

The process, not unlike town meetings held in March and April all around the state, was called the annual meeting of legal voters of the Concord Union School District. Registered voters would attend the meeting, approve or amend the budget, and vote on it.

In June 1961, the state Legislature approved a law eliminating the annual meeting for Concord due to legal battles between the administration, teacher contracts, and property taxpayers which led legislators to step in. Since that time, SAU 8 has been autonomous — the only district in New Hampshire that is able to tax and spend without any oversight of the voting public or city councilors or aldermen.

About 20 years later, a city councilor named David Coeyman, who was later mayor, proposed a ballot question to have the Concord City Council have the final say over the school budget similar to the process in Manchester. School board members and administrators at the time, naturally, disagreed. Two referendums were placed on the ballot in 1981 by both bodies proposing city council oversight and the school district being left alone. Voters approved both questions effectively nullifying each other and the district retained authority of its budgeting without oversight while the Legislature controlled its charter.

In the late 1980s, some city residents also attempted to move from a strong city manager system to a strong mayor form of government but that also failed, a story for another day.

Another quarter of a century would go by before anyone in Concord would try to end this autonomy.

Enter Elementary School Consolidation

Believing it would face declining enrollments and tightened budgets (even though there has been little-to-no control over spending in SAU 8), the Concord School District hired Dore & Whittier Architects to dive into the possibility of consolidating the city’s nine elementary schools.

A voluminous report was produced by the firm and inside, a study of the public found overwhelming community support for “neighborhood schools” and historic preservation.

This was no surprise. Many longtime residents as well as newbies lament the decision made decades before to tear down the old train station on Storrs Street and point to other projects like the Capitol Center for the Arts and Fire House Block Apartments of potentially productive reuse of historic buildings.

Everyone who has studied ways of improving education knows resources and finances should be focused on children — programming and smaller class sizes, as an example, and not buildings, because learning can be done everywhere, in any setting, as shown with the success of the online Virtual Learning Academy Charter School, which was created in 2007 as well as foreign students far outpacing their American counterparts in school buildings that are nowhere near as good as ours.

Even though there was no consensus on consolidation, the district ramped up proposals to knock down the Conant, Kimball, and Morrill elementary schools, all historical buildings, and sound, solid structures, sell Dame, Eastman, Rumford, and Walker buildings, and renovate the Dewey School for the district’s central office. Ignoring the recommendation in the report about the importance of neighborhood schools, proponents of consolidation began forwarding the concept of a single “downtown school” instead of “neighborhood schools” — something never mentioned by the only study of the community at the time.

There was an aura of class bigotry, for lack of a better term, to the decision, too, with the “downtown school” mantra — the more affluent parents of the West End would get to have a school their students could walk to but the less affluent parents of the North End, Jennings Drive, Loudon Road, and the Heights would have students bused to their schools when they used to be able to walk.

While there was support for the project, there was more support for keeping the intimate elementary schools and preserving buildings, especially Kimball.

Renovation estimates came in at only a few million dollars more than new schools — but that was because the renovation proposals were filled with wants and not needs, making them equal to all the flashy new buildings. More limited renovation proposals, with some suggestions forwarded by the public, would have saved tens of millions of dollars and would not have needed the recent hiring of nearly a dozen more administrators — making the school district more expensive than it needed to be, already eating away at the consolidation savings which never materialized.

Initial final costs of the new buildings, in the $100 million to $125 million range, were lowballed by both the Concord Monitor and school officials who did not count interest or other factors into the actual cost of the consolidation (it wasn’t until August 2012, when the buildings were completed, that the Monitor accurately reported the cost of the project at $90.8 million, in a story by Sarah Palermo).

There were also serious but hilarious comments, in hindsight, made about the state of some of the smaller schools including accessibility issues which were easily and cheaply solved and the fear of asbestos. Asbestos was raised as an issue at nearly every turn including the Dame School which was sold to the city for $1 and turned into community center office for the Concord Parks and Recreation Department — with remediation being limited to a single closet in the building. The issue was raised at the Eastman School, too, but it is being used by Greater Concord Child Care Services and other programs, with limited renovation. Rumford School was easily and inexpensively turned into the Concord Community Arts Center after being sold for $399,500, way below market value. After a bidding war which started at $620,000, Walker School was sold to Binnie Media for $900,000 — way below the $3.7 million appraised value school board members and district officials floated before approving the consolidation plan. Dozens of people work in the building which has all kinds of visitors of all ages. For a while, it had a television station running from the school’s former auditorium. The building was efficiently made accessible with the installation of an elevator.

Opposition to consolidation was so high that state representatives got involved in an attempt to give more power to Concord residents to help them at least have a voice by voting on the project.

Bills Seeking To Give Power Back To Residents Hijacked

In 2008, with the district guiding consolidation full-steam, state representatives began proposing bills to amend the district’s charter via the legislative process.

Then-state Rep. Rick Watrous along with state Reps. Jessie Osborne, Mary Stuart Giles, Bill Stetson, and Candice Bouchard sponsored a bill requiring any district borrowing in excess of $5 million to be approved by voters. State Rep. Steve Shurtleff (D-Penacook), who did not live in the district but served as an at-large councilor, also proposed a bill allowing for the election of school board members by district (multiple wards). If signed by the governor, both bills would have needed Concord voter approval to move forward.

The authorization vote bill was a no-brainer. The consolidation process was controversial and unpopular to many and, again, all but a handful of communities in the state require votes on school building projects and the voters of Concord deserved the chance to chime in. While there were negatives and positives to Shurtleff’s bill, most people agreed with it. For far too long, a large percentage of the school board’s nine members were made up of residents of the city’s tony West End neighborhood in Ward 5. The change also made it easier for regular citizens to campaign since running a citywide, at-large campaign is more expensive than a multi-ward district race.

During a committee hearing, members of the general public testified in favor of the bills while school district officials and employees and board members testified against the bills. Other state representatives though were confused as to why the Legislature controlled the district’s charter and how the school district was allowed to be autonomous without any oversight of the budget by a city council or the voters at town meeting like every other community. The bill was then amended to return the charter directly to the residents of the city in 2009, allowing them the right to revise or amend their charter, and was approved by voice vote of the full House.

After the approval of the bill, it went to the state Senate. Again, members of the public requested approval so they could have control of their district’s charter while school officials and board members testified against the idea.

One person who testified was John Teague, an attorney for the school district who worked for Upton & Hatfield. He even argued there was nothing wrong with the current system and the Legislature had been doing a fine job of oversight — much to the chagrin and giggles of a number of attendees. Teague also advocated the formation of a committee to study taking the charter away from the Legislature instead of giving it back to its residents.

Not long after the meeting, something odd happened: Unbeknownst to everyone, an amendment magically appeared, proposed by Concord’s state Senator at the time, Sylvia Larsen, which re-wrote the bill to create a 13-member school district charter commission study commission. Five members of the study commission would be chosen by Concord’s city manager, someone who has no role in school district affairs, and would also feature the mayor, who also has no role in school affairs, another city councilor chosen by the mayor, two legislators, a state Senate representative, the school board president and another school board member.

Watrous, the other sponsors, and members of the public supporting the original bill were stunned by the amendment but the bill was approved by both houses and the study commission moved forward.

Later, everyone learned Larsen made the proposal at the behest of the school administration and school board members with Teague re-writing the bill. In other words, the same people who failed to derail the proposal in the House paid their attorney to create a delay to any accountability of themselves by the citizens who pay for everything.

During debate about the bills, it was also revealed that even though the bond on a Concord High School renovation project had expired, the district had been setting money aside each year into a trust fund which had grown to more than $2.7 million. No other school district in the state is allowed to do this without a vote of town meeting or an oversight body, like a city council. This money should have been returned to property taxpayers when the bond expired. But not in Concord.

By the end of November, with a lame duck school board sitting in seats, the board voted to move forward with the elementary school consolidation proposal by a 7-2 vote.

But Watrous was curious how his bill could be so manipulated, out of nowhere. What he was about to find out shocked even him.

Study Commission Results Were No Surprise

In August 2009, the Legislative Charter Study Commission was formed.

Concord City Manager Tom Aspell seated Chuck Douglas, a former judge and Representative to Congress; Wilbur "Bill" Glahn, a local attorney; Maureen Redmond-Scura, an artist and education activist who would later serve on the school board; Charlie Russell, another attorney; and Anthony "Skip" Tenczar, a university professor as his five picks. Mayor Jim Bouley sat on the commission and named Shurtleff to join him. Larsen sat herself while House Speaker Terie Norielli chose Watrous and then-state Rep. Bev Farrante (R-Derry). Osborne requested to be on the study commission but was rejected due to her vote against the budget. Kass Ardinger, the school board president at the time, also sat on the committee.

From the get-go, the fix was in: Most of the people appointed to the study commission had already expressed views and opinions against reforming the school district charter, against allowing taxpayers and parents voting rights, or were presumed to be chosen to oppose all of those things.

Months of meetings were held. At one, Teague, the school district attorney who had testified numerous times, presented another proposal to the commission: The creation of an election charter commission.

“Essentially, he was now testifying that his previous recommendation was not representative enough,” Watrous said at the time. “The school district’s attorney had moved the goalposts yet again.”

Later, three proposals were considered: One would leave things the way they were; another would take the charter out of the hands of the Legislature and amend it by adding a 49B amendment process to it which would allow citizens to collect signatures to propose changes to the charter; and a third would create a charter commission.

Just days before the vote, members of the Kimball Walker PTO and consolidation supporters used email contacts in an inappropriate manner to influence the outcome of the commission vote.

Chuck Willing, a Democratic activist and a lawyer with Rath Young Pignatelli, the law firm founded by former attorney general, Tom Rath, the husband of Chris Rath, the school superintendent at the time who was leading the board to consolidation, sent out an accusatory email claiming the volunteers of the study committee were attempting to stop consolidation.

“Many of the members of the committee are people who want to stop the school consolidation project at all costs,” he wrote, without offering any proof or evidence of such accusations.

Even though the 49B process is law in New Hampshire for all but a handful of communities, he said it would make the process “something like the California ballot initiative process, and that has not turned out well for governance in California” while urging everyone to write emails and forward his email to “anyone else who might be interested.” The email was then sent to the Kimball Walker PTO president who requested the email be sent out to the volunteer list.

Privately, a number of members of the commission fumed about the emails, calling it “dirty pool” that denigrated volunteers. Another wondered how often PTO emails were used in a political manner in the past while a third wondered why they would be attempting to steal civil and political rights from parents and taxpayers.

During discussion of the proposals, there was a lot of concern bandied about. Douglas, whose office is in Concord but now lives in Bow, said he was concerned a charter commission would end up being like a politburo meeting. Glahn advocated for citywide candidates while Ardinger agreed, saying it would ensure the election of the best candidates willing to take on a thankless job.

The third proposal was approved by a 7-6 vote. Candidates would file for charter commission in November 2010 with a proposal to be forwarded to voters in November 2011.

School Attorney Breaks Lobbying Law; Gets Wrist Slapped

In 2010, the attorney general was requested to investigate how the bill, that was approved by the house to give the charter directly back to voters, was completely re-written for a study commission.

Watrous said something did not smell right especially after watching the process unfold.

In September 2010, a damning report by the AG's Office was released revealing collusion between state and school officials, and Teague violating New Hampshire lobbying law.

Matthew Mavrogeorge, an attorney with the department's civil bureau, stated Teague violated the law on May 4, 2009, when he, along with Rath and Ardinger met with Larsen and state Sen. Betsi DeVries, a Manchester Democrat and chairwoman of the Senate Public & Municipal Affairs Committee at the time, to discuss the bill. At the meeting, which was private and held in Larsen’s office, Teague, Rath, and Ardinger discussed “concerns” they had with the bill. Rath requested Teague attend the meeting; he was paid $270 to prepare for and attend it.

According to Larsen’s statement to the investigator, Teague, Rath, and Ardinger “expressed ideas” about “how to respond to HB 319 and were looking for Senate support for these suggestions.” Larsen told investigators Teague came up with the idea for a study commission and offered a draft.

The investigator determined Teague’s participation in the meeting constituted lobbying, and since Teague was not registered as a lobbyist at the time, he violated the statute. The AG stated Teague believed he did not have to register since he was “promoting alternative language as legal services on behalf of a long time client.” Teague was requested to “make a retroactive registration with the Secretary of State regarding this lobbying activity and fulfill the public disclosure components of the lobbying registration statute,” which he did.

Interestingly, while violations of the lobbying law are misdemeanors, according the statute, if performed by an individual but a felony if performed by a firm.

The AG Office’s opinion cleared Teague of any wrongdoing when he testified before the committee in May 14, 2009, to promote his re-write of the bill which had already been decided, in secret, by Larsen, Rath, Kass Ardinger, and DeVries, to derail the original bill. Teague though, while acting as a lobbyist, should have been required to have been wearing a lobbyist's tag during that meeting, since he was lobbying on behalf of a client, but this was strangely not mentioned in the report.

Teague was warned not to do it again and neither he nor his firm were charged.

What shocked and repulsed Watrous and others the most was they had just found out the entire state Senate public hearing was a charade.

More than a dozen ordinary people took time out of their workday to testify in a sham hearing only to find out later that the legislation was going to be changed. Every single person who forwarded legislation, amendments, testimony, both written and verbal, thought they were getting a fair hearing, but they were not. Behind closed doors, the people who were supposed to be representing children, parents, and taxpayers were cutting backroom deals to render citizens powerless to offer reforms.

One would think a rigged hearing by political insiders with a slap on the wrist against an attorney would have been a big news story. Actually, in any city in America, it would have been front page news, above the fold. But not in Concord.

Watrous delivered a package with all the documents to Felice Belman, the editor of the Monitor who no longer works in New England. But there was not a peep in the city’s newspaper of record. After emailing Belman wondering when the newspaper would be writing about it, she replied, “It’s not a story.”

Later, the newspaper allowed Watrous to write a My Turn column about the situation. Opinion pieces, however, do not have the same effect on the reading public as a story. And even though all this occurred and was documented, some in the community have accused anyone who has brought up this situation as being liars — all because they did not read it in the newspaper.

Eight months later, Concord NH Patch was started, giving readers in the city an alternative news source.

27 Run For 2011 Charter Commission

In September 2010, 27 candidates filed to run for at-large and district charter commission seats.

The candidates were a myriad of city politicos including many former and current school board members, several lawyers, spouses of elected officials, a former mayor, and a city councilor.

During the campaign, a number of surveys were also collected. The now disbanded Concord Taxpayers Association, an organization I co-founded with Douglas, surveyed the candidates requesting specific information on each of the issues that have been dealt with during the entire debacle. Surprisingly, or maybe not so, a number of the candidates did not understand the framework of the purpose for running for the commission. Many never offered commentary or attended a single hearing before the House and Senate hearings or were involved in the study commission process either.

Only six of the 27 candidates said they would support some process by which residents would have the ability to vote on budgets or projects. They were later nicknamed “the democracy slate.” A few other candidates were open to the ideas of empowering district residents but did not want to make a commitment.

The Monitor sent out a generic survey asking two questions: Have you run for office and why do you want to be on the commission. In other words, it did not really tell anyone anything. The Concord Education Association, the district’s teachers union, also sent out a survey — to a select group of candidates. Later, the union endorsed all of the candidates connected to the school board in some way either by marriage or prior membership. One source reported that on Election Day, they over heard two voters speaking about the association’s mailer saying, “Do you have the NEA cheat sheet with you?”

The Monitor, which was editorially pushing consolidation, refused to issue a disclaimer when it endorsed a candidate who was married to a newspaper employee (that candidate did not win).

While everyone has a right to run for office, the incestuous connection between some candidates and the school administration and school board members attempting to keep the status quo intact was not missed by many.

One candidate who was elected was William Ardinger, the husband of the school board president and another lawyer at Rath Young Pignatelli. Former school board members Clint Cogswell, who was a cheerleader for consolidation while on the board, and Betty Hoadley were elected along with Mike Donovan, a former mayor. Robert Gile, the husband of then-state Rep. Gile, also was elected along with Osborne, who also ran. Douglas and Martin Honigberg, a former school board member who is now a judge, were also elected. Kathy Conners, an opponent of consolidation, was also elected.

After a number of meetings in the spring and summer of 2011, the commission wrote two proposals for the voters to consider. One question would take the district’s charter away from the Legislature while a second question would change the makeup of some of the school board seats from at-large to district (multiple ward) seats — with 60 percent supermajority needed for passage.

Donovan, an attorney, too, wrote the language for the change in board seat representation and called the 60 percent language — “a compromise” to get more support for the change. Ardinger, who lives in Ward 5 and whose wife was elected repeatedly citywide, said he thought continuing at-large representation was fine but supported the proposal.

Before the vote, there was a strong push by Hoadley to have all the commission members united in support of the changes even though some members did not like the final outcome. Conners said she had a very hard time with something so monumental having so many restrictions — including a provision of future amendments to the charter requiring a 60 percent supermajority.

The final report was approved by an 8-1 vote with Conners voting against it. The ballot question to take the charter away from the Legislature was approved by a 7-1 vote with Conners voting against it and Douglas not offering a vote.

The district seats proposal was approved by a 7-2 vote with Conners and Douglas rejecting it, due to the supermajority vote requirement.

Another Investigation By The AG's Office

In November 2011, voters in Concord went to the polls to give an up or down vote on the charter commission proposals.

Before the election, SAU 8 sent out a double-sided “voter guide” mailer to all homes in the district about the proposed changes and used the district’s nonprofit bulk mail postal meter, which is paid for by taxpayers, to pay for the letter. The cost was not known at the time but prior newsletters to households cost about $2,000.

While most of the wording in the mailer was relatively neutral, the mailer failed to publish or even reference that there was a minority report offering reasons for rejecting the proposals including the supermajority requirement. It also failed to tell voters where they could find more information online about everything the commission looked at.

Rath, when questioned about the oversight said, in hindsight, the mailer should have at least included a link to the charter commission documents. Just promoting the website though would not be enough, she added, saying, “there is something about people getting a piece of mail that they could carry to the polls.”

At the polls, another strange thing happened: An organization of former and current school board members were at the polls holding signs calling for a vote against Question 2, the school board district seat proposal. Kass Ardinger was seen standing outside of the Ward 5 polling location with another woman who was holding a sign. She was also overheard urging approaching voters to cast a vote against the proposal, something that is not allowed at city polling locations.

As the votes were counted, Question 2 barely passed by 34 votes out of more than 3,000 cast. Ward 5 was the only ward in the city where more voters cast ballots against the question than for it, according to the results.

At a party at the function room of O Restaurant downtown, Jack Dunn, who is now the business administrator for the district, was asked about the coordination and who was involved.

“What does it matter now?,” Dunn said, walking away.

The organization was coordinated very quietly until Election Day while fudging campaign finance laws and other rules. The signs, as an example, did not have a disclaimer on them noting who paid for them, a violation of state law. Some were illegally posted on telephone poles and left lying around, too.

A Monitor story, written by Palermo, reported Dunn and Kass Ardinger collected checks for the signs from former board members Claudia Damon and Megan De Vorsey, Redmond-Scura and others.

Watrous filed a request for the matter to be investigated as did Eva Sartwell, an active city Democrat who opposed consolidation who died in December 2019.

"I believe that some laws may have been broken and it seems to fit in with a pattern of questionable activity by the school board to maintain the status quo," he told Patch. "This is the second time School Board President Kass Ardinger has been involved in what may be illegal activity."

Neither Dunn nor Kass Ardinger responded to repeated requests for comment at the time.

About two and half months later, the attorney general’s office issued a report, found the story had changed and gave Dunn a warning finding him in violation of state election laws.

During the investigation, Dunn contradicted what he and others told the Monitor: the report said Dunn told an Investigator he paid for the signs and "although other individuals had offered to give you some money for the signs, you declined to accept such money." He also took the blame for placing the signs on public and private property and that there were times the signs were left unattended.

Watrous and Sartwell were both mystified by the dual stories and how the AG’s office missed the fact that on two different occasions, both present and past school board members were acting as a collective to hijack legislation and steal the political and civil rights of the city’s residents.

Filing Deadline For 2021 Commission Is Monday

The filing deadline for charter commission membership is Monday. Nine members will be on the ballot for the commission including three citywide positions and two positions from three districts broken down by city wards (District A members will come from Wards 1, 2, 3, and 4; District B members will live in Wards 5, 6, and 7; and District C members will represent Wards 8, 9, and 10).

Signups run through Monday, Sept. 13, at Phillips Law Office, 104 Pleasant St. (enter on Pine Street) in Concord. The office is open from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

After filing ends, voters will get the chance to see and hear from the candidates and what they propose. But at least now, voters can know and understand the history of what has happened in Concord and why residents still do not have the voter rights of nearly every other parent and taxpayer in the state and rights Concord residents had 70 years ago.

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