Travel

motion from Biancheria and O'Connell asking for a report on all travel, basically, for this year
also, we appear to have a police officer here tonight
Boone wants to walk through the back-up of this item
"provide some information that was provided to the T&G"
Boone points out that all out-of-state travel has been expended only from external sources
backup is not what Biancheria asked for: wants a full report
"we discuss the budget every single time we have a meeting"

taxes and tax bills
"if we are extremely and crystal clear that this is grant funded...very clear to many people...my concern is that's going to escalate as we look at our budget...there are times where we are looking at where people are going on trips"
look forward going forward...
Boone: look at adding a little more information to what you've received
O'Connell: important to keep in mind that much of our activity are grant-funded, those grants are taxpayer funded...defend to the public...we have a convincing argument for why they were there
"a practical, logical, cost-effective" option for us
share that data
conferences can be very detailed, very time-consuming, very arduous
"the expenses seem to be within the general bounds of what conferences run"
minimal
Novick: glad this came up; talk of the city. Not micromanagement or meddling
Every penny we spend is public; must be willing to explain how it's spent to whomever asks
disappointed to see only financial, not academic side in article; badly needed explanation; denied that from admin last week
Motion: request administrative evaluation on recruiting efforts (commendable to do, but how do we know it's working?)
is this the highest and best use of federal funds?
public vote of grants to get away from this perception that we're sneaking money places; we aren't, but need to be public about how it's spent
Motion: that travel be reported via agenda (not Friday letter, as done now), and include funding
support motion for report on travel and request further justification of travel, as well.
Boone: focus on student achievement
pull it in when we focus on certain things
recruiting minority teachers for cultural and language competency
bottom line is that if there's trust in particular administration
Foley: talking about travel for a number of years
disagree with my colleagues: authorization of travel is clearly a management
"no interest in going through invoices"
great investment
have to look at results of recruitment effort
no problem with others making a response from the administration
"we have to be careful as a school committee that we don't respond to some of the things in the media, some of the rumors.."
Mullaney: wasn't anticipating this kind of discussion tonight; I'll chime in a little bit
"trying to envision any other way that we could do this"
"there's a fine line between micromanaging and sitting back on your duff and being a worthy public servant"
"I have enough respect for her that she would not repeat a gesture if it were futile"
"just because a reporter decides to do a story on something...we've seen instances in the past of reporters who just want to create a story on something"
"I think the implication is going a little too far that administration did something wrong, and that's not the implication that I want to give"
Mayor O'Brien: balancing your responsibility for policy and budget and doing oversight
"think it's a good process that we have a document" showing where we're going
"if we have questions we should ask them"
"this past week, people got their tax bills and most of them went up...we're in a covenant with people in this city: we're going to ask you support public services..and in return we're going to be responsible with public dollars"