SAUGUS — Tempers flared during a meeting of the School Committee Thursday night as a group of residents repeatedly called on the committee to support the funding of a school resource officer in the district, prompting frustrations from members who said they were doing all they could but were financially hamstrung.
The renewed effort behind SROs, at least from the public, comes in the wake of the arrest of middle school science teacher Roxanne Plaskon, who was allegedly in possession of fentanyl on school grounds. Precinct 2 Town Meeting member Matt Parlante was the most vocal supporter of the SRO position of those who spoke at the meeting, at times arguing with School Committee Vice Chair Tom Whittredge and accusing Whittredge of not supporting the position.
Talk of bringing an SRO to Saugus dates back to at least 2022, and, as members noted Thursday, the committee has worked with the police department and administrators to pursue grant programs to fund the position. Committee members, both current and former, have been vocal about their desire to bring at least one officer to the schools but have said there is little they can do financially. At one point, Whittredge said an SRO was a “pie in the sky” goal for the committee.
Now, the committee is pursuing funding via the Student Support Reserve Fund, which was created by Town Manager Scott Crabtree and Town Meeting in 2022, for a pilot program to fund the position. An article has been prepared to seek $100,000 for the SRO position and will likely go before the Town Meeting when it convenes in May. The fund has a balance in excess of $3 million, but the committee has thus far not accessed any of the money, which is under the control of the Finance Committee and Town Meeting.
But for Parlante, that strategy simply wasn’t good enough.
Parlante, who works as a firefighter in Revere and is serving his first term on Town Meeting, called on the committee to reopen its budget and fund an SRO as a line item, as it would a teacher’s salary or any other position. However, School Committee Chair Vincent Serino said the committee could not reopen its budget, having finalized the document in January and submitted it for review by Feb.1, as dictated by the town charter.
Serino and later other committee members said pursuing the SRO through the reserve fund rather than as a line item in the budget meant there was a higher likelihood it would actually come to fruition, as the committee often does not receive the full allocation it requests from the town.
Still, Parlante pressed on, repeatedly lambasting the committee for what he saw as it not making the position a priority. To Parlante, passing the position through Town Meeting via the fund would allow Crabtree to not deliver the funds, a suggestion dismissed as absurd by Serino and other committee members.
Committee members appeared flummoxed and perplexed by Parlante’s comments as he repeatedly argued with Whittredge about how the committee should go about funding the position.
“I don’t understand how you don’t see the difference in it being a priority by putting it into your school budget versus throwing out an [article] that you already know isn’t going to get passed,” he said. “That tells me it’s not a priority to you right now.”
Whittredge noted the likelihood the committee does not receive the full $2.7 million increase over the fiscal year 2024 budget it was asking for and if the committee was forced to make budget cuts, an SRO would be among the first line items to go because of the myriad other needs in the school system.
“Put it in the budget. It gets cut no matter what,” he said.
Committee member John Hatch grew frustrated with the rhetoric from Parlante and noted the difficult decisions the committee was forced to make.
“People get the wrong idea that this committee is against that SROs when we’ve been talking about it for two years,” he said. “Do you know how many SpEd teachers we should have that we don’t? Do you know how many classroom teachers that we need and can’t get? There’s a priority list everywhere. To say one thing’s a priority over another is wrong.”
“We are doing our job,” he continued. “You’re trying to make it apparent… that this committee does not want an SRO or it’s not a priority. If that’s even the realm of truth, we wouldn’t have been talking about it for two years.”
Precinct 7 Town Meeting member Frank Federico, also in his first term, supported Parlante’s push for an SRO to be paid out of the budget.
“I would guess we will be able to find enough for an SRO if we actually go through line by line in the schools and make sure that we’re spending money as efficiently as possible,” he said. “That’s my recommendation to the board.”
Serino noted the committee and school officials have done so — to bring in more teachers.
Attempting to quell the tension, Serino said the committee, the district, the town, and those in the audience were all on the same team, pushing for the same goal.
Later, committee members committed to funding the SRO position if the district received the full $2.7 million budget request over the prior fiscal year, though they also called on Parlante and Federico to support the article seeking access to the reserve fund on the floor of Town Meeting.
