18 March—People who get their local news from the Waterbury rag will have read or will read only today about last Thursday’s Region 20 school board meeting at which the meconium hit the fan about the board’s ill-conceived 2025-26 budget, which is certain to be aborted by taxpayers in all four of the region’s towns.

Since the Republican-American’s veteran local-area reporter decided with excellent cause to cut ties with Hearst, there’s been no local coverage in what is still called the Republican-American. And the Region 20 board had to ask Hearst management to send a reporter to cover a very important meeting. So a former reporter, now a correspondent (essentially a reporter who’s underpaid for piecework), covered the meeting quite well, even though he (or a typesetter) made board member John Morosani into Moroni, a Mormon prophet.

We suggest that if you want to keep current on local news in the Litchfield area, you should subscribe to Litchfield.bz. You won’t have to wait the better part of a week to know what’s happening. John McKenna is on the spot, on the job, and on time.

On the subject of Region 20, this email was sent last night “on behalf of the R20 BOE” by broadcasts@schoolmessengermail.com, “a notification service used by the nation’s leading school systems to connect with parents, students and staff through voice, SMS text, email, and social media.”

This text was added: “The Region 20 Board of Education cordially invites you to join us for a Special Meeting on Thursday, March 20, 2025 for an appointment to the position of Superintendent. There will be a reception following the meeting and all are welcome.”

Why is the pussycat snarling? Is that a teaser or what? We’ve been informed, if not exactly kept up to date, about the search for a permanent superintendent to replace Chris Leone. But this announcement appears to be a total surprise to everyone not on the R20 BOE. In all events, it’s certainly not the way a school board should conduct itself. Appointment of a superintendent is not a theatrical award. As of this writing, we haven’t heard back from any R20 BOE members we’ve left messages with, so we know bupkes about the possible new superintendent.

Leaving aside the short notice, the timing of the superintendent announcement festivities on 20 March seems like a strategic ploy to draw attention and fire from the irresponsible 2025-26 budget.

This is a link to what’s supposed to be the latest draft of the bloated budget: https://core-docs.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/documents/asset/uploaded_file/1951/RSD_20/5422738/3.15.2025_FY26Budget_DRAFT-Working_Document.pdf

A 16 March email from the R20 BOE announced a virtual community forum Wednesday, 19 March, at 7:00 pm with the Region 20 CFO and acting superintendent “to elicit community input as the district finalizes the proposed FY26 budget.” Don’t forget that community input is usually ignored except as it involves threats to shoot down budgets. And even then, boards and legislative bodies tend to do as they please.

The link to the virtual meeting wasn’t included in the email, but Litchfield.bz provided it: meet.google.com/sku-pjzp-sqr

To participate in the forum by phone, call 1-508-812-8088. The meeting pin number is 620 327 459#

Does Region 20 really need to pay a messenger service to send out emails and texts? And why the hell are the new, overly generous Litchfield town employee contracts retroactive to July 2024? Will we ever read about them in the Waterbury Rag?