The three motions filed by the parent interveners will be heard on the morning of January 30th, 2012 at the Essex County Probate Court in Salem.  The hearing is scheduled at 8:30AM, although we are told it is unlikely to be on time.

There is no particular need for a large turnout, but the hearing is open to the public and if you are interested to hear the arguments in person it would be worth making the trip.  The courthouse is convenient to the train station in Salem.

Tonight’s Tri-Board meeting to discuss the Trust Administration Order was three hours of minutiae punctuated by a half hour of substantive discussion on the spending policy.  In particular, the italicized phrase in the sentence below:

“The educational uses of the distributed funds shall be determined by the Ipswich School Committee, with preference when feasible for supplemental enrichment programs and uses that provide educational enhancement for Ipswich public school students.”

There was a surprisingly large variety of opinions among members of the three boards as to what was appropriate.  The range went from a suggestion that the School Committee should not, in any way, restrict the potential uses of the funds in the Trust document to suggestions that there should be no leeway for the funds to be used for anything but enhancement and that this could be best enforced by Trustees that are sufficiently independent of the School Committee, possibly through a granting structure as had been discussed in earlier versions of this document.  There was much discussion, but in the end it was up to the 5 members of the School Committee in attendance.  Rachel Roesler moved to strike “with preference when feasible” and this motion failed by a vote of 3-2 (with Jen Bauman joining in the affirmative).  Then Barry moved to strike only “when feasible” and this motion passed 3-2 (with Jeff Loeb and Laura Dietz joining in the affirmative).  It was not clear at the time why those in the affirmative thought that removing only this part of the text would have any substantive effect in practice, since “with preference” and “when feasible” seem to be duplicative.

It would appear that there is no clear consensus on this issue among the three boards, and since we are confident that this trust document is not going to be implemented anyway due to the intervention, there may yet be opportunities to revisit the question with a broader constituency participating.

So while the outcome was not what we had hoped for, we did get one critical thing that we were denied in the decision to sell Little Neck: a public airing of the question, with the cameras rolling, and where members of the boards could be held accountable to the statements made in the meeting.

7:30 in the Selectman’s Meeting Room in Town Hall.  Agenda here.

The School Committee, Selectmen and FinCom will discuss the proposed Trust Administration Order that the court required be revised as part of the agreement for judgment.

Points of interest compared to previous versions of this document are:

* A new policy requiring reinvestment means it will be more difficult to diminish the principal over time (good) , but also reduces the amount that the Feoffees will be able to distribute each year.  Given this change, the School Committee should present their analysis of how much they anticipate the Trust distributing in future years, and how this compares to the additional costs that the school system would have as a result of students from the new year-round residences so that we can see whether there is any money left for “enhancements”.

* The trust document doesn’t give the new trustees any say over the usage of the so-called “additional” $3M of back rent that distinguishes this deal from the original $29.1M deal that the School Committee has opposed for over a year.  This money is committed to be spent “off the top” and is not included in the calculation of the principal of the Trust fund for future generations.

* The primary concern that remains with this document is that it leaves too much control in the hands of School Committee, and only requires funds to be used for enhancement “when feasible” (see Section 3).  Our vision of the way this Trust should work – whether based on cash or land – is more like a foundation that makes grants based on the merits of an application for funds.  Earlier versions of this document hewed closer to this line.  As written, it will be much too easy for these funds to just be absorbed into the school budget over time.

Even though we do not believe this document will ever be put into practice, since the settlement will not go through, this is an important discussion to participate in.  The basic tenets of how the future Feoffees will operate and how funds are distributed are the same whether the asset is land or dollars.