SAUGUS — The School Committee on Thursday appointed former Saugus High School Principal Michael Hashem to serve as acting superintendent while Superintendent Erin McMahon remains on paid administrative leave, and shot down the budget first proposed by McMahon last month.
McMahon has been on leave since Jan. 17, amid an investigation into potential, unspecified allegations of misconduct. School Committee members repeatedly declined to comment on the status of district leadership or the $32.8 million budget in the two-week period between the announcement of McMahon’s leave and Hashem’s appointment Thursday.
Hashem served as principal of Saugus High School for eight years, before stepping away from the post to return to the classroom as a math teacher in June 2021. He will now take over the leadership of the district for an unknown length of time, while an investigation into McMahon play out. School Committee Vice Chair John Hatch said Hashem, who previously served as acting superintendent in 2016, is a “really valued member of our school district.”
Hatch said he could not comment beyond that.
A statement issued by McMahon following the announcement of her leave alludes to allegations of financial mismanagement, but she said she would “zealously and transparently defend my unblemished professional reputation.”
“The district’s financial records are audited every year by independent CPAs (Certified Public Accountants) who have never reported to me that the school department should change or adjust any practices,” McMahon wrote. “I look forward to assisting in an unbiased review, which I hope will be done efficiently and expeditiously.”
The committee adjourned to executive session for more than 15 minutes at the start of the meeting “for the purpose of conducting a strategy to negotiate non-union personnel rates,” before returning and voting four to one to reject the budget McMahon submitted last month. The rejection was a seemingly swift reversal from the initial discussion the committee had prior to McMahon taking leave, where few questions were asked and no members raised objections.
Committee member Dennis Gould served as the lone “yes” vote on the budget.
Serino, who has met with Town Manager Scott Crabtree at least once since the budget was submitted, led the discussion saying that he “liked” the budget but believed “in reality we don’t have the money for what we’re looking for.” McMahon’s budget represented a $2.5 million increase from the previous year.
“What we need to do is take care of obligations first within the district before we start adding other positions and other needs,” Serino said. “Currently we don’t have the money in the bank to fund this budget.”
Committee member Ryan Fisher said he was supportive of the priorities laid out in the budget, and of the document itself, but believed the committee should take a more staggered approach to voting on the budget, approving pieces of it at a time.
Gould, on the other hand, believed the committee should approve the budget as submitted, with the knowledge that the district would likely be receiving as much or more than $3 million through Chapter 70, the state’s “major program of state aid to public elementary and secondary schools.”
“I did budgets for almost 40 years. You always know money comes in during the 12 months, you don’t have the cash on day one. But when you do a budget as a project manager you budget it like your income’s going to match your output by the year end,” Gould said, noting that the Fiscal Year 23 budget the schools have been operating under represented a decrease from the number first submitted by McMahon and approved by the committee. “You say what the total need is for the school to run it the way you think is proper.”
But, Serino said, if the committee were to approve the budget as is and not receive the amount officials anticipate to get from the state, the district would have to lay off staff.
Hatch said the committee has to be “realistic” and “hopefully over deliver.”
The district’s executive director of finance and administration, Pola Andrews, told the committee that they could vote down the budget and schedule a finance subcommittee meeting to parse its details more closely before re-voting on it.
“The school committee has always had the right to table a budget or to vote no or to come back and ask me to add things, eliminate things,” she said.
Fisher said a finance subcommittee meeting would likely be scheduled for next week to review the budget. Should the School Committee pass a budget, it would have to win approval from the Finance Committee before it goes to the Town Meeting for a final vote.