"Stop the Heidcamp Report," Cry Certain Board Members! For the last 17-weeks I’ve questioned the behavior of and made certain assertions about Superintendent Rhau and other administrative personnel. I’ve also furnished evidence in the form of documents to substantiate my claims. Although repeated requests have been made for Board President Buono to investigate the allegations and provide the public with answers, to date (and with the exception of a motion to review Rhau’s vouchers each month) absolutely nothing has been done to address these issues by either Buono or his cronies.. Instead, two board members complained to the Saugerties Post Star that they want the Heidcamp Report stopped! They claim that I’ve threatened them when I told them that I will not go away until I get answers, and that I’ve bullied them when I’ve opined or asked a question. Of course their arguments are based on opinion rather than fact. Asking a board member a question about the way he voted on an issue or offering my opinion is neither bullying nor threatening. It seems pretty obvious to me that they’d rather ignore the problems than fix them. They obviously subscribe to the "shoot the messenger" theory. Board members who’d like to shut me up are sadly mistaken if they feel that by silencing the Heidcamp Report or having their friends (such as James Harris) write critical letters-to-the-editor will achieve their goal. On the contrary, it will only make me work just that much harder. I repeat once again: I feel very strongly that I’ve raised serious concerns about Rhau’s actions and also feel that Buono has an obligation to address these concerns. Most importantly, an overwhelming number of people concur. The public has a right to real answers instead of representatives who insist upon burying their heads in the sand, ignoring unpleasant or hard-to-handle issues. The public wants and deserves checks and balances as well as accountably in the administration.   Is the Tail Wagging the Dog? For example, the reader will recall the issue where 585 recorded calls were made by Rhau on the District cell phone. Of those calls, 479 were made to numbers either out of town or state, such as California, West Virginia, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Georgia, but mostly to New Jersey, where Rhau has a home. Most of the out-of-state calls were made after school or ordinary business hours, leading me to conclude that Rhau has been using the District cell phone primarily for personal use and only secondarily for business purposes. Since we are paying these phone bills, it seems appropriate that we know just whom he is calling. To ascertain answers to these questions, I submitted a FOIL request and asked for a breakdown of those 585 calls to determine which are District business and which are for personal use. After waiting a month for that information (which is kept in a file cabinet less then 20-feet from Rhau’s office), I was finally told that they have no way of telling which calls were made for business or which were made for personal reasons. Now that is a problem! Once again, a lack of checks and balances and accountability are evident. Where is Buono? Does he know? If not, why isn’t he questioning Rhau about all these calls? I’ve actually been told that certain board members (who shall remain nameless for now) have no problem with Rhau making all these calls since, in their estimation, he is not going over allotted minutes anyway. But, the point is not whether Rhau is abusing the time allowance, it is the fact that the phone was provided to him at our expense primarily for "District business," with a noted exception of "reasonable personal" calls; not the other way around. I’ve also been advised that Rhau now wants to give the District cell phone and District credit card back to the District and use his own personal credit card and cell phone instead and then submit a bill for reimbursement. Personal bills, of course are not subject to public scrutiny under the Freedom of Information Law, so his expenditures would not be subject to the same review as they have been thus far. In other words, expenditures relating to, say, a trip to Orlando, would probably be lumped together and vague, and we would never know whether he ordered cashews or peanuts from room service. Very interesting. For another example, I submitted a request through FOIL to review any and all records, illustrating Superintendent Rhau’s requests to the Board to attend any and all conferences, seminars, and workshops, including any information brought back the Superintendent and shared with the Board for the period from June 1, 2004 to date. I‘ve been advised that no minutes nor record exist. I also requested any and all minutes indicating approval by the Board of Education of the vouchers for Rhau’s trips to conferences, seminars, workshops, meetings, etc., outside of the District from June 1, 2004 to date. Again, I was advised that no minutes nor records exist. I realize that some of the issues that I’ve addressed are contractual, I’m merely pointing out to the public how some of our money is being spent and the fact that there are absolutely no checks and balances or accountably by the Administration to the Board of Education (they are supposed to be the representatives for our side). It certainly appears that the tail is wagging the dog in the Saugerties Central School District. Another pressing issue is Assistant Superintendent Cheryl Nuciforo (a non-resident), who is paid over $100,000 annually, plus $10,000 in cash each year for her health insurance buy-out. She is also reimbursed 44.5 cents a mile each and every time she leaves the high school parking lot on District business. According to records obtained through FOIL, she has been paid over $900 for mileage. Again, I understand this is contractual, but when I see children going without books, teachers working without a contract for more than two years, and $400,000 cut from the budget, seeing Nuciforo charging the District more than 62-cents to drive down Washington Avenue to the Cahill School and back is a hard pill to swallow.   It’s All About the Kids, Isn’t It? Perhaps, in the spirit of cooperation, Rhau could cut back on some of those lunches at Chowhound and Applebee’s and Nunciforo could give some of that mileage money back to help save up for some textbooks for the children. After all, don’t they always tell the public it’s "all about the kids?" Hopefully, by the time this article appears in the newspaper, the School Board will have already voted to replace the Board President. If so, I will sit back for a while and give the new leadership the benefit of the doubt that they will make the necessary changes and corrections to make the administration more accountable, and the chance to do it. Time will tell... Stand by................ Visit my web-site www.saugertieswatchdog.com . George D. Heidcamp, Sr. July 6, 2006