Kate Fratti Fallout

According to two items from Kate Fratti's BCCT blog, former Morrisville school board member, and current Bucks County NAACP president Jon Jordan will address the Morrisville School Board at its regular meeting on Jan. 23. Meeting begins at 7:30.

Oh, and before I forget, she mentioned something about last night's meeting. Thanks, Kate...your integrity's welcome in Morrisville, and it's much larger than the combined integrity of the two members you mentioned. I don't think you experienced a "pencil malfunction", but the inevitable result that comes from crossing over into this side of the Twilight Zone.

A mea culpa

It’s not easy to stand up for yourself, and especially not when you have to do it before a roomful of people, but that’s what Beth Yonson, superintendent of Morrisville schools did last week.

Said she had no choice holding up a copy of my column in which I’d opined that she wasn’t playing fair with school board members. I based that on board members’ public allegations that her administration never notified them of an important budget deadline.

“It wasn’t advantageous,” Marilys Mihok said, and Gloria Heater agreed, for the administration to let elected officials know they had until just Jan. 3, to cap any budget increase to just 4.4 percent. It is why a special meeting had to be called quickly for Jan. 2, and with very short notice to members. No administrators or even the solicitor attended.

The cap, which the board eventually did approve at the special meeting, means the board has closed the door on asking for any special exceptions even in the event of financial emergency.

Thing is, whether or not Yonson liked the idea of the cap — she doesn’t because she believes the board could hold an increase to 4.4 or below without a legal resolution that could hamstring it — she not only notified them of the resolution deadline but publicly discussed it at length.

Last week, she used her superintendent’s report to replay a meeting tape showing that. She said she didn’t mean to embarrass anyone, just to defend her reputation.
“My integrity is important to me,” she said.

Mine, too. And so I apologize to Dr. Yonson for not checking the physical record before taking board members at their word even at a public meeting.
For their part, members Mihok and Heater accused this columnist of fabricating any statement about being hoodwinked by administrators. Heater said I must have misunderstood. Mihok advised the superintendent to grow a “thicker skin.”

Me, too, I guess.

Integrity is not important to everyone.