33 p.m. And I'd like to call to order the March 26th, nope. May 26 May 20. It's today May 28th. >> May >> the May 28th >> meeting of the South Orange Maplewood Board of Education. Mr. Bing, would you
please take the roll call? >> Yes, sir. >> Uh we're not Are we live? There's >> We good, guys? >> Great. Uh, board member Jeff Bennett, board member Dedra Brown,
board member Elizabeth Callahan >> here. >> Board member Meredith Higgins >> here. >> Board member Bimmel Capadia >> here. >> Board President Will Meyer
>> here. Board member Melani Nyar, I thought I spoke. >> Board member Shaina Sack Gable >> here. >> Board member Paul Stefan >> here. >> And would you please recall uh Mr.
Bennett, >> board member Jeffrey Bennett >> here. >> Very good. We have a quorum. >> Uh please stand if you are able for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the
republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Adequate notice of this meeting was sent from the office of the secretary of the board first on April 29th, 2026 and then
again on May 26th, 2026 to the Maplewood and South Orange Township clerks and the editors of the news record, Star Ledger, Tap into Soma and the Village Green. The purpose of our meeting tonight is trifold. The board will meet in executive session this evening, just the nine of us, to discuss the evaluation of
our chief school administrator, Superintendent Bing. This is our annual legal obligation, and all board members have invested significant time and thoughtfulness so far in this process. Prior to that, we will have the second of our annual retreats, which is in fact
our fifth during the current school year. Gan Clearary, our field service representative from the New Jersey School Board Association, uh is uh going to be presenting. Regular trainings are an important part of our certification process as well as a useful process as
we fulfill our varied duties as board members. uh as we put our heads together this evening to synthesize our individual evaluations to a consensus document and prepare for our own board self-evaluation. Uh Gan is going to help contextualize the process and review roles and responsibilities of the board.
This will also help prepare us as we look toward the outcome of this evaluative process, the development of next year's board and district goals. Before this, however, we will take up two sign time-sensitive resolutions. One of which is securing paraprofessional services for the summer of 2026 and the
other is approving architectural services for the ongoing remediation of drainage issues at Seth Bdon that has kept one of its gyms offline for multiple years. Uh however, before that I'm going to turn it over to the superintendent for some brief words and then we'll move to our hearing of
individuals and delegates. Thank you, board president Meyer. Just wanted to give a quick update on Maplewood Middle School. I am happy to announce students and staff will be returning to Maplewood Middle School
tomorrow on Friday. Uh, I want to give a very big thank you to our director of facilities, Henry, who has spent 24/7 since Memorial Day weekend when we had a small portion of a ceiling uh fall on the
second floor. Um, he immediately contacted the state, immediately contacted our contractors, uh, worked very closely with our municipality, with our fire department, with our police. Um, we had our state approved contractors in the building
from around 2 pm yesterday to around 2 am last night uh doing the final repairs uh sending out the final uh also air quality test that all came back clean as of this afternoon. Uh we also have the
final inspection approved uh from the state so our students and staff are ready to uh occupy the building come Friday. So very happy to announce that. Okay, we will now move to our hearings of individuals and delegations and we
are having one hearing this evening. Thank you for coming in person or at least joining us online this evening. We value public comment at our board meetings and while we cannot engage in a dialogue with you, we take your comments very seriously and your input will inform our work. Our comment period is
limited to 1 hour and each speaker will have three minutes. Please begin by stating your name and your town. And please note there will be just a single public speaks this evening. Miss Cordell, do we have any in-person public speaks? We do not. Uh I believe we do have one online public speaks. Uh
Rebecca Newberg. >> Person is not present online. >> Understood. Uh that therefore uh concludes this evening's hearing of individuals and delegations. Uh we're now going to move to the action portion of our meeting. Uh on our agenda this
evening is one resolution. Uh resolution 4982. Uh there are parts A and B. Uh 4982A is to approve the um ESS services organization for provision of
paraprofessional services in the summer of 2026. Uh and B is the approval of the uh architect Peret Somjin to uh do the uh project development work for the uh Seth
Bdon drainage project. Uh do I have a motion uh to consider these? Board member Sack Gable. Do I have a second? Board member Stefen. Uh discussion. Board member Higgins. >> You're looking right at me. Um
>> what's that? I thought it would just be helpful to hear kind of the process of how this works. My understanding was, you know, when it when it comes to an architect, there's still the next step of finding a contractor and then scheduling their availability. So, I just thought it would be helpful to hear
like what are the major steps in this process so that I understand and the public understands, you know, those steps. Yeah, I asked Frank to just do a quick sum. Um, obviously, uh, originally the
work was before my time, before Frank's time. Um, this particular company that was chosen has done work in this district previously. Um, we also, uh, they have received high recommendations from other districts. Uh, it's just part of our protocol in regards to uh, making
sure we're we're getting quality folks. Um, for us, uh, aside from Tiffany, I've also worked with this company in other districts. Uh, and Frank has also worked with the company in other districts. So, uh, we know they're very reputable. We did have an incident two weeks ago in
regards to the state disqualifying >> a vendor. So, we wanted to make sure that did not happen. Again, again, that's we went through a co-op system and and that's uh really just a a group of schools uh that work cooperatively to get lower prices for for work across the
state and also qualify uh professional vendors so districts don't have to do it on their own. Um so we did a lot of uh leg work in regards to making sure this current company is qualified uh and certified after two weeks ago. Uh uh and
I think we're in a good place to uh start the work moving forward. Uh and it's about time for Seth Bon. >> Great. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Any other discussion? Board member Na. >> Um Mr. Bing, can you confirm that the um
paraprofessional contract extension is it's through July and it is within the budget that we approved. And so, um, we're going to go out to bid and
we expect to have a new contract in place by August. >> Yeah. So, for us, it just made a little more sense to stick with ESS for the summer. Uh, so we met with them uh last week. um literally within four hours
they sent over an addendum to the current contract which expired June 30th to extend their services through our extended school year. Uh that also will give us a little more wiggle room in regards to uh putting out a uh power bid
uh for the fall. Gives us more of a cushion. Um, so we will put out a we probably well I don't want to say we will uh we just received bids in for our initial uh power bid for the fall. So we we are
looking at those um and we're looking at some other avenues through co-op as well. So we'll make some decisions around if we are going out for a second bid um probably for the next week. But ESS was wonderful to work with and as I
noted within four hours they sent over an addendum and we will have the we will have no gap whatsoever between end of the year and ESY. Any other discussion? Okay. Mr. Mr. Would you please call the
role >> for motion 4982A? >> This is A and B together. >> Board member Bennett. >> Yes. >> Brown. Board member Callahan. >> Yes. >> Board member Higgins.
>> Yes. >> Board member Kapadia. >> Yes. Board President Meyer, >> yes. >> Board member Nar, >> yes. >> And board member Sack Gable, >> yes. >> And board member Stfan,
>> yes. >> Eight affirmed. >> Very good. Motion passes. Uh we will and that concludes the action portion of our meeting. Uh we will now move to the retreat portion of our public meeting which we hold in a conference setting
and is not livereamed. After that session we will uh move into executive session uh and will adjourn immediately thereafter. So we will be saying goodbye to our online viewers at this point. The board will meet again in public session on Thursday, June 11, 2026 at 6:30 p.m.
for a special meeting to present in executive session the CSA evaluation. Action may be taken at that meeting. We will also meet for our regular monthly meeting on Thursday, June 25th, 2026 at 6:30 p.m. Action will be taken. And with
that, we will retire to the conference area.