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The Westfield News Serving Westfield, Southwick, and the surrounding Hilltowns
www.thewestfieldnews.com THURSDAY, JANUARY 15, 2015
VOL. 84 NO. 013
If you don’t
stand for something you will fall for anything. — MALCOLM X
75 cents
Knapik seeks to consolidate departments
GATEWAY REGIONAL HIGH SCHOOL
Furloughs selected over layoffs at Gateway By PETER FRANCIS Staff Writer HUNTINGTON – After an executive session during last night’s meeting of the Gateway Regional School District’s School Committee, a memorandum of understanding proposed by the Gateway Teachers Association was accepted by the committee and a crisis averted. The GTA proposed a one day furlough for March 9 in order to save the jobs of seven district teachers, who School Superintendent Dr. David Hopson said last month would have to be laid off on January 23 to make up the $241,000 the district would lose as a result of 9C budget cuts to
regional transportation made by Gov. Deval L. Patrick last year totalling $18 million. According to school committee Chair Michele Crane of Blandford, the memorandum comes with some caveats. “If Governor Patrick’s 9C cuts stay in place, the district will not be open on March 9, which was a day the students were going to have conferences, so there weren’t going to be classes anyway,” said Crane. “In exchange for that day, the teachers will get an extra personal day for the next school year.” “If, by some chance, the new Governor restores those 9C cuts before March 9, than the teachers will be paid as normal and
we’ll have conferences,” she continued, in reference to Gov. Charlie Baker, who was sworn in earlier this month. “If they’re restored afterward, they’ll get paid for the day even though they didn’t work it.” While Crane and Hopson have alluded in the past that the immediate restoration of those cuts is unlikely, the school committee also voted to join in on a lawsuit filed by the Massachusetts Association of Regional Schools (MARS) challenging the legality of Patrick’s 9C cuts, which they say were made without first cutting state Chapter 70, which funds the Commonwealth’s schools, See Furloughs, Layoffs, Page 3
By DAN MORIARTY Staff Writer WESTFIELD – Mayor Daniel M. Knapik is requesting the City Council to approve changes of city ordinances to consolidate several city departments and restructure management of a new Department of Public Works Dave Billips, currently the superintendent of the Water Resource Department and interim superintendent of the Public Wo r k s Department, said Wednesday that the consolidation is based on an assessment of the current departmental structure completed in December by Tata & Howard of MAYOR DANIEL M. KNAPIK Marlborough. Knapik hired the consulting firm last August to access the city’s departments currently performing a number of public works related functions to determine if consolidation of those departments would benefit the city. Knapik is seeking City Council approval of an ordinance change to create a Department of Public Works which will “encompass the current Department of Public Works; The Water Resource Department; a portion of the Health Department, as it relates to the (Twiss Street) Transfer Station and the Parks & Recreation Department.” Billips said that the reorganization will also involve moving divisions within the current departmental structure to a more streamlined organizational structure. “What (Tata & Howard) are recommending is consolidation of those departments,” Billips said. “There will still be four divisions, Public See Departments, Page 3
State approves town withdrawal, school district to file suit By PETER FRANCIS Staff Writer HUNTINGTON – Following the ruling earlier this week from the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education approving the town of Worthington’s unilateral withdrawal from the Gateway Regional School District effective July 1, a hilltown counter to that decision is now moving forward. Ruth Kennedy, a Gateway School Committee member from Russell, has filed a lawsuit with the help of Russell Dupere, GRSD’s legal counsel, attempting to halt Worthington’s withdrawal, listing the town as a defendant along with the DESE. At a meeting last night, the School Committee formally joined Kennedy in the suit, and plaintiffs currently include five of the six remaining towns in the district, with the town of Russell still weighing whether or not to jump into the fray. “We’re looking at the towns to come on board and my Select
Board in Russell… they just want answers to questions that just aren’t available” said Kennedy. “‘How long is it going to take? How much is it going to be?’ I don’t know.” Kennedy said that she received a response from Worthington and that she has nine days to respond, while the Office of Attorney General Maura Healey has contacted her, as well asking for an extension until the end of January. “It’s still going forward and active,” said Kennedy, adding that she spoke with state Sen. Benjamin B. Downing and that the Pittsfield Democrat agreed with her assessment of the situation. “He doesn’t understand how DESE can make a legal ruling on whether (Worthington) can withdraw when they are a defendant in a lawsuit,” said Kennedy. “Those are the questions but it is still going forward. Attorney Dupere and I are working together on this See Town Withdrawal, Page 3
Couple charged, man held on bail By CARL E. HARTDEGEN Staff Writer WESTFIELD – A city man appeared in Westfield District Court Tuesday for arraignment in four different cases and was held, in lieu of cash bail, in all four cases. His girlfriend is implicated in at least three of the cases, police report. Det. Anthony Tsatsos reports that on September 29, 2014, Kayla R. Fanion, 24, of 67 Pochassic St., went to an East Main Street rental business with her boyfriend, Roy V. Ramonas Jr., 24, of the Bel Air Motel, 387 Riverdale St., West Springfield, and signed a year-long lease for a Sony Play Station 4 game system valued at $520. Fanion agreed to pay $109.99 each month for 12 months but Tsatsos reports that he found that
Ramonas sold the game system to a city video game store the same day for $220. He reports that the duo returned to the rental store on Oct. 8 when Fanion leased, for $91.99 per month, an X-Box One game system, paying $231.84 by a personal check. The store was notified a few days later that the check had been written on a closed account. Tsatsos found, again, that Ramonas sold the second game system the same day Fanion leased it. He was paid $200 for the game system, Tsatsos reports. Fanion was arraigned in December, in two separate cases, on two charges of larceny of property valued more than $250 and one charge of uttering a false check. She was released on her personal recognizance and is scheduled to return to court on
Feb. 2. Ironically, Feb. 2 is Ramonas’ birthday. Ramonas was arraigned Tuesday for two cases involving the rented games systems and charged with two charges of receiving stolen property valued more than $250 (the two game systems) and for larceny of property valued less than $250. The second charge reflects the loss that the business took when one of the stolen game systems was seized as evidence. The first game system Ramonas allegedly was paid for had been sold by the store before Tsatsos started to look for it. The third larceny the couple apparently staged together was at Fanion’s workplace. Tsatsos reports that Fannion had been employed at a local donut shop where she was working at the drive-up window when
ROY V. RAMONAS Ramonas arrived to make a purchase. Tsatsos reports that he paid for the purchase with a $20 bill but, as another worker told her employer, when she made change “Fanion handed Ramonas multiple $20.00 and $10.00 bills.” See Couple, Page 3
Revamped committees seek to clear backlog By DAN MORIARTY Staff Writer WESTFIELD – Several City Council committees with newly assigned members are attempting to clear back logged issues, some of which have lingered for years. The Finance Committee comprised of At-large Councilor Brent B. Bean II as chairman, Ward 5 Councilor Robert A. Paul Sr., and Ward 6 Councilor Christopher Crean, is meeting at 5:30 p.m. tonight to wade through 15 items on its agenda, mostly transfers within departments, including several to fund accounts from the 2014 and 2013 fiscal years. The most contentious item on the Finance agenda is consideration of increasing a sewer rate. Paul said that the city has to finance the department to continue to expand the system and connect the “dry” sewer lines to the city’s system. Developers have been required by the Planning Board to install a dry sewer line in subdivisions for at least two decades with the idea that the city would eventually connect to those lines as it expanded sewer service. Paul also has suggested that the council institute an “availability” fee for residents who have access to active sewers but who have not connected. That availability fee would not be accessed to residents with dry sewer service. The Legislative & Ordinance Committee is slated to meet at 6 p.m. tonight to discuss two See Committees, Page 3