NK school district ends state of emergency | News | independentri.com - The Independent

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NORTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. — In another sign of the district coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, the North Kingstown School Committee voted unanimously Tuesday night to rescind the district’s Superintendent’s Emergency Authority ordinance, which had been in place since March 24, 2020, which granted Superintendent Phil Auger additional powers under both Rhode Island and the Town of North Kingstown’s state of emergency declarations.

“If you think back to sort of our darkest times, we gave the superintendent some emergency authority due to the difficulty in having public meetings and all the uncertainty that was going on at the time,” School Committee Chairman Greg Blasbalg said. “Thankfully, while we are not out of the woods yet, conditions have certainly improved drastically to the point that I think that emergency authority is no longer necessary because we are able to get together, have public meetings and make any kind of approval that we might need.”

Blasbalg said the decision was in no way a rebuttal of Auger or the district’s handling of the pandemic, rather a housekeeping measure as the 2020-21 school year draws to a close.

Tuesday night’s meeting, the second to last before the final day of school on June 24, was very brief, lasting under 15 minutes as the School Committee moved quickly through a short agenda, which also included the unanimous approval of the appointment of current North Kingstown High School Dean of Students Kathie DeLuca to be the next Wickford Middle School Assistant Principal. DeLuca was the top choice of the selection team, which consisted of Wickford Middle School Principal Alison Palladino, Assistant Superintendent Denise Mancieri and Director of Human Resources Brian Lally, who served as principal of the school before taking on his current role in March. 

“We are really pleased that this is another example of the North Kingstown School District being able to successfully grow our administrative team from within our own ranks,” Auger said, adding she had “the perfect background and experience” for the job.

The committee also unanimously denied a grievance by the National Education Association North Kingstown (NEANK), the union representing the district’s educators, on the use of an evaluation tool as a force of discipline. They unanimously approved a decision to approve the bid for $1,732,866 by Narragansett’s Martone Service Co. to complete the remaining bond projects for 2021 from the initiative approved by voters in 2018, namely adding intake air ventilation to the system at Hamilton Elementary School. 

“There were five total vendors at the pre-bid hearing (and) only one decided to bid on it,” NKSD Chief Operating Officer Mary King said, adding the buildings committee recommended going with the Martone bid and that she trusts the firm from the work they did replacing windows and doors at Davisville Middle School last summer. 

“That was one of the best projects that we’ve had here since I started here,” King said, praising Martone for their “seamless” work that stood out among a plethora of good contractors.

The next North Kingstown School Committee meeting, the final meeting of the 2020-21 school year, is scheduled for June 22 at 7 p.m. in the North Kingstown High School Auditorium. 

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NK school district ends state of emergency | News | independentri.com - The Independent
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