Participants
Every member on the draft minutes’ masthead, marked present or absent from the minutes’ roll call, plus the administrators and guests who appear in the record. There were no citizens’ comments. Names follow the draft minutes; the transcript’s renderings are noted where they differ.
| Name | Role | Participation |
|---|
| Arlene Hawkins | Chair (elected at this meeting); Claremont member | Nominated by Crawford, seconded by Whitney per the minutes; presided from 0:01:06; raised the electronic check signature and the missing treasurer; continues as policy subcommittee chair. Rendered “Holly Hawkins” once. |
| Rocco Ruggeri | Vice chair (elected at this meeting); Unity member | Nominated by Sprague; volunteered to review and sign vouchers; reported the Unity withdrawal vote. Rendered “Mr. Jerry” and “Mr. Ruggieri”. |
| Candace Crawford | Treasurer (elected at this meeting); Claremont member | Nominated Hawkins; questioned the auditor on purchase orders, journal entries, missing deposit records and late payments; checked the SAU’s projected surplus. |
| Heather Whitney | Member; Claremont board chair | Seconded the chair and vice-chair nominations and moved the agenda and the December 12, 2024 minutes (per the minutes); asked about stale-dated checks; nominated Crawford and Madden; moved to refer the background-check amendment to Claremont’s policy committee; moved the nonpublic session. |
| Frank Sprague | Member; superintendent-evaluation subcommittee chair | Nominated Ruggeri; asked about repeat findings; argued the background-check amendment belonged in Claremont policy JLIF; reported the evaluation instrument. |
| William “Bill” Madden | Member | Elected a voucher signer; joined the superintendent-evaluation subcommittee. The minutes credit him with the question on volunteers’ background checks, which the dialogue file assigns to Sprague (1:35:22). |
| Loren Howard | Member | Seconded the treasurer and voucher-signer nominations (“My timid second”) and the sealing motion; joined the policy subcommittee; moved adjournment (per the minutes). |
| Michael Petrin | Member | Present per the minutes, which record him seconding the December 12 minutes and the nonpublic motion. Not identified as a speaker in the dialogue file. |
| Marjorie Erickson | Member (Unity) | Absent (draft minutes). |
| Atonya Hart | Member (Unity) | Absent (draft minutes). Discussed as a possible evaluation-subcommittee member (1:41:14). |
| Shannon Popescu | Member (Unity) | Absent (draft minutes). |
| Noelle Kronberg | SAU 6 board clerk | Called the roll and the nonpublic roll call (addressed as “Miss Cronenberg”); recorded the minutes. |
| Christopher Pratt | Superintendent, SAU 6 | Called the meeting to order and ran the election of the chair; supported the Strengthening Families presentation; addressed district cell phones, fire-rated filing cabinets and volunteer background checks. |
| Mary Henry | Business Administrator, SAU 6 | Introduced the auditor; answered most of the audit questions; specified the signatories she needed; walked the year-to-date financial report. |
| Michael Campo | Auditor, Plodzik & Sanderson (attending by video) | Presented the audit status from 0:04:10 to 0:29:48. His connection dropped at 0:15:43 and again during the journal-entry question at 0:22:02; see flag 7. Rendered “Classic and Sanderson”, “Mr. Campbell” and “Mr. King”. |
| Matthieu A.F. Fortier, Q.D.D.P., C.E.S.P. | Strengthening Families Initiative Coordinator, TLC Family Resource Center (spelling and title per the minutes; “Matthew Fortier” in his own introduction and the dialogue file) | Presented the Strengthening Families needs assessment (Exhibit A), 0:32:53 to 0:58:54. |
| “Bonnie” | Former SAU 6 treasurer (first name only on the recording) | Not present. The chair: “remember Bonnie was the treasurer, and you were going to talk with her about signing things.” The June 12, 2025 draft minutes add that “the previous treasurer and the electronic signature is a former Board member”. |
Agenda
Items as reproduced in the draft minutes. The SAU 6 agenda itself is not in this meeting’s public folder; see flag 3.
| Taken up | Item | Agenda text / disposition |
|---|
| 0:00:03 | I. Call to order and Pledge (Pratt) | “I’d like to call the April 10th Siu six [SAU 6] school board to order.” |
| 0:00:33 | II.a Election of chair | “The first order of business tonight is to reorganization and to elect a board chair for the Sussex [SAU 6] School Board.” Crawford nominated Hawkins; Whitney seconded per the minutes; voice vote at 0:01:01, “all present voting in favor” per the minutes. |
| 0:01:22 | II.b Election of vice chair | Sprague: “Like to nominate Rocco for vice chair.” On the recording the chair says “I’ll second that” (0:01:25); the minutes record Whitney as seconder. Voice vote, all in favor. |
| 0:01:38 | III. General business: roll call, agenda, minutes, citizens’ comments | Minutes: present Crawford, Howard, Madden, Petrin, Sprague, Ruggeri, Whitney, Hawkins; absent Erickson, Hart, Popescu. At 0:02:11 the chair: “We have the agenda in our packet for tonight’s meeting.” Agenda approved at 0:02:24 (Whitney, Crawford per the minutes). The December 12, 2024 minutes, 119 days old, approved at 0:03:00 (Whitney, Petrin per the minutes): “Any corrections to the minutes from December 12th, 2024? Seems like a long time ago.” Citizens’ comments: none. |
| 0:03:00 | IV. “SAU 2020 Audit Recommendations- Plodzik and Sanderson, CPA” | The report discussed was FY2021; Henry at 0:31:44: “Should have said 2021. And I just got 2022.” Treasurer and two voucher signers elected inside this item, 0:16:12 to 0:17:45. See flags 1, 2 and 10. |
| 0:32:35 | V.1 Strengthening Families needs assessment (Exhibit A) | “a presentation by Matt Fortier from TLC Family Resource Center.” Discussion only. Exhibit A is not in any public folder located. |
| 0:59:11 | V.2 Financial report (Exhibit B): “Up to Date FY 2025 detailed review of actual to budgeted and specific line items” | “Miss Henry has provided us with the year to date financials.” Line-by-line review; discussion only. Exhibit B is not in any public folder located. |
| 1:20:06 | V.3 Unity town vote | “Moving along now, we have from Mr. Jerry [Ruggeri] the unity town vote.” Last day in SAU 6: June 30, 2026. Minutes, under Other Business: “State approved Unity’s separation”. |
| 1:22:03 | V.4 Subcommittee appointments | Hawkins continues as policy chair, joined by Howard; Sprague continues as superintendent-evaluation chair, joined by Madden, and will ask a Unity member. |
| 1:25:29 | V.5.a Policy: GBCD, Background Investigation and Criminal History Records Check (revision) | A superintendent-proposed addendum on offenders against children. Whitney moved at 1:34:48 to have the Claremont policy committee update JLIF instead; Sprague seconded; voice vote at 1:36:50, all in favor per the minutes. See flag 12. |
| 1:37:05 | V.5.b Superintendent evaluation | Sprague reported the instrument finished; Howard and Madden ineligible to complete it; target of May 1 for the board survey. |
| 1:41:29 | VI. Nonpublic session, RSA 91-A:3, II (a & j) | Whitney moved at 1:41:51; the recording has Crawford seconding, the minutes Petrin; roll call at 1:42:20. Minutes: entered 8:12 p.m.; out at 8:38 p.m.; “Heather Whitney made a motion to seal the minutes for 1 year, Loren Howard seconded the motion; roll call vote taken by Noelle Kronberg, all present voting in favor”. See flags 4, 5 and 11. |
| | VII. Future dates and agenda items | Not on the recording. Minutes: Claremont board 4/16/2025 and 5/7/2025; Unity board 5/13/2025; future agenda item “Continued audit presentations (2021-2024) timeline prior to June 2026”. |
| | VIII. Other business: meeting dates for 2025–26 | Not on the recording. Minutes: “Consensus to meet on an as-need basis”; “State approved Unity’s separation”. |
| | IX. Adjournment | Minutes: “Loren Howard made a motion to adjourn, Frank Sprague seconded the motion”. Not on the recording. |
Discussion timeline
Chronological topics. Quotations are from the dialogue transcript as transcribed; bracketed text is an insertion or correction, and an ellipsis joins rows the diarizer split or marks an omission.
| Time | Topic | What was said | Flags |
|---|
| 0:00:33 | Reorganization | Crawford nominated Hawkins; Sprague nominated Ruggeri; both carried by voice vote. Hawkins at 0:01:38: “We’ve become quite the team.” No treasurer or secretary was elected at this point; the treasurer came later, inside the audit item. | POSITIVE |
| 0:03:32 | The FY2022 draft arrives that afternoon | Henry: “we received fiscal year 22 audit today for review for saw [SAU].” “I just got it this afternoon from Mike, which is good.” The findings, she said, are “all going to be the same, like Mike and I have talked to or spoken about, until we get to a point where I’m here and things are different.” | MEDIUM |
| 0:04:10 | Campo: turnover in the finance office | “One of the biggest challenges we’ve had is that we’ve had different renditions of the management team in place.” At 0:04:35: “with each change, there’s the disconnect of some things as simple as where invoices kept”. “We’re obviously we have a few years we have to get through.” | MEDIUM |
| 0:04:56 | Where each fiscal year stood | FY2022: “I actually pushed pushed extra hard to make sure that draft got there before tonight’s meeting for the 22 audit.” “We want to make sure at least we’re both comfortable with the numbers before we start any field work on 23.” FY2023, at 0:05:22: “the goal is to be into 23 before the end of the month.” FY2024, at 0:07:41: “we haven’t actually looked at 24 yet.” At 0:07:20, on the FY2021 report: “even though it’s carrying a 24 issuance date, this is going back to 21”. At 0:05:43: “where we’re looking at 2025 mere two months away”. | MEDIUM |
| 0:06:04 | The electronic signature and the missing treasurer | Hawkins: “Under the under the treasurer signing the check registers. It says an electronic signature is being used.” “remember Bonnie was the treasurer, and you were going to talk with her about signing things.” Henry at 0:08:01: “No Bonnie has not. So I need to get with Bonnie.” Hawkins at 0:08:08: “We we need a treasurer.” Asked at 0:10:26 who the electronic signature is: “I have to look and see what that electronic. Right now it’s who’s on the bank account. So I would have to look to see who that is.” At 0:11:47: “I have it set so that the only signature you can use is that signature in the system.” | MEDIUM |
| 0:06:36 | Campo on review of the check register | “you guys are a little bit unique because you don’t necessarily meet on a regular basis”. At 0:06:58: “At the very least, the treasurer should be reviewing the check registers to make sure that they’re reasonable. It gives you that extra layer of oversight that the RSA is looking for”. He did not name the statute. | MEDIUM |
| 0:08:42 | Vouchers no one was reviewing | Henry: “you guys should be looking at the vouchers as well. So, we need to implement that where you guys would get copies of those vouchers.” At 0:09:04: “The board should review those.” Campo at 0:09:21: “designating at least two individuals to go in, see the actual manifest, review the invoices, make sure that they are lining up with what’s on the manifest and then sign off.” At 0:09:41: “I tell my staff if if you don’t document it, it didn’t happen.” | MEDIUM POSITIVE |
| 0:11:56 | Repeat findings: “we’re talking 2021” | Sprague: “we’re talking 2021. So this doesn’t affect this this administration at all.” Campo at 0:12:35: “The challenge here is that we’re talking about four years ago when we look at this. And the problem is that some of these just continued because of the lack of continuity in the finance department.” At 0:12:57: “your your governance letter and management letter are very similar in the 22 audit as well.” Hawkins at 0:13:26: “So just to clarify, it will get better. These findings will go away.” Henry: “It’s better already.” | MEDIUM |
| 0:13:36 | Stale-dated checks and cash reconciliation | Campo at 0:13:55: “on an annual basis, you’re adding more stale data [dated] checks.” “It gives you a really bad, bad, bad idea of where your cash stands”. At 0:14:40: “one of the challenges that we’ve had is the lack of reconciliations in general.” At 0:14:59: “That really should be done on the monthly basis. They were doing like a year’s worth a year and a half worth.” Henry at 0:15:26: the amounts are not big “because we don’t make out huge tax [checks]”, and “some of them were duplicate checks to where they just weren’t voided.” | MEDIUM |
| 0:15:43 | The auditor drops off; the board elects signatories | “Did we lose them?” The chair at 0:16:12: “So we can actually nominate while we’re waiting to get Mr. Campo back.” Ruggeri: “I’ll do it.” Carried at 0:16:40. Crawford as treasurer, Howard seconding (“My timid second”), carried at 0:17:00. Henry at 0:17:28: “I need one person to sign checks and then I need two people from your board other than your treasurer to sign the voucher.” Madden elected at 0:17:45. Hawkins at 0:18:18: “So it’ll be Rocco and Bill Madden. Those will be your other two signatures.” | POSITIVE |
| 0:19:29 | The target: all audits done before Unity leaves | Hawkins at 0:19:52: “it would be helpful if we could have all the audits, and it sounds like it might happen so that as my family used to say, you put the bow on the package, it’s all done.” Henry: “And unity is up to 22 as well. So, yes, that is the plan.” When Campo reconnected, the chair repeated it at 0:20:26: “we’re optimistic and hopeful that all of the audits will be completed by then.” No answer from Campo is on the recording; Henry: “That’s his goal as well.” | MEDIUM OBSERVATION |
| 0:20:47 | Crawford works through the findings | Purchase orders at 0:21:37: “I see purchase orders were not created or attached to invoices for cash disbursements.” Henry: “Nothing is ordered without a purchase order.” Journal entries at 0:22:02: “Would you agree that this is unusual?” The next Campo row begins mid-procedure. Henry at 0:23:13: “there are times when we are busy and I will enter journal entries on my own and not have someone else enter them for me”, while at 0:23:36 “my staff accountant is not able to process her own entries.” | OBSERVATION |
| 0:24:27 | Deposit records that could not be found | Crawford: “supporting documentation for all deposits could not be located. What is the implication here?” Campo at 0:25:07: “the building also went through some major renovations, and I think some records were shifted. And frankly, I think some of them were lost.” Henry at 0:25:29: “Everything is scanned into our system.” At 0:25:55: “But that started in 24 because I got here in July 1st of 23.” | MEDIUM |
| 0:26:02 | Late payments, unclaimed grants, no cash | Henry at 0:26:27: “I had to go back and claim almost two years worth of grants to get the money in. We had cash flow issues. We were working off a spreadsheet.” At 0:28:39, on transfers from the districts: “Someone would call it the bank, say move this money. We do checks now”. At 0:29:01: “more so Claremont did not claim their grants. Unity doesn’t have as much. But when you’re talking millions of dollars in grants and Esser [ESSER] funds that weren’t claimed until two years later, that’s it’s a snowball effect”. | MEDIUM |
| 0:30:18 | “Rip the Band-Aid off” | Henry: “Their firm is also pushing to get this done.” At 0:30:39: “if I could have a month straight, I would just to get it, just rip the Band-Aid off and be done.” Hawkins at 0:31:08: “It’s nice to finally start having our head coming up from underwater.” Henry at 0:31:14: “I am so looking forward to doing the Doe [DOE-25] this year and having real numbers”. | |
| 0:31:29 | The agenda named the wrong year | Crawford: “our agenda says it’s the SA 2020 audit recommendations.” Henry: “Should have said 2021. And I just got 2022.” Crawford at 0:31:47: “I did get the 2020 review also in our packet. Okay we cancel that meeting. So that was also ready.” The minutes: “there was a previous agenda item for 2020 and the report was received, but the meeting was cancelled”. Henry at 0:32:28: once she accepts FY2022 “I will have it sent over to you and it won’t say draft on it anymore.” | MEDIUM MEDIUM |
| 0:33:28 | Fortier: a Claremont needs assessment | “there’s a grant that exists from New Hampshire Children’s Trust to create my position”. At 0:34:48: “my program is specifically Claremont”. Phase one interviewed community leaders and surveyed educators through the superintendent; phase two surveyed parents. At 0:41:37: after a district-wide email, “the very next day I had over 1500 responses.” After removing duplicates prompted by a $20 gift card, at 0:43:13: “we still had a eight over 800 unique responses”. | |
| 0:45:58 | Parenting as the second struggle | “The second most frequent reported struggle is parenting”. At 0:48:03: “I was able to do a t test comparing the two groups.” Parents who named parenting asked for community events and child care. His response, at 0:51:26: family cafes, “I host it with a free meal”. Pratt at 0:54:49 offered district channels. Asked whether families from other sending towns could come, at 0:57:33: “I’m going to say that they can come.” | |
| 0:59:35 | The SAU’s year-to-date report | Henry, on the exhibit: “as of right now, I know this bottom line says 205. It’s actually 212,000, just so you know.” She had updated copies at 0:59:20: “I have updated ones if you want them.” Line items: the out-of-district coordinator carried in Claremont’s budget this year; a mileage line budgeted at $1,250 against an agreement of $2,500 (1:09:28); fire-rated filing cabinets; two Claremont bills paid by the SAU to be billed back. At 1:13:19: “we haven’t had a meeting in a while”. | |
| 1:18:32 | The projected surplus | Crawford: “We’re to the good 205,000. That can be attributed to one person not in this budget.” At 1:19:18: “we should be to the good for about 100,000.” At 1:19:45: “It’s still going to be to the good 150,000.” Henry: “I would say that. Yes. Confidently. Yes.” The minutes record “about $100,000”. | OBSERVATION |
| 1:20:12 | Unity’s withdrawal | Ruggeri: “March 15th … 2025, the unity annual budget was presented to the town where the Warren [warrant] article, asking the town to vote on movie [moving] with a drawing [withdrawing] from saw six was presented and passed.” At 1:20:31: “the last day that unity will be part of saw six will be June 30th, 2026.” At 1:21:10: “there’s every bit of interest to maintain and improve that.” Hawkins at 1:21:39: “We are working to get the audits completed.” | OBSERVATION |
| 1:26:26 | The background-check amendment | Hawkins: a revision “to include anyone who is classified as an offender against children to keep them off of school grounds and any place there is a school sponsored event”, needing no second reading “because it’s already in place.” Sprague at 1:27:54: “Claremont has a policy. JLIF which is the receipt and use of sex offender registry information”. At 1:28:23: “I’m not objecting to the content. I just think we’re attaching it to the wrong policy.” At 1:28:58: “I just think it’s very nobody’s going to find it.” Hawkins at 1:29:02: “The reason we did this and in bringing it forward for revision is for expediency.” | POSITIVE |
| 1:34:48 | Referred to the Claremont policy committee | Whitney: “I’d like to make a motion to instead of approving this policy to task the Claremont Policy Committee to make a priority of updating policy … JLL … I f [JLIF] to include the relevant language.” At 1:35:22: “do we ever do background checks on volunteers?” Pratt: “Yeah, legally we have to.” Hawkins at 1:35:56: “we can look through the RSA and see how it’s stated in the RSA”. Carried at 1:36:50. | POSITIVE |
| 1:37:05 | Superintendent evaluation | Sprague: “I’ve finished the superintendent’s evaluation instrument.” “Lauren [Loren] and Bill, you you are ineligible to, to take to take it because you haven’t been on the board long enough”. On timing at 1:39:17: “I think it’s actually June, to be honest with you.” On a Unity member at 1:41:14: “I reach out to a Tanya, I think she’s. Yeah. I don’t want to. She’s got enough.” | OBSERVATION |
| 1:41:29 | Into nonpublic; the recording stops | Hawkins: “item number seven is a request for a non public session under RSA 91-83A [91-A:3] colon three comma two a and J.” Whitney at 1:41:51: “I make a motion to move into nonpublic per RSA 91-8 [91-A:3] colon, three comma Roman numeral two A and a [J].” The chair: “Did you get that, Noel?” Roll call at 1:42:20. At 1:42:28: “So we will wrap up our public meeting after this non public session.” | MEDIUM OBSERVATION POSITIVE |
Items flagged for review
These flags are a reviewer’s aid. They are not findings of violation and not legal advice. Each flag cites the rule it rests on; an Observation rests on no confirmed rule.
MEDIUM The SAU had no treasurer, checks carried a scanned signature no one in the room could name, and no one was reviewing vouchers
RSA 194-C:5, I requires the SAU board to meet between April 1 and June 1 each year and “organize by choosing a chairperson, a secretary, and a treasurer.” Going into this meeting the board had no treasurer: the chair said “We we need a treasurer” (0:08:08), and the minutes record that “the SAU Board currently has no treasurer”. Checks printed with an electronic signature belonging to “who’s on the bank account”, and asked who that was, the business administrator said “I would have to look to see who that is” (0:10:32). No one was reviewing the check register or the vouchers (0:08:42). The auditor recommended that the treasurer review the check registers and that two designees review and initial the manifests and invoices. RSA 194-C:4, II(a) lists “audits, and coordination with the treasurer” among the SAU’s administrative services. RSA 197:23-a, which gives a school district treasurer custody of district money, is cited only as the district-level analogue. Follow-up: the June 12, 2025 draft minutes record that the previous treasurer and the electronic signature belonged to “a former Board member” and that the signatory for the electronic signature cannot be a board member. The board filled the office at this meeting; see flag 10.
Sources: RSA 194-C:5, I (1996, 298:3; text read 2026-09-25); RSA 194-C:4, II(a) (2010, 5:2; text read 2026-09-25); RSA 197:23-a (district analogue only); 4.10.25 draft minutes, item IV; 6.12.25 draft minutes, item III.2.
MEDIUM Audit status on April 10, 2025: FY2020 received but never presented, FY2021 before the board, FY2022 in draft that afternoon, FY2023 not started, FY2024 not looked at
FY2020: the report was distributed, but the meeting set to receive it was cancelled (“Okay we cancel that meeting”, 0:31:47). FY2021: the report before the board, mislabeled “2020” on the agenda. Campo called it “four years ago” and said findings “just continued because of the lack of continuity in the finance department” (0:12:35); the report itself carried a 2024 issuance date (0:07:20). FY2022: the draft reached the business administrator that afternoon, and “your your governance letter and management letter are very similar in the 22 audit as well” (0:12:57). FY2023: “the goal is to be into 23 before the end of the month.” FY2024: “we haven’t actually looked at 24 yet.” The findings discussed were substantive: stale-dated checks accumulating yearly, cash reconciliations done a year or more at a time, deposit records “lost” in a renovation, and late payments traced to grants Claremont had not claimed for two years (0:29:01). The board’s target, carried into the minutes, was “Continued audit presentations (2021-2024) timeline prior to June 2026.”
Why MEDIUM, not HIGH. No statute in force in April 2025 required an SAU to be audited by a deadline. RSA 21-J:19 is permissive and names towns, school districts and village districts, not SAUs; RSA 194-C:4, II(a) lists audits among the SAU’s administrative services without a date. The law has since changed: 2026 N.H. Laws ch. 272 (SB 586), approved July 2, 2026, eff. July 1, 2026, reenacts RSA 198:4-d so that ¶VI requires school administrative units to be audited by an independent public accountant and ¶VIII requires the audit report “within 9 months of the end of the fiscal year”. It does not apply to this meeting. If SAU 6 spent $750,000 or more in federal awards in a fiscal year beginning before October 1, 2024, 2 CFR 200.501 would require a single audit and 2 CFR 200.512(a)(1) would set the reporting deadline at the earlier of 30 days after the auditor’s report or nine months after year end. The record does not show SAU 6’s federal expenditure level, so this is stated conditionally.
Sources: RSA 21-J:19 (permissive; 2008, 174:1); RSA 194-C:4, II(a); 2026 N.H. Laws ch. 272 (SB 586), RSA 198:4-d, VI and VIII (eff. July 1, 2026; later law, context only); 2 CFR 200.501 and 2 CFR 200.512(a)(1) (conditional; $750,000 threshold for fiscal years beginning before Oct. 1, 2024); 4.10.25 draft minutes, item IV and future agenda items; Valley News, Jan. 2, 2026 (reporting, not law).
MEDIUM The meeting’s public folder holds another body’s agenda; the SAU 6 agenda and every document discussed were not posted
This meeting’s packet folder, “19. CSB 4.10.25” in the Claremont 2025 archive, holds one file, “CSB Agenda 4.10.25.pdf”. It is not the SAU 6 agenda. It is a Claremont School Board agenda for the same evening: call to order at 6:15 PM, one action item, “Youth & Government Overnight Trip (Vote)”, and adjournment at 6:30 PM. The SAU 6 agenda existed (“We have the agenda in our packet for tonight’s meeting”, 0:02:11) and is reproduced in the draft minutes, but no copy was located in the Claremont folder or the SAU 6 Schoolboard Packets share, which has no folder for this date. Nor were the documents the board worked from posted: the FY2021 audit report members read from line by line, the FY2020 report, Exhibit A (the needs-assessment slides) and Exhibit B (the year-to-date report, updated copies of which were handed out in the room). RSA 91-A:2, II requires notice of the time and place of a meeting, not an agenda or packet, and RSA 91-A:4 governs access to records on request. The gap is findability: a resident looking for this meeting’s business finds a different board’s agenda.
Sources: folder 19. CSB 4.10.25; CSB Agenda 4.10.25.pdf (read 2026-09-25); RSA 91-A:2, II; RSA 91-A:4.
MEDIUM Nonpublic minutes sealed for one year with no statutory finding recorded
RSA 91-A:3, III makes disclosure of nonpublic minutes within 72 hours the default. They may be withheld only if two-thirds of members present, by recorded vote “taken in public session”, determine that disclosure would likely affect adversely the reputation of a person other than a member, render a proposed action ineffective, or concern terrorism-related preparations. The draft minutes record the procedural half: after public session resumed at 8:38 p.m., “Heather Whitney made a motion to seal the minutes for 1 year, Loren Howard seconded the motion; roll call vote taken by Noelle Kronberg, all present voting in favor.” They state no determination and no reason for a one-year term. The recording had already ended, so the minutes are the only record. Mitigation: the vote was roll-called and taken in public session, as the statute requires. The board used the same wording on June 12, 2025.
Sources: RSA 91-A:3, III (2023, 189:1, eff. Oct. 3, 2023); 4.10.25 draft minutes, item VI.
OBSERVATION One of the two exemptions cited, II(j), is limited to adjudicative proceedings under RSA 541 or 541-A
The motion and the minutes cite RSA 91-A:3, II (a) and (j). Paragraph II(j) covers “Consideration of confidential, commercial, or financial information that is exempt from public disclosure under RSA 91-A:5, IV in an adjudicative proceeding pursuant to RSA 541 or RSA 541-A” (the minutes reproduce this text). Nothing in the record indicates that an adjudicative proceeding under either chapter was before the SAU board. Paragraph I(c) confines the session to the matters in the motion; if the discussion fell only under (j), the ground may not have been available. The minutes are sealed, so what was discussed cannot be checked, and ground (a), personnel, may have covered all of it.
Sources: RSA 91-A:3, I(c), II(a), II(j) (2023, 189:1); 4.10.25 draft minutes, item VI.
OBSERVATION The minutes surface only in a later meeting’s folder and remain a draft after approval
RSA 91-A:2, II requires minutes to be open to public inspection within five business days. The only copy located of these minutes is the draft filed in the SAU 6 folder for June 12, 2025. The June 12 draft minutes record that “Rocco Ruggeri made a motion to approve the minutes from 4.10.25 as presented”, carried; no approved copy has been located. The search was two-stage: this meeting’s own folder (which holds only the Claremont agenda), every later SAU 6 folder, and the district’s Meeting Minutes share, which holds no SAU 6 files (per the project map, checked 2026-08-26). When these minutes first became public cannot be determined, so no five-day breach is asserted. The same meeting approved the December 12, 2024 minutes, 119 days after that meeting, and those have not been located in any public share either.
Sources: RSA 91-A:2, II (five business days; wording before the 2025, 112:1 amendment); 4.10.25 DRAFT SAU6 Board Meeting Minutes (1).pdf; DRAFT SAU6 Meeting Minutes 6.12 .25.pdf.
OBSERVATION Three places where the minutes say more than the recording
The auditor attended by video and his connection failed twice. One: at 0:20:26 the chair asked whether all audits would be done before Unity leaves; no answer from Campo is on the recording, and the next voice is the business administrator’s, “That’s his goal as well.” The minutes say “Mr. Campo said that is the plan”. Two: at 0:22:02 Crawford asked Campo whether the reversed journal entries were unusual; his next row begins mid-procedure. The minutes say “Mr. Campo agreed that it is unusual and changes have been made”. Three: on the projected year-end surplus, the minutes record “about $100,000”; on the recording Crawford moved from 100,000 to 150,000 (1:19:45) and Henry answered “Confidently. Yes.” The minutes may reflect what the room heard; the recording cannot confirm it. Campo said at 0:10:06: “I’ve done for [four] meetings in four nights, so I’m a little bit fraught.”
Sources: 4.10.25 draft minutes, items IV and V.2; Dialogue/16463 SAU6Mtg-041025.mp4.CSV rows 158–166 and 496–505.
OBSERVATION The board reorganized for its last joint year with three of four Unity seats empty
Three of the four Unity members were absent: Erickson, Hart and Popescu. Ruggeri, the only Unity member present, became vice chair and a voucher signer and gave the withdrawal report. Sprague wanted a Unity member on the evaluation subcommittee and hesitated to ask the one he named. The minutes record a quorum and every vote was taken among members present. Unity’s withdrawal, approved at its March 2025 town meeting and effective July 1, 2026, sets the board’s own deadline for the audits.
Sources: RSA 194-C:2, IV (withdrawal from an SAU); 4.10.25 draft minutes: masthead, roll call, items V.3 and V.4, Other Business.
OBSERVATION A Claremont School Board meeting noticed for 6:15 p.m. the same evening has no recording or minutes located
The agenda in this meeting’s folder (see flag 3) notices a Claremont School Board meeting on April 10, 2025 at 6:15 PM to vote on a Youth & Government overnight trip for April 11–12, with adjournment at 6:30 PM. This recording begins with the SAU 6 call to order at 0:00:03. The approved minutes of the Claremont board’s April 16 meeting approve only the April 2 minutes. This page could not check the Cablecast gallery for a separate recording (the site refused automated access). Whether the Claremont meeting was held cannot be determined from the documents on hand; if it was, its minutes are missing.
Sources: CSB Agenda 4.10.25.pdf; 21. Approved CSB Meeting Minutes 4.16.25; RSA 91-A:2, II.
POSITIVE The board closed the control gap at the meeting where the auditor named it, within the statutory reorganization window
The gap described at 0:06:58 was closed by 0:17:45, none of it on the agenda. While the auditor’s video was restored, the chair opened nominations: Ruggeri to review and sign vouchers, Crawford as treasurer, Madden as the second voucher signer, each with a second and a voice vote, and the minutes name the mover and seconder of each. The business administrator specified the split (“two people from your board other than your treasurer to sign the voucher”), so the check signer and the voucher reviewers are different people from both districts. Choosing a treasurer between April 1 and June 1 is what RSA 194-C:5, I requires. The minutes record no choice of a secretary; the clerk serves in that role, and whether that satisfies the statute is not determined here.
Sources: RSA 194-C:5, I; 4.10.25 draft minutes, item IV.
POSITIVE The nonpublic motion stated its exemptions on its face, followed by a roll call
RSA 91-A:3, I(b) requires the motion to state the specific paragraph II exemption and the vote to be by roll call. The chair read the item with its subparagraphs, the mover repeated them in the motion (“Roman numeral two A and a [J]”), the chair confirmed the clerk had it, and the roll was called. The minutes record the motion as “under RSA 91-a:3, II (a& j)” and print the text of both grounds. The Claremont board’s motion eight days earlier named only the paragraph (April 2, 2025 page, flag 1). Whether (j) was available is a separate question; see flag 5.
Sources: RSA 91-A:3, I(b); 4.10.25 draft minutes, item VI.
POSITIVE Offered a quick route for a child-safety policy, the board chose the findable one
The superintendent’s amendment would have added a bar on offenders against children to the SAU’s background-check policy GBCD, presented as a revision to avoid two readings “for expediency”. Sprague objected to the placement, not the substance: Claremont’s policy JLIF already covers sex offender registry information, and in a hiring policy “nobody’s going to find it.” The board referred the language to the Claremont policy committee to fold into JLIF. The discussion also raised volunteers, and the chair undertook to check the statute rather than assume. No rule requires this choice; it favors a reader looking for the rule. At the Claremont board’s April 16 meeting the approved minutes record that the GBCD revision was then accepted there on the policy committee’s recommendation, after noting Sprague’s concern.
Sources: 4.10.25 draft minutes, item V.5.a; approved 4.16.25 Claremont minutes, item VI.6.c.
Appendix — source files
Official and public sources
Project files
Working files this page was built from. The dialogue file is linked; the others are not published with the page.
Laws and rules cited on this page
- Right-to-Know: RSA 91-A:2, II (pre-2025 wording); RSA 91-A:3, I(b), I(c), II(a), II(j), III (2023, 189:1, eff. Oct. 3, 2023); RSA 91-A:4
- SAU governance and money: RSA 194-C:5, I; RSA 194-C:4, II(a); RSA 194-C:2, IV; RSA 197:23-a (analogue only); RSA 21-J:19
- Later session law (context only): 2026 N.H. Laws ch. 272 (SB 586), approved July 2, 2026, eff. July 1, 2026
- Federal (conditional): 2 CFR 200.501; 2 CFR 200.512
- Press (reporting, not law): Valley News, January 2, 2026