Berkeley Heights BOE BHPSNJ Staff Retention

Do the Rules Even Matter?

Jul 8, 2023

In the clip below, Ms. Akiri points to the BOE’s continued policy violations under Angela Penna and Joy Young.

These violations include interfering with a resident’s right to free speech (Angela Penna has consistently interrupted residents improperly while speaking about issues that are strictly related to District business and BOE actions), the Budget process, social media policy, and the continued hostile work environment many teachers and administrators have informed us of but was finally made public by Ms. Corely in her resignation letter.

The social media policy violations are rather interesting, as Ms. Stanley has repeatedly violated this policy despite voting for the restrictions last year over the objections of Ms. Akiri and Dr. Foregger. As of late this week, Ms. Stanley still had her District BOE email address on her campaign page.

Ms. Young and Ms. Penna, who both voted to use District funds in supporting Ms. Stanley’s and Mr. Cianculli’s mostly defunct ethics complaint against Ms. Akiri, have not once publicly admonished Ms. Stanley for her continued violations in this area. The SEC certainly has as that one action on the part of the BOE Majority has led to far more substantiated ethics violations against them than Ms. Akiri.

Also interesting is that neither Ms. Penna, Ms. Young, Ms. Stanley, nor Mr. Cianculli have EVER admonished Dr. Varley for the nepotism violation that she now admits – they have not once even talked about it publicly – in fact, they voted to allow Dr. Varley to hire her family member.

And while the largely dismissed complaint against Ms. Akiri (which I believe will be entirely dismissed by a Judge for reasons I’ve explained in past articles) was plastered on headlines by our local media, the nepotism complaint admitted to by the Superintendent was buried in a long article about a BOE Meeting.

There is not one article about the MULTIPLE validated complaints or law violations by the “cool kids” (BOE Majority).

Not one article about the violation of bidding and educational adequacy laws either.

Community media took down an OP-Ed that decimated Ms. Penna’s fairy tale as her ads ran all over that same outlet- to this day, Ms. Penna has been unable to refute any of the claims made against her action to take down that op-ed.

The BOE majority is willing to use District dollars to bully and intimidate BOE Members they disagree with but can’t hold each other accountable when it comes to legitimate violations of policy and ethics -in fact, every member of the majority, except for Ms. Bradford who wasn’t elected at the time, supported Ms. Stanley’s unethical motion in paying attorneys to do her bidding.

They also oversee what appears to be a strategy of using intimidation when it comes to OPRA. All three minors whose names were disclosed by the District in the past six months were attached to some form of communication from family members who were critical of the District or asking for a change in policy/practice. We are starting to understand the role of the OPRA Custodian – someone not subject to SEC standards and who does not possess a license to practice law that could be held accountable in front of a Board.

All of this to say that last year’s policy change rampage by the BOE had little to do with our students. It had everything with turning the entire business of the District into a campaign against people they don’t like or agree with and to shield their actions as BOE Members from the public eye.

These same people who are so willing to put more and more police in schools can’t even abide by basic laws and protections in place for our students and families – nor can they hold each other accountable in the face of flagrant and persistent violations.

Wonder why our schools have a bullying problem and sinking scores in Math, Science, and ELA?

It shouldn’t be a mystery considering the people in charge of our District.