BHCW received information from sources within the District that:

(1) Other than the Feb 26 presentation and the sample rubric, there are no other documents that have been shared with the Board   

(2) There is NO email communication with the rubric from transportation consultants.

(3) There was NO FINAL REPORT that ranked the 265 streets that the Board could review or, based on the latest report, that the District even received.

The last point should surprise a community that has been debating this “list” over the past month – a list no one appears to have seen.  

Yet, it does explain why streets defined as hazardous appeared to change from one day to the next.

This appears to confirm BHCW’s experience in requesting this information.

On 03/04/2024 BHCW requested:

(2) Please provide the Rubric Analysis of the Berkeley Heights Roads that lead to categorizing roads as “hazardous” on the maps presented to the Berkeley Heights Board of Education by School Transportation Consultants Ray Kuehner, Ingrid Reitano, Patrick Doyle during the 02/26/2024 Berkeley Heights Board of Education Meeting in the possession of Any Member of the Board of Education and/or Dr. Melissa Varley and/or Anthony Juskiewicz and/or Kelly Sheehan

On 03/13/2024 Mr. Juskiewicz responded:

With respect to item 2, the District conducted a good-faith search and determined that it is not in possession of any responsive records.

In other words, neither BOE Members, The Superintendent, The Business Administrator, nor even the Transportation Director were in possession of the analysis that led to a basic categorization of roads as either “hazardous” or “non-hazardous.”

In that same OPRA request, BHCW requested:

(1) Please provide all reports and analysis provided to the District by: School Transportation Consultants Ray Kuehner, Ingrid Reitano, Patrick Doyle To Any Member of the Board of Education and/or Dr. Melissa Varley and/or Anthony Juskiewicz and/or Kelly Sheehan Between 11/2023 through 03/01/2024

The District affirmed that the only record responsive to this request was the consultants’ public PowerPoint presentation in February of this year.

The question we should ask at this point is, where did this list come from?

The entire criticism of the past practice centered on the fact that some residents had to pay $1000 for subscription busing while others had to pay nothing with no clear criteria established, no clarity on numbers , and contradicting reports made to the state and the public.

The entire reason this firm was hired was to re-calibrate Courtesy busing into an informed practice – yet the very list being debated by the community on forums and during council meetings holds no evidence of connection to the consultancy firm at this time.     

I hope that the District administration can address this issue publicly tonight and confirm the existence of this list, it’s source, who has it, and why it has yet to be shared with the Board or the public – over two months after the presentation by the consultants.

OPRA Request Response

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