Gill-Montague School Committee Approves $207K in Warrants at Final 2020 Meeting

GILL — December 22, 2020 — Gill-Montague School Committee approved four warrants totaling more than $207,000 and renewed its legal retainer at its December 22 remote meeting. The warrants included a $201,223.01 accounts-payable bill, two scholarship payments of $3,100 and $2,550, and a $6,010 emergency postage warrant to mail elementary report cards. The legal retainer renewal carried a roughly $50-per-month increase, which administrators called modest given the district's legal workload. The meeting opened with a public statement from Carl Jura, president of the Gill-Montague Education Association, signed by 75 staff members, demanding the committee explain its rejection of a memorandum of agreement that would have allowed administrative assistants to work remotely three days per week and warning that requiring daily on-site presence amid spiking COVID-19 case counts — Greenfield cases had doubled to 134 in seven days — constituted a potential unfair labor practice.