Font ResizeJust when you think that public officials have run out of new ways to violate the intent, if not the letter, of the law you get surprised. A little over a year ago we elected Keith Cheveralls to the Harvard School Committee even though his wife is a fourth grade teacher at the Harvard Elementary School (HES). Keith claims to have sought advice from the state regarding the potential conflict of interest issue and was assured that he could serve as long as he recused himself when necessary. Keith has place a "conflict of interest" file publicly available at Town Hall.
At (Monday) night's School Committee meeting which I attended, Stu Sklar read an e-mail Keith had sent to all committee members notifying them of actions he had recently taken. It seems that Keith had written a letter recusing himself from dealing with a teacher grievance filed by four HES teaches, one of whom is Keith's wife, and placed this letter in his conflict of interest file at Town Hall. This letter and/or accompanying documentation divulges the nature of this grievance which by law is confidential information to be dealt with by School Committee in executive session.
Further, after placing this confidential information in a publicly accessible folder, Keith admits that he notified a Harvard Hillside reporter of his actions. Needless to say this grievance is now being discussed publicly instead of being dealt with by School Committee in the confidentiality of executive session.
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What Mr. Cheveralls fails to realize is that his actions were certainly unethical and quite possibly illegal. For all of his public assurances of never allowing himself to be accused of a conflict of interest I am reminded of an old quote I can only paraphrase: "Beware the man who doth too loudly proclaim his innocence."
DARRELL WICKMAN
Harvard
