To the Editor:
“No comment” remains the only official words from the superintendent of Brunswick schools regarding the abrupt resignation of high school principal Art Abelmann in May.
Citizens may recall Superintendent Paul Perzanoski was on vacation at the time and could not be reached. His continued silence on the issue is just his latest failure of leadership.
Perzanoski has been fumbling the ball for years. There was the embarrassing August 2012 back-to-school letter, which Perzanoski used to lambaste Gov. Paul LePage. Whether you consider yourself part of 39 percent or the 61 percent of Maine’s gubernatorial political spectrum, I hope you would agree that a back-to-school letter is not the proper medium for political debate.
Perhaps the letter was a way to deflect attention from the $1.2M budget miscalculation that same year that resulted in short-notice faculty cuts and an eventual increase in property taxes in 2013. Of note: No personnel cuts were made in the superintendent’s office.
The budget crisis occurred in part because the superintendent’s office failed to properly calculate the revenue loss from the departure of Navy families. How hard could that be to estimate? Who was held accountable, other than the taxpayers of Brunswick?
Why does the process for hiring a new principal remain a mystery? I would like some reassurance that the selection process has been fixed and the same mistakes will not be made again. One only has to look to Topsham to find a better model for hiring a new principal. In Topsham, they make their plans public. In Brunswick, we only get silence and obfuscation.
What the citizens of Brunswick deserve for the schools in their fine community is leadership from the office of superintendent. We are not getting it. The leadership failures such as those repeatedly displayed by Superintendent Perzanoski over the past couple of years are grounds for firing. For the good of our community, our children and our schools, it is time to find a new leader we can trust.
Patrick O’Doblian
Brunswick
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