{"id":6412,"date":"2015-09-30T20:29:04","date_gmt":"2015-10-01T00:29:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/?p=6412"},"modified":"2015-09-30T21:41:54","modified_gmt":"2015-10-01T01:41:54","slug":"uszenski-suspended-without-pay-brick-boe-informed-on-future-options","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2015\/09\/uszenski-suspended-without-pay-brick-boe-informed-on-future-options\/","title":{"rendered":"Uszenski Suspended Without Pay, Brick BOE Informed of Future Options"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Brick<\/a>

Brick Board of Education members and employees, Sept. 30, 2015. (Photo: Daniel Nee)<\/p><\/div>\n

Suspended Brick schools superintendent Walter Uszenski lost his pay one day after his indictment on charges of official misconduct and theft, part of an alleged scheme to provide his grandchild with educational services to which she was not entitled.<\/p>\n

The Brick Township Board of Education voted unanimously to suspend Uszenski without pay at an emergency meeting Wednesday night. He was previously suspended with pay following his arrest on the charges in May. Board attorney Jack Sahradnik has said state law allows a board to take away a employee\u2019s pay only after he or she is indicted by a grand jury.<\/p>\n

Sahradnik advised board members against commenting on the issue, but provided a few options going forward that could result in the early termination of Uszenski\u2019s contract, which ends June 30, 2018.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe board has the right to go forward with charges, if they so desire, against the superintendent,\u201d said Sahradnik. \u201cAlso, the board or the prosecutor\u2019s office could proceed with essentially seeking to have his certificate to continue serving revoked. They both require hearings.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alternatively, the board could allow the legal process to play out.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have charges that are pending that still have to go through the judicial process,\u201d said Sahradnik.<\/p>\n

If Uszenski is found not guilty, or the charges against him were to be dismissed, the board could potentially owe him back pay.<\/p>\n

In some cases, residents asked whether Uszenski\u2019s pay should have been suspended \u2013 specifically, at an emergency meeting. Board President Sharon Cantillo said that a \u201cpublic outcry\u201d on the matter had been heard by the board.<\/p>\n

Resident George Scott asked why the ratification of Uszenski\u2019s suspension without pay could not have been handled at a regular meeting, versus paying attorneys and other professionals to come to a special meeting.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bottom line is, from the standpoint of the feelings of the board, they wanted to act quickly to correct and take the action they could take on the indictment without getting into a delay of a period of time,\u201d Sahradnik said.<\/p>\n

Business Administrator James Edwards said there was a pay period in between the date of the indictment and that would have raised a question if a vote was not taken.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the man goes to trial and proves he is innocent \u2026 the board is going to get sued right on down the line,\u201d said Joe Coutant, arguing against suspending Uszenski\u2019s pay. \u201cIt\u2019s going to cost us a fortune. The only thing I\u2019m trying to say is, be careful as to how you\u2019re going to handle this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI can sense the wolves ready to just pounce, and it\u2019s really sad,\u201d added former board member John Talty.<\/p>\n

The Meeting Continues<\/strong><\/p>\n

Following the board\u2019s vote to suspend Uszenski without pay, the scope of public comment began to widen. One woman, Victoria Pakala, a candidate for the Brick school board in this November\u2019s election, asked how Andrew Morgan was able to obtain a job in the Brick school district despite a criminal record.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow did Andrew Morgan slip through the cracks?\u201d Pakala, who identified herself as a teacher, asked.<\/p>\n

Morgan is accused of helping Uszenski with his plan to provide his grandchild with benefits, and lying on a job application by concealing his criminal record<\/a> of drug dealing activity in New York in 1989.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery employee of the district goes through a background check and is not hired if not cleared through the state,\u201d Sahradnik said.<\/p>\n

Previously, state officials have told Shorebeat that Morgan, who was hired by the board on Uszenski\u2019s recommendation, could not have had a criminal record used against him under a waiver he was granted in 1997<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt one time, New Jersey state law contained a provision that allowed people who were disqualified from school employment to file an appeal, based on demonstrated rehabilitation, to the [Education] Commissioner\u2019s Office,\u201d state Department of Education spokesman Michael Yaple said.<\/p>\n

The state law was in existence from 1986 through 1998, when it was repealed, but people who had been granted waivers under the program were grandfathered in.<\/p>\n

A side bone of contention developed between some members of the public and school officials after Vito Gagliardi, Sr. \u2013 who was appointed to the board in August to fill the vacated seat of John Talty \u2013 participated in the meeting and cast a vote over the phone. The members of the public asked if board member Karyn Cusanelli, who had a previous obligation Wednesday night, was afforded the same opportunity.<\/p>\n

Cantillo said Cusanelli \u2013 like her \u2013 would probably not have known that option was available. Gagliardi took it upon himself to notify the district he wanted to vote that way, Edwards would later say, and school officials checked with Interim Ocean County Executive Superintendent of Schools Todd Flora to confirm the practice was legal.<\/p>\n

One member of the public, Vic Fanelli, began questioning if Flora could have made a special accommodation for the man he appointed to the board, but Edwards quickly explained that previous case law surrounding the Open Public Meetings Act \u2013 specifically, a case involving the state Pinelands Commission \u2013 allowed it.<\/p>\n

Sahradnik eventually quieted the matter, asking members of the public to keep on-topic to the Uszenski situation.<\/p>\n

<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Suspended Brick schools superintendent Walter Uszenski lost his pay one day after his indictment on charges of official misconduct and theft, part of an alleged scheme to provide his grandchild with educational services to which she was not entitled. The Brick Township Board of Education voted unanimously to suspend Uszenski without pay at an emergency […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6413,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[13],"tags":[41,24,1281],"class_list":["post-6412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-brick-schools","tag-board-of-education","tag-brick-nj-news","tag-walter-uszenski"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/brick_boe_usz.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgt2Ft-1Fq","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6412"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6412\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}