Franklin Newsletter Blurb Featuring BOE Candidate Prompts Debate

An eight-page Home and School (H&S) newsletter sparked a debate at the Board of Education meeting Tuesday night over the ethics and legality behind a recent blurb featuring a BOE candidate.

Residents argued that BOE candidate violated the New Jersey School Ethics Act and district procedures after her biography and photo appeared in the elementary school's April newsletter, released sometime last week. Bumpus, whose son attends Franklin, is a H&S board member and class parent, according to the newsletter.

"The type of communication that went out is prohibited by the education law, plain and simple," said attorney Joel Rosen, also a BOE candidate in the April 27 election.

After filing an Open Public Records Act request Tuesday morning, Rosen said he examined a thread of emails between Franklin H&S President Lisa Ruiz, newsletter Chair Suzi Soares and Bumpus.

"It became very clear to me that the people who were involved in putting that item in the newsletter knew exactly what they were doing," he said.

The idea to feature Bumpus in the newsletter was initiated by Soares, who had emailed Ruiz for her approval on March 23, according to documents obtained by Patch. Two days later, Bumpus was asked for her permission to run the small piece. It appears Franklin Elementary Principal Marianne Abbasso was not aware of the piece before it was published, based off an email from Soares on April 6.

"I am so sorry for the nightmare this newspaper thing has caused," the email from Soares to Abbasso read. "I never would have even asked Lisa if we could do it if I had known we weren't supposed to so I'm really sorry. I know I didn't send it to you, but below is my original message to Lisa and her reply…"

Bumpus, Soares and Ruiz were not present at Tuesday night's meeting, but BOE members Mary Shaughnessy and Shane Berger spoke in their defense, saying the incident was not illegal or unethical.

"These are people who are proud to have one of their own parents running for the board," said Shaughnessy, who read the email exchanges in full at the meeting.

Berger called the incident a "terrible mistake" and urged the to put the situation behind them.

"One of the highest common denominators in this community is empathy," said Berger. "For attorney Rosen to come before the public and threaten that this election could be challenged - I don't know if that's appropriate."

Interim Superintendent Catherine Mozak denounced the publishing of the blurb and notified all Bloomfield principals that using school materials for BOE candidate campaigns is prohibited under statute.

"What was done nobody is defending," said Mozak, whose last BOE meeting as interim superintendent was Tuesday night.

BOE attorney Nick Dotoli said Franklin H&S has "provided an infirmity" under board policy and certain New Jersey statutes. He declined to comment on the legal advice he has provided Mozak and BOE members.

"I can tell you the board's posture in quickly rectifying this, although it might seem a little bit late and not sufficient, was expeditious," he said.

A retraction was issued shortly after the newsletter was released. Part of the retraction stated: "An article went home this week, without approval, in the Franklin Home & School newspaper … Anything that was printed in our newspaper that may have appear to influence anyone's opinion, is being taken out of context."

BOE members Maribel Perez, Robert DeMarino, Dianna Fuller and Vice President Rachel Park were absent from the meeting.

Click here to watch the entire BOE meeting, courtesy of WBMA-TV.