Catherine Sanderson reports on the Gazette reportThe Springfield Republican follows up (actually using the Gazette as a source)
UPDATE Monday Morning (quarterbacking): The crusty Gazette finally caught up with this story. Must be a tad embarrassed as they threw up a brief last night on Gazettenet, but back dated it to Saturday. And intrepid forever reporter Nick Grabbe had to resort to using persons "with direct knowledge of the situation," as sources but of course unnamed.
The Regional School Committee meets tonight in Executive Session to try to put together Dr. Rodriguez's going away present. For sure he will demand the rest of this year's salary (about $40,000) but he may ask for all of next year's as well ($158,000.) Probably will not have the gall to also ask for the $15,000 in housing/transportation. If so, let's hope the School Committee pays him off in pennies so he gets a hernia dragging them back to sunny Miami, Florida.
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UPDATE: Saturday around noon:
So sorry for not responding to all the Comments that occurred after I, finally, hit the "publish" button close to midnight last night as I then retired.
And sorry for deleting the post "We interrupt this regularly scheduled program..." which had garnered a few comments because I was sitting on this "A-Rod Strikes Out" story in draft for sooooo many hours that when I finally got the corroboration I needed for some reason it published below the placeholder, throw-away post signaling something BIG was in the offing.
So I just deleted that entire post (only the 2nd time in three years I have done such a thing.)
When someone taunted me by email about being out of touch on this story with the bricks and mortar media possibly beating me to it (and at that point it was written, the photo uploaded and my right hand was hovering over the publish button) I instantly flashed back to that great scene in "Tora, Tora, Tora" where the lowly staff Sergeant had tried to get his commanding officer to do something after the rookie commander of the USS Ward reporting attacking an enemy submarine at the mouth of Pearl Harbor, early on the morning of December 7.
The Commander, not happy about working on a gorgeous Sunday. barked "Corroboration, I need corroboration!" A few hours later he bursts into the same office with his eyes wide open and jaw hitting the floor and the lowly Sargent (busily answering the phone and stamping forms at a frantic pace) looks up, points his hand at the huge picture window overlooking the Harbor now filled with burning, dying ships and shouts, "There's your corroboration!"
ORIGINAL POST: late last night
After less than a year as the highest paid Amherst "public servant", School Superintendent Alberto Rodriguez will go the way of the previous (less than) Super, Alton Sprague who took his co-Superintendent wife, two months of taxpayer funded salary, and flew the coop.
In this case, Rodriguez will be winging back to Miami, Florida where "we play hard, hard, hardball" he bragged to the Amherst Bulletin last year, declaring he would have no trouble surviving in the People's Republic of Amherst.
Once again Maria Geryk steps up to cover as she did previously after the aged co-supers disappeared with two months left on their one-year contract, and most recently for the numerous days A-Rod took as vacation/sick time.
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SUPERINTENDENT ‑ CONTRACT OF EMPLOYMENT
4. TERMINATION: This Agreement may be terminated or modified by mutual written agreement of the parties. In the event that the Superintendent desires to terminate this Agreement before the term of the Agreement and his employment expires, he may do so by giving at least one-hundred twenty (120) days’ notice of his intention to the Committees. This Agreement may be terminated by the Committees prior to its expiration, for good cause, but not without prior written notice to the Superintendent of the proposed reasons for termination.
