GREENFIELD — The Greenfield School Department is looking to add back a director of health and wellness services position, which has not existed for several years.
The School Committee voted unanimously on Wednesday to approve the job description. However, Superintendent Carol Kruser said the district will not post the position or seek candidates just yet; next month, she will return to the committee with a proposal after Business Manager Andy Paquette reorganizes the district finances to accommodate the job.
School Committee member Melodie Goodwin asked how the school district would be able to fund the position, as the budget has already been voted on and does not include an appropriation for the role. In response, Kruser said there are some unfilled positions in the district and it could use the savings from those vacancies to fund the job.
“He’ll go back in and budget it from the vacancy savings, and make a report for you,” Kruser said, referring to Paquette.
The draft job description includes a salary range of $105,000 to $115,000. It requires applicants to be licensed as a registered nurse and licensed with the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to work as a school nurse or school nurse director.
The director of health and wellness services will oversee the district’s behavioral and medical health protocols and programs, including supervising school nurses, managing state-mandated health screenings, and overseeing medical accommodations, emergency and crisis policies. The full draft job description is included in the School Committee’s meeting packet for Sept. 9.
During public comment, resident Michael Mastrototaro expressed concern that the district is too “top-heavy” and suggested that the money could be better used to support more student-facing programs, such as the elementary school band.
“We have, from what I understand, barely 1,300 kids in this school district,” Mastrototaro said. “And yet apparently we’re about to hire two more administrators that aren’t even in the budget. … It just baffles me. It baffles me what is important and what isn’t, and it seems the most important thing in this school district is salaries for administrators.”
Football field lights
Kruser added that the School Department is working with the city to address aging, failing lights at Veterans’ Memorial Field and get the property fully lit again as soon as possible.
“The School Committee has received a lot of emails about the lights, and we have not forgotten about it,” Kruser said. “We do want to repair them.”
School Committee Vice Chair Ann Childs said she attended Monday’s Planning and Construction Committee meeting, and the city and school district are trying to determine the best course of action to address the issue.
Approximately 50 of the 350 high-pressure sodium light bulbs on the field are not functional, Childs said. The broken lights are spread throughout the field, creating an overall dim appearance, rather than one dark area in particular.
Current estimates to replace all the lights with LED bulbs are approximately $500,000, and would require lowering the height of all the lampposts. Childs said replacing the broken bulbs with new sodium bulbs would cost somewhere between $20,000 and $50,000, and could entail further expenses if it is discovered that there are more issues with wiring and other lighting elements. Repairs would be paid for through the School Department’s Athletic Revolving Account.
“Obviously, what you would want to do is upgrade to LED because that would save you a ton on energy costs,” Childs said. “Every time we turn the lights on, the town takes a big chunk of change out of their wallet to pay the electric cost, but just to immediately move us to an LED system would run us half a million dollars.”
While the goal is to eventually find funding to support a transition to LEDs, Childs said the city does not want to leave the field dark in the meantime, and is looking to replace bulbs, or potentially move the remaining working bulbs to more evenly distribute light.
“This is something that would be a Band-Aid approach,” Childs said. “This is not a system that we can indefinitely maintain because as these systems are less and less common, the availability of the pieces to fix them … it’s already deteriorating.”
According to Greenfield Recorder archives, Greenfield first installed lights at Veterans’ Memorial Field in October 1995 for a cost of approximately $90,000.
Childs said no decisions have been made, and the city and school district will continue to evaluate and explore options.
“This is something that the city is very deeply involved in working on fixing for people because we want our kids to have their football and our community to have football, and our band to be able to be out there for games,” Childs said.
Sexton up for award
During the meeting, committee members also took a moment to recognize Chair Stacey Sexton, who will be presented with an All-State School Committee 2025 award at the Massachusetts Association of School Committees’ conference in November.
A letter that the Massachusetts Association of School Committees sent to Sexton states the award is for their “contributions to the Greenfield Public Schools, both through your commitment to the role of the school committee and through your advocacy and efforts on behalf of the highest quality educational opportunities for the children of the district.”
Committee member Elizabeth DeNeeve, who won a 2024 award, said it is quite an achievement for the district to win two years in a row.
“I really want to congratulate you, and I think that is quite the feather in the hat of this district,” DeNeeve said. “It should really help people understand that we are working toward student achievement and it’s recognized by the state.”
“It’s a huge deal,” Kruser added. “It doesn’t happen very often.”
