Rodriguez To Resign From Board Of Education

Joseph Rodriguez plans to step down from the Board of Education on Sept. 1.

He announced the pending resignation in a Monday email to Mayor Toni Harp, board President Darnell Goldson and Superintendent Carol Birks, saying that he feels stretched too thin between his ​“job, family and other commitments” to continue on the school board.

“I entered this journey committed to the challenges ahead while recognizing we all play a part in working towards an even stronger district. From day one, we tackled some serious issues, such as a growing budget deficit, new leadership and the development of new district goals and objectives,” Rodriguez wrote. ​“I have learned that we have an amazing district with remarkable staff and students who, when engaged and listened to, can contribute so much to the decisions ahead.

“Please continue to put our children first and remain committed to solving problems collectively,” he added. ​“We succeed when everyone has a seat at the table.”

Rodriguez’s term was set to run until December 2022. The mayor will get to nominate someone to finish out his term; the Board of Alders will the chance to review the nomination and vote it up or down. Frank Redente, another appointee of Mayor Harp, also resigned his seat mid-term (twice), last year.

Rodriguez joined the school board in March 2018, taking the oath of office at Superintendent Birks’s first meeting. At the time, Rodriguez said that his top three priorities would be establishing equity among schools, cleaning up the school’s ​“financial mess” and advocating for bilingual education.

Over the following year and a half, Rodriguez took a lead in rejecting controversial contracts, restoring pre-school funding, improving cafeteria food and encouraging student leadership and parent involvement.

From the beginning, Rodriguez led a newly created Food Service Task Force, which undertook a comprehensive review of the district’s policies and practices around school meals, after parent complaints and a student hospitalization.

Under his leadership, the committee focused on training staff on how to follow district policies on special dietary needs. They updated the website with policies, asked about food service in the annual school survey, removed plastic wrapping from heated food, identified summer meal sites earlier and expanded evening supper service.

He also worked with the administration on a corrective action plan after the district was cited for numerous violations that threatened its annual grant of $5.7 million in federal Head Start funding.

Last month, Rodriguez also took over as chair of the board’s Finance & Operations Committee, the body that reviews tens of millions of dollars in grants and contracts, just as the district confronted a $30 million budget shortfall, about one-third of which will be covered by grant funds.

In the next two and a half months before he resigns, Rodriguez said he wants to straighten out next fiscal year’s budget deficit, once the Budget Mitigation Committee presents its recommendations. He also wants to start implementing a new procurement policy that will standardize the way contractors are selected and monitored and pull the committee’s focus back from individual contracts to bigger chunks of the budget with monthly presentations.

A High School in the Community grad and former Fair Haven alder, Rodriguez now works as Sen. Richard Blumenthal’s deputy state director and organizes an annual Puerto Rican festival.

Between those other obligations, including the daily commute to Hartford alone, Rodriguez said he felt that he didn’t have enough time to give to the big challenges the district faces.

“When I first expressed interest in joining the board, I certainly thought I could balance evening meetings with my work schedule, family life and other commitments with boards and commissions, but unfortunately it’s proving to be quite difficult,” he said. ​“I hope whoever joins the board, come the new academic year, understands that it’s much more than evening meetings. I didn’t have the time to commit, and we have some deep, deep issues that we as a district have to collectively address.”

By the time next school year starts and his daughter moves ahead to fourth grade, Rodriguez said, he wants to get back to volunteering at Benjamin Jepson School, where his involvement in education all began.

“I was quite active at my daughter’s school in PTO meetings, but I haven’t been able to go because the meetings are on the same night as [Finance & Operations at] Meadow Street. In the new school year, I want to commit to being a more active father in my daughter’s school,” he said. ​“I actually think this will allow me to be more of an asset. I will speak out on her behalf and on behalf of all our children.”