A high-ranking official at the Brookline school district has decided to retire, citing allegations of financial mismanagement that she claims has resulted in a “hostile work environment.”
In a letter that she sent to the School Committee on December 6th, Liza O’Connell, who is the deputy superintendent of student services for the Public Schools of Brookline, stated that she intends to start her retirement on March 15th, 2025. Her office is responsible for overseeing both school counseling and special education, as well as nurses and health services.
Over the course of the past few years, the district has had a significant amount of employee turnover in its administrative positions.
The last two school years have been marked by “financial management issues within the Office of Administration and Finance (OAF) that are beyond my control,” according to a comment made by O’Connell, who joined the system in 2022 as an interim deputy superintendent.
“It has become increasingly difficult over FY24 and FY25 to deliver the student services that the students and parents of Brookline expect and deserve, while being constantly distracted by an endless stream of budget, accounting and financial challenges,” according to the letter.
According to what she stated, a “hostile work environment” has grown over the course of time, which has rendered her employment unworkable.
After serving as the director of special education for Dedham Public Schools, O’Connell recently moved to Brookline and made a request to the School Committee, requesting that they take into consideration the possibility of conducting a “independent audit and reconciliation” of the budgets for the two most recent school years.
“I have enjoyed working on behalf of our PSB students, parents, and staff, and I am committed to ensuring a smooth transition,” she wrote in her letter.
Superintendent Linus Guillory gave a statement in which he expressed gratitude to O’Connell for the service she has provided to the school district.
“I have full faith and confidence in the professional skills of all our senior leadership team members and am most appreciative of their work and service to the district,” he stated. “The Town and the PSB have an annual audit by an outside CPA firm to ensure overall compliance. PSB continues to refine and improve its budgeting processes in keeping with best practices.”
‘We cannot, however, ignore a claim of a hostile work environment and have consulted with legal counsel to discuss next steps,” he further added.
In addition to other departures and signals of financial difficulty at the Brookline public schools, O’Connell’s resignation comes as a following development.
At the highest levels of management, there has been a significant amount of employee turnover.
It has been announced that Susan Givens, who was appointed to the role of deputy superintendent for administration and finance in the district a year ago, will be relocating to a different job within the district. A job advertisement to replace Givens will be ready “very soon,” according to Guillory, who revealed this information to the School Committee one month ago.
The other deputy superintendent, Jodi Fortuna, who is in charge of teaching and learning, and Claire Galloway-Jones, who is in charge of educational equity, have only been working in the district since the year 2023. After her predecessor resigned from the seat a year ago, alleging a lack of support from PSB, Galloway-Jones became the new representative for the constituency.
In order to address late salary claims, the district had to pay out damages totaling $500,000 to staff members the previous year. This was necessary because the district had been weeks late in paying them for their summer labor the year before.
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In addition, this year, the largest afterschool program in the district was terminated due to a disagreement on rent, which was partially caused by a turnover in the post of operations director for PSB.
The budget of the school district has also been put under strain. In March, the School Committee made the decision to let off literacy coaches and instructors of global languages due to an unexpected deficit in the budget.
