Monday’s Board of Education candidate debates, hosted by the League of Women Voters Greenwich and moderated by Wilton High School civics teacher Anthony Presta and GHS student Catherine Broderick, featured enough questions to fill two full hours.
BOE candidates left to right: Democrat Bob Chaney, Democrat Laura Kostin, Democrat Veronica Chiavaroli, Republican Karen Krause and Republican Paul Cappiali. Oct 6, 2025 Photo: Leslie Yager
LWV president Melissa McClammy said the League declined to invite BOE Republican incumbent Dr. Mercanti-Anthony to be on the panel as he is running unopposed in a separate race to fill the remaining two-years of Karen Kowalski’s term after Kowalski resigned in July 2024.
There were three Democrats on the panel competing for two openings on the board, creating a real contest.
Republicans Karen Krause and Paul Cappiali were endorsed by their party to run for the two openings on the BOE. Oct 6, 2025 Photo Leslie Yager
The two Republican candidates are matched with two full-term openings after two Republican candidates withdrew recently: Shawn O’Donnell and Granit Balidemaj.
Incumbent BOE Democrat Laura Kostin, who was not selected by her party to run for another term and subsequently petitioned her way onto the ballot, was on the panel beside the endorsed Democrats, Veronica Chiavaroli and Bob Chaney.
The Board of Education debate at Greenwich town hall was moderated by Wilton High School civics teacher Anthony Presta and GHS student Catherine Broderick. Oct 6, 2025 Photo: Leslie Yager
Introductions
Ms Kostin, who has 4 GPS children and is a member of the CMS building committee and the board’s budget committee, said she was particularly proud of the progress schools have made in student achievement, and working through unprecedented challenges including the shutdown of Central Middle School during the pandemic.
Ms Chiavaroli, a Greenwich native who graduated from GHS, and has masters degrees in Clinical Social Work from Columbia University and a masters in General and Special Education from Bank Street College in NYC, said she taught in Greenwich and NYC for about a decade. She has 3 children in GPS.
Mr. Chaney has been volunteering extensively in GPS including on the Julian Curtiss PTA, Central Middle School PTA board and PTA Council board. He served as parent liaison the JC feasibility committee and is now the vice chair of the JC building committee. He serves on D11 in RTM and is member of the Finance Committee and is on the board of Greenwich Alliance.
Ms Krause, parent of two Cos Cob School students, said she would bring her 25-years experience as a finance and strategy executive to the board.
Mr. Cappiali, a Greenwich native who graduated from GHS, is married to a kindergarten teacher in the district and they have two children in Greenwich Schools. He is the town’s appointed harbormaster and runs a retail wine store, is known in town for his volunteer work at St. Roch’s Church including chairing the annual raffle.
Cappiali introduced himself by saying, “I am currently serving on the board of education, although due to some partisan divide I haven’t been allowed to sit at a meeting.”
Indeed, Cappiali has not been seated at BOE meetings over the past year. Republican Jen Behette has been seated. The disagreement over who is the rightful board member is the subject of a lawsuit. (FST-CV25-6070637-S. CAMILLO, FRED Et Al v. HIRSH, KAREN Et Al)
Greenwich High School student Catherine Broderick helped moderate the BOE debate. Oct 6, 2025 photo: Leslie Yager
Middle School Redistricting
The five candidates were cordial, but there were disagreements including on the topic of redistricting middle school catchment areas to move students from crowded Eastern Middle School to the new Central Middle School which might have space for more students.
Mr. Cappiali said he would advocate for redistricting to relieve overcrowding.
“It might be unpopular, but we are here to lead and sometimes being a leader means doing things that are unpopular,” he said. “Eastern is busting at the seams.”
Ms Krause said she was open to the idea but noted that it could impact property values and should be based on parent choice, possibly by creating a magnet school.
Ms Chiavaroli said she did not support redistricting, but that CMS could, for example offer unique programs or ADA opportunities students don’t have at the other two middle schools.
Bob Chaney at the BOE debate Oct 6, 2025 Photo: Leslie Yager
Mr. Chaney said the question would be complex and to expect a great deal of public input.
“Build it and they will come,” Kostin said, adding that when Glenville School was rebuilt it drew families that had previously bypassed public school and she expected that would be the case at the new CMS.
A question on the typically fraught topic of suitable books in school media centers was a non-starter. All the candidates said they deferred to the media center staff and noted there is a review process in place should a parent have a concern.
Other topics including teacher morale and retention, special education and ADA compatibility drew no disagreements.
School Start Times, Cardinal Stadium Lights
As for restoring the later GHS start time of 8:30am, candidates seemed to agree that given the research, science and years of deliberation that went into that decision in 2016 they would prefer to restore the later start, especially if they were given a “magic wand.”
On the topic of improving fields 6 and 7 at GHS Mr. Chaney segued to the idea of night time lighting at Cardinal Stadium, which Dr. Mercanti-Anthony has been pushing for.
Mr. Chaney said he realized it was a legal “quagmire” but he felt it would bring the community together.
Today, the school is subject to a 2003 legal agreement that limits Cardinal Stadium lights to be used for 10 athletic games and 6 practices per year.
Challenges and accomplishments
“There’s a lot of politics happening in town that is dividing us. The lawsuit that happened, the cut or reduction, are challenges to be met by working together and putting politics aside,” Chaney said.
Kostin emphasized district accomplishments including the number of ‘shovels in the ground,’ and completed projects including the GHS secure entry way and the remediation and new turf fields at Western Middle School. She noted both Julian Curtiss and OGS projects were moving ahead as well.
She said the biggest challenge today was operational and the budget cycle ahead.
“We were dealt a very difficult circumstance with the reduction from the BET. Right now we are picking up those pieces,” she said. “Families are dealing with very difficult transportation and busing challenges in their neighborhoods.”
Ms Krause said the district’s biggest strengths were school teachers and staff and deeply involved parents. She said challenges included politics and the district’s achievement gap.
Veronica Chiavaroli at the BOE debate. Oct 6, 2025 Photo: Leslie Yager
Chiavaroli said teachers and administrators were an asset and GHS college placement and curriculum were strengths of the district representing the culmination of work in earlier grades.
“I think this year our biggest challenge on the board will be the budget, whether it is managing the $4 million cut that happened this past spring or moving into next year’s budget cycle,” Chiavaroli said.
Asked about teacher retention, Ms Kostin said while Greenwich attracts the best and brightest teachers, “when I see the kind of angst that the operating budget reduction caused for our staff, I’m deeply sad.”
“I know that right now we do not have budget guidelines for the year ahead, and I fear we might not until after the election,” she continued. “I cannot possibly imagine another reduction that would force us to lose staff.”
“There has to be an acknowledgement from our finance board that contractual costs are what they are. That has to become a regular, predictable factor in their calculations,” Kostin added.
Paul Cappiali at the BOE debate. Oct 6, 2025 Photo: Leslie Yager
Mr. Cappiali said teacher morale was an issue facing the schools and translated to absenteeism.
“If the teachers don’t feel supported, students don’t get their best. And we’ve seen morale dip, driven by staff shortages, behavioral challenges and too much change coming from the top without teacher input.”
Ms Krause described teaching as a hard job, both emotionally physically.
“You’ve got 25 kids with a wide range of needs,” she said. “We need to set the right tone so that our teachers feel valued, supported and empowered to do their jobs.”
Ms Chiavaroli said when teachers were stretched too thin, it impacts retention.
“Whether it’s dealing with large class size, diverse abilities of students in the classroom and the 10,000 other things they’re asked to do beside responding to parent emails and phone calls, beside IEP planning and special ed, I can understand why they are maybe burned out and unhappy.”
Mr. Chaney said, “The struggle is real.”
He said teachers should be heard and salary was important given teachers commute significant distances work because it is expensive to live in Greenwich.
Bob Chaney and Laura Kostin at the BOE debate. Oct 6, 2025 Photo: Leslie Yager
Ms Kostin said the budget was an ongoing challenge.
“It’s a tale as old as time. The BOE has the needs. The finance board has the means, and to this point they have looked at this budget as a whether-to-fund problem, not a how-to-fund problem, and that needs to change.
“If you know the costs of your contracts. If you know what it takes to run your buildings. If you know what kind of non-certified personnel you need, there should be no surprises,” she added. “If they don’t believe the product is worth the price, they will not fund us.”
$4.2 Million BET Cut/Reduction to BOE Budget
The main disagreement arose over April’s BET “cut” – or “reduction in increase” – depending on one’s perspective.
Mr. Cappiali said while he was not seated on the Board last year, he had collaborated with town officials and worked behind the scenes, caucusing with his party and brokering a deal, but the Democrats declined it.
Mr. Cappiali said he believed $2m in funds had been available.
“Whether the $2 million was offered behind closed doors and another side of the BET said ‘$4 million or nothing,’ and whether it was offered over the table, there should have been communication and trust,” Cappiali said. “I myself facilitated a $1.9 million supplement, which was the number to cut the buses.”
Cappiali said the biggest problem for families this year was the change of school start time that he said was changed “without thoughtful process or community engagement that had gone into the original decision.”
“Start times effect everything from sleep patterns, childcare, athletics and transportation. They can’t be changed on a whim,” Cappiali said.
Ms Krause disagreed with the question referring to a “cut.”
“BET gave guidance for $198 and offered an additional $2 million that the Democrats turned down. The superintendent had asked for $202 million,” Ms Krause said.
“I was disappointed to see programs valued by our families – PE, ALP and sports – put on the chopping block. There was not enough emphasis on looking at administration and ways to be more efficient to protect the individuals who directly contact our students.”
Ms Chiavaroli complimented the BOE’s work on the budget and said they had been forced to make difficult decisions and resisted cutting forward-facing staff as much as possible.
Mr. Chaney pushed back on Ms Krause’s opinion, saying the only motion put forward at the BET was for a $4 million cut.
“It doesn’t matter what happened behind closed doors. The only thing put forward was a $4.2 million reduction,” Chaney said.
“The reduction by Republicans on the BET was horrible and the students are suffering for it. It gave the BOE a terrible choice to make. They did the best they would with what they had,” Chaney added.
Ms Kostin agreed. She said there was no motion to restore $2 million.
“Over the years we have lost an astounding amount of staff because we couldn’t afford them,” Kostin said. “We still don’t have any budget guidelines for the current year. Last year we got them far too late from the BET. The process of the timing is an easy course correction, but there has been no willingness to course correct on that front.”
She listed numerous full time equivalent positions that were lost over the past several years, most recently media assistants, PE staff and evaluators.
“I think it’s astounding how much we have diminished our offerings to accommodate a finance board that is unwilling to see the need,” she added.
Ms Kostin said that given the BET reduction to the school budget, the school board opted for “the least bad thing,” scheduling the first bell at GHS at 7:45am.
Lawsuit following vacancy and BOE replacement
Mr. Chaney said it was important to take the politics out of the BOE as much as possible.
“The lawsuit was not, in my opinion, good for the town. There is a lot of good taxpayer money being spent on this lawsuit. Hopefully we will have new members coming in November and we can move on,” Chaney said.
Ms Kostin said, “having been through this process, I will just say, the BOE had a wealth of candidates that came to us with the time and dedication to want to serve. We did our best. We did not get great legal advice from the town attorney,” she said. “We have to move on.”
Mr. Cappiali said, “Everyone can’t move on if we allow this kind of illegal takeover to stand, every board and commission could use it as a precedent and we could see chaos spread across the state.”
How to Vote
LWV president Ms McClammy explained that voters may cast votes for up to four candidates on the ballot, but no more than two from a party. By law, no more than half the members on the BOE can be in the same party.
Also, on the ballot is an additional BOE race to fill the two-year vacancy on the board created by Kowalski’s resignation. There is one candidate running unopposed, Dr. Michael-Joseph Mercanti-Anthony.
See also:
April 27, 2025
April 11, 2025
BET Cuts $4.1 Million from Greenwich Schools: Audience Chants “Shame on you”
April 4, 2025
Greenwich Schools Chief Rebuts RTC Chair: “This Level of Reduction Would Have Long-Lasting Consequences” April 2, 2025
Hahn: A Reasonable Compromise on the School Budget April 2, 2025