This account is from Jenny Mosher on the meeting with Sen. Gaffey and his constituents on 04/08/08:

The meeting started approximately 20 minutes late, due to Senator Gaffey's late arrival. Upon entering and seeing our group, Sen. Gaffey was concerned that he only meet with his constituents and invited us into a conference room. Upon being asked whether NHELD representatives could also attend the meeting, as sources of information rather than vehicles for debate, he declared his absolute objection to their presence, and also refused to allow taping of the meeting, deeming it "offensive." There ensued some discussion between him and Liz DePalma about the way in which the meeting was set up and the final number of attendants; whereas Liz had been expecting to meet only with the Senator, she had been informed by someone at the LOB on Friday that Sen. Gaffey was intending to have attorneys and researchers at the meeting, and therefore Liz had sought similar resources. Further, as several of the other attendants made clear, once constituents knew that someone was going to be able to meet with Senator Gaffey, they had "jumped at the chance" to meet with him, as they had been finding him unresponsive to their attempts to engage him through other means. Sen. Gaffey stated that he had only been expecting three people, but he was glad we were all there.

The discussion of SB162 began with Sen. Gaffey being asked why he had felt it necessary to change the language at all, and at whose suggestion. Sen. Gaffey repeated assertions that while Rep. O'Neill had questioned the amending of 10-184 instead of 10-220, he had not actually stated a clear objection to the new language in his meeting with him, which was "maybe 10 minutes," and that the leading Republican on the Education committee had conveyed that Rep. O'Neill was "fine" with the changes. Sen. Gaffey then stated that he did want to take Rep. O'Neill "at his word," given O'Neill's later clarification, and so was willing to concede that perhaps O'Neill had simply been unclear and his objection misunderstood. So the issue was then raised that now that it was clear that Rep. O'Neill and the entire homeschooling community objected to the new version, why he was unwilling to change it back. To this Sen. Gaffey responded that Rep. O'Neill is only one representative, unable to speak for the entire legislature. We confirmed that we understood this, but the fact remained that Rep. O'Neill had drafted SB162 in consultation with the homeschooling community, whereas Sen. Gaffey had not consulted with homeschoolers at all in changing a bill that we had initiated and that would greatly affect us.

The discussion returned to the reason for the changes. Sen. Gaffey insisted that the changes were sourced solely in the drafting attorneys and their concern that 10-184, as the current location of other withdrawal language, seemed the more appropriate place for amendment. This was met with unanimous objection from the constituents; accepting notices of withdrawal and removing children from the rolls of schools can only possibly be understood as the duties of school boards, not the duties of parents. Further it was pointed out that the new Gaffey language contains no assurance that a child will actually be deemed withdrawn and thus the exact redress being sought, that children not be inappropriately be declared truant simply for being homeschooled, was not being granted. At this Sen. Gaffey inquired whether simply adding the statement that a child would be considered withdrawn upon receipt of the letter of notice to withdraw would make the language acceptable. Constituents repeated their assertion that no change to 10-184 was going to be acceptable in this instance, as it was school boards who needed to be checked in their behavior. Addressing the concern of a staff lawyer that the amendment of 10-220 might be seen as repealing the procedure developed in 10-184 requiring parents of 16 year old drop-outs to appear in person, the suggestion was made that language be added to clarify that the O'Neill amendment did not repeal that procedure.

In the ensuing discussion it emerged that both Sen. Gaffey and the attorneys present considered the issues of withdrawal and "equivalent instruction" to be necessarily "linked" and that this was the other reason they wished 10-184 to be amended, and that perhaps we were going to have to "agree to disagree." Our response to this was that these issues are linked only if Sen. Gaffey insists that they are, and that if he is truly serious in his assertions that he wants to stop DCF investigations of innocent families now, rather than after scores more families have been affected, he needs to un-link them and revert SB162 to the simpler, original O'Neill language. If he wishes to open a discussion on the nature of equivalent instruction in another bill, that is his prerogative in another session. However, our priority for this session is to stop arbitrary harassment and abuse of families by school boards. If a parent chooses to withdraw their child from a public school for whatever reason, the school authorities must accept that notice of withdrawal, period. If there are independent signs of neglect or abuse, the law already allows for investigation of those signs.

Sen. Gaffey made statements that attempted to assure us that there was no "sinister" subtext to his version of SB162 and that he was not trying to "pull the rug out from under" what we were doing with our children. Constituents made it clear that whatever Sen. Gaffey's intentions, the manner in which he made changes to the bill (with no consultation of the homeschooling community and in apparent defiance of our stated objections to similar changes at the public hearing before the Children's Committee) and the actual content of those same changes (which render SB162 into a form completely at odds with its original purpose) could not possibly be received by homeschoolers as a kind of benign assistance. If he desires to help us stop arbitrary harassment of families by school officials, he will work to restore the original O'Neill language.

The final segment of the meeting consisted of Sen. Gaffey warning us about the shortness of the session and the likelihood that the original O'Neill language was likely to spark long debate in the House and elicit opposition from school board and DCF representatives. To these dire predictions we simply stated that families were already suffering from negative interactions with school boards and DCF; we greatly prefer, indeed welcome, the opportunity to discuss these issues in the public forum of the legislature, rather than in arbitrary, expensive and traumatic closed door proceedings in which families are forced to defend themselves against false charges and are threatened with the removal of their children. Constituents thanked Sen. Gaffey for his time and attention and left; the meeting took a little over an hour.

I am personally very grateful for everyone who accompanied Liz DePalma, Sue Cox and myself. Everyone who spoke contributed in an articulate and passionate manner, and all spoke volumes with their presence. It is my sincere hope that Sen. Gaffey will show himself to be a responsive leader and take the initiative to return SB162 to its original O'Neill language and work for its passage. He stated at various points during the meeting that he agrees that the families who have been subjected to harassment have been treated in an appalling manner. On those grounds, I hope he will make stopping that abuse immediately his first priority. Passing the original O'Neill version of SB162 will achieve that goal definitively.

Jenny Mosher