Resident Flags $318,000 in Capital Construction Expenses Charged to Routine School Maintenance Account
Formal requests urge the town auditor to intervene as financial records disappear from the newly redesigned Board of Education website.
A formal request has been submitted to Sherman’s chief executive and municipal auditor to investigate hundreds of thousands of dollars in school construction costs that have been charged to the Board of Education’s general operating fund.
In a detailed letter dated July 7, 2026, a Sherman resident formally notified First Selectman Don Lowe and Town Auditor David Cappelletti of a severe accounting discrepancy regarding the $50 million school building project. According to the documented complaint, a routine Board of Education maintenance sub-account with an allocated budget of $14,675 is currently carrying more than $318,000 in actual and encumbered expenses.
Itemized Construction Costs
The documentation provided to the town identifies approximately $281,000 of these overruns as direct capital construction costs, rather than routine operating expenses. The itemized charges absorbed by the education budget include the installation of temporary electrical and heating systems, water service relocations, temporary demising walls, and general carpentry required to open the temporary school facilities.
The resident's letter warns that charging building project expenses to the general fund obscures the true cost of the voter-approved capital project and effectively shifts the financial burden of construction overruns onto the town's education budget.
Calls for Auditor Intervention
With the 2025-2026 fiscal year finalizing, the complaint explicitly requests that Lowe, acting in his combined capacities as First Selectman, Chairman of the Board of Finance, and a member of the School Building Committee, direct the town’s auditor to review the charges.
The resident formally requested that Cappelletti and Clermont & Associates ensure all building-project-related expenses are removed from the school's general operating fund and correctly charged to the voter-approved capital project accounts before the books are closed.
Removal of Public Records
The formal inquiry also highlighted a simultaneous reduction in public transparency regarding the Board of Education's financial documentation. According to the July 7 letter, the Board of Education recently launched a redesigned website that no longer hosts the public financial records necessary to track these expenditures.
The agendas, minutes, enrollment reports, and the specific monthly budget status reports that originally revealed the maintenance-account overruns are no longer accessible on the site. The resident formally requested that the First Selectman direct the Board of Education to restore the missing financial documents to the public domain.
Despite previous notifications regarding these specific misallocations sent in September 2025 and March 2026, the administration has yet to provide evidence that any corrective accounting action has been taken.
Sources & Further Reading
- FOIA Documents:March 2026 Sequestered BOS & Missing Budget Workshop minutes
- FOIA Documents:BOE Repairs & Maintenance Invoices & Purchase Orders
- Sherman School Board [Deleted]Agendas & Minutes
Update: Administration and Board of Education Response
July 24, 2026
On Thursday, July 23, Sherman CT News submitted formal press inquiries to First Selectman Don Lowe, Superintendent Dr. Pat Cosentino LLaVia, Town Auditor David Cappelletti, and Board of Education members Matt Vogt, Tim Laughlin, and Matt Frey.
The officials were offered the opportunity to provide on-the-record clarification regarding the $281,259 in sole-source school construction expenses charged directly to a $14,675 BOE routine maintenance account, the resulting inflation of the education budget baseline, and the abrupt removal of historical budget reports and meeting minutes from the redesigned Board of Education website.
Despite being given a deadline of Friday, July 24 at the close of business, all officials chose absolute silence and declined to address these documented discrepancies or account for taxpayer funds to the public.
Sherman CT News remains committed to transparency and will publish their unedited responses in full should they choose to address the public regarding these findings.