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After the Asbury Park Board of Education failed to renew teacher and administrator contracts for the 2012-2013 school year, the decision is in state fiscal monitor Lester Richens’s hands.

The contract renewal was up for a vote at last night’s board of education meeting. Board members were unable to publicly discuss the contracts in detail because this qualifies as a personnel matter, which is only to be discussed in private executive session.

Those employees whose names were not on the renewal list are effectively terminated. The superintendent is required to notify them by May 15 that their contracts have not been renewed, said board attorney Michael Gross. If they are not notified by that date, they “will be deemed to be renewed on May 16 whether the board acts or not,” he said.

Board member Angela Ahbez-Anderson moved that two tenured employees and two non-tenured employees be removed from the contract renewal list and tabled until a future meeting. Those employees’ names were not disclosed. After a vote, this motion did not carry.

Only four board members voted to approve the renewal list, while two abstained. Because passage requires five votes, the motion did not carry.

State fiscal monitor Richens then spoke up, saying he has the authority to overrule the board on this matter and would give the board a decision by Friday.

Richens could not immediately be reached for comment.

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