First Records Arrive Free: A Settlement Records Project Update

Tantasqua Regional produced 45 pages of settlement records for nothing — while Dracut demanded $2,950 for 45 agreements it says it found. The project’s first production is published, the tracker grew new columns, and the fee gap is now data.

The Numbers First

• 65 Massachusetts school districts have received the same standardized public-records request for final student settlement agreements.
• 18 districts have acknowledged receipt as of September 25, 2026.
• 1 production of actual records has arrived — the first of the entire project — and it is published, reviewed, and free to download.
• 4 districts have responded with fee estimates instead of records: $75, $150, $300, and $2,950.
• 120 hours is the largest fee claim on the board — Dracut’s, for the same request Tantasqua filled without charging a cent.
• 0 dollars was charged by Tantasqua Regional School District, the only district so far to hand over the records themselves.
• 45 pages of responsive documents came out of Tantasqua’s production: nine separate settlement agreements and mediation agreements, spanning 2022 through 2026, plus a staff retirement agreement that had no business in the envelope.
• 45 agreements is how many responsive agreements Dracut says it found — and it will not let anyone see them until $2,950 arrives.

Tantasqua: The First Production, and the One Nobody Paid For

On September 25, 2026, an email arrived from Kim Andre, Benefits Coordinator for the Tantasqua Regional School District and Union 61. No fee estimate. No payment demand. No invoice with a line for “segregation.” Attached was the thing the whole project has been asking sixty-five districts to produce: 45 pages of final, executed settlement and resolution agreements, dated from November 2022 through early 2026, resolving student special-education disputes at the BSEA and with the district directly.

Before posting, every page was reviewed for student personally identifiable information. The published copy is the reviewed version — PII-reviewed public copy (PDF). The district’s own file is not published; the reviewed copy is.

The production contains nine separate documents: a confidential settlement agreement funding placement at the Bancroft School, an agreement with Sturbridge and Grafton over a Futures placement, a three-year White Oak settlement, three BSEA mediation agreements from November 2022 through February 2026, a settlement funding Eagle Hill summer programming from October 2025, a 2023 Eagle Hill settlement, and a memorandum of agreement from October 2024. Names of students and parents were checked line by line before publication.

One item deserves attention: the production included a staff retirement agreement, although the request expressly excluded staff and employment records. It is published as received in the district’s production, and it is flagged here for transparency. The request asked for student-related agreements only; the retirement agreement of a district employee is not that. Tantasqua appears to have included it in error — the same error in the other direction that a $2,950 fee estimate is, just cheaper for the requester.

The Fee Spread: Four Districts, Four Prices, Same Request

• Dracut: $2,950. A letter dated September 23 from Supt. Steven Stone, received September 25, says the district identified 45 agreements as responsive and estimates 120 hours of work for search, segregation and redaction at $25 an hour — the first two hours free. Records are produced only upon payment, and per-page printing charges are extra.
• Peabody: $300. A response letter from RAO Lily Bettencourt with an invoice attached claims 14 hours for search, segregation, redaction and production at $25 an hour, the first two free. Work begins upon receipt of payment.
• Pentucket: $150. An itemized estimate from Alyson Tedeschi: 2.0 hours of search and compilation at $50, plus 4.0 hours of review and redaction at $100. Production within ten business days of payment.
• Berlin-Boylston: $75 — three hours at $25 an hour, itemized, and the first fee estimate of the project. The district denied the project’s public-interest fee waiver in writing on September 24.
• Amesbury: $750 for thirty hours, under appeal to the Supervisor of Public Records since September 23.

Same standardized request. Same statutory rate. Five districts, five prices, spanning $75 to $2,950 — a factor of nearly forty between the cheapest estimate and the dearest. And one district that charged nothing at all, because Tantasqua read the request, gathered 45 pages, and sent them.

The Tracker Grew New Columns

The Massachusetts Student Settlement Records Project tracker now shows four more fields per district: the date a district acknowledged the request, any fee estimate and the hours claimed behind it, and a records column that links straight to published productions. The records library has its first entry, and the fee column turns what used to be prose in a note into sortable data. Check the board before you send your own request — your district may already have a price on it.

What This Means for Parents

• The first records are free. Tantasqua’s 45-page production is published in full. If your child’s dispute is one of the nine agreements in it, the terms are now readable by anyone — no fee, no request of your own required.
• Prices vary wildly, and now they are visible. $75 to $2,950 for the same request, and $0 for the only district that actually produced records. Check the tracker’s fee column before paying any district’s estimate.
• Hours claimed are a negotiating signal. Dracut claims 120 hours for 45 agreements — 2.7 hours per document. Tantasqua delivered nine comparable documents with no hours claim at all. If a district’s estimate arrives with a bare total, ask for the itemization and compare it against the board.
• A production can contain records you did not ask for. Tantasqua’s envelope included a staff retirement agreement despite the request’s express exclusion. Review any production you receive against the scope of your request — and note the district’s error in writing.
• Acknowledge dates are now tracked. Eighteen districts have acknowledged; 37 have not. If your district is on the wrong side of that split, the tracker is evidence that the question exists and has gone unanswered.

Sources

• Kim Andre, Benefits Coordinator, Tantasqua Regional School District/Union 61, email of September 25, 2026, attaching the 45-page production; production published in PII-reviewed form.
• Dracut Public Schools, letter dated September 23, 2026 from Supt. Steven Stone, received September 25, 2026, identifying 45 responsive agreements and estimating 120 hours at $25/hr; self-hosted PDF linked from the project tracker.
• Peabody Public Schools, response letter from RAO Lily Bettencourt with invoice, September 25, 2026, estimating 14 hours at $25/hr; self-hosted PDF linked from the project tracker.
• Pentucket Regional School District, fee estimate from Alyson Tedeschi, September 25, 2026, itemizing 2.0 hours search/compilation and 4.0 hours review/redaction at $25/hr.
• Berlin-Boylston Regional School District, written denial of public-interest fee waiver, September 24, 2026.
• Massachusetts Public Records Law, G.L. c. 66, § 10; 950 C.M.R. 32.00.
• Champa v. Weston Public Schools, 473 Mass. 86 (2015).
• Massachusetts Student Settlement Records Project tracker, current as of September 25, 2026: 65 districts, 18 acknowledged, 37 awaiting first response, 4 routed or re-sent, 4 fee-estimate responses, 1 appeal filed, 1 production published.

The project is a parent-led transparency effort, and it runs on reader requests. If your district is not on the tracker yet, request it.