From the Echoes-Sentinel

WARREN TWP. – New leadership and the swearing in of two new board members marked the Watchung Hills Regional High School Board of Education reorganization meeting on Tuesday, Jan. 4.

Board member Robert Morrison of Warren Township was unanimously elected president by his peers.

Morrison initially joined the board in January 2014. He was previously elected board president in 2017. Morrison proceeded to earn a rare honor in 2019, being awarded the Certified Board Leader recognition by the New Jersey School Boards Association.

Board Vice President Susan Ober of Long Hill was sworn-in for another three-year term after earning re-election in the Nov. 2 general election. She was again named vice president at the reorganization meeting, also via unanimous vote.

Ober joined the board in October 2018, serving the remainder of an unexpired term.

New board members Catherine Leigh of Watchung and Daniel Gallic of Warren Township were sworn into the high school board on Jan. 4. They both won three-year seats in the Nov. 2 general election as write-in candidates.

Leigh currently serves on the Watchung traffic and beautification commission.

Along with serving as Warren Township Planning Board chairman, Gallic is the managing member and founder of Gallic Development and Land Planning, which acquires and sells residential real estate. He also chairs the technology board for Visit Mexico and is the chairman on the board of directors for To The Moon Ventures, a company that offers trading platforms, services and expertise in the Cryptocurrency industry.

Gallic is now a member of the board that roughly three years ago he was litigating against.

In 2019, Gallic was involved in a lawsuit against the Watchung Hills Board of Education for including “Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic” in its 12th grade English curriculum.

The lawsuit was filed by Gallic, his son, Emmett Gallic, a 2018 Watchung Hills graduate who was assigned the book as a 17-year-old senior, Green Brook resident Doreen Blanchard-Gliebe and Warren resident Tristin Goode.

The group called on the high school to remove “Fun Home” from its curriculum, and alleged that in assigning the material to the then-17-year-old Emmett Gallic, it distributed “obscene material” to a minor.

The suit was filed in April 2019. State Superior Court Judge Margaret Goodzeit, sitting in Somerville, granted the school district’s motion to dismiss the suit in June 2019, and denied the plaintiffs’ request for injunctive relief to remove the book from the 12th grade English curriculum.

The 2022 board committee assignments were tabled at the reorganization meeting. Business Administrator Timothy Stys said the board president typically takes input and assigns them “usually by the next meeting but sometimes in February.”