Projo 7 to 7 News Blog

Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch's office last month charged Robert Legacy with one count each of felony embezzlement, conspiracy and receiving stolen goods. Kevin Legacy is charged with larceny and conspiracy.

The sales involved desktop models and laptops and allegedly include one that happened just six months after Legacy was named in February 2007 to the $86,500-a-year job of information technology director.

The School Committee on Thursday approved freezing the IT director's and network manager's salaries at current levels. Robert Legacy is currently suspended without pay.

Meanwhile, the School Committee voted on June 25 to award a $10,800 contract to American Appraisal. Pearson said it will review the school district's inventory of computers in the aftermath of the alleged thefts.

The panel also approved creating a data manager position and a district support position, subject to funding availability. The committee put a $10,000 pay cap on the data manager position, which would be four or five hours per week, rising to 10 to 15 hours in a week where the job would be concerned with required reporting to the state Department of Education.

Pearson described the data manager and district support positions as not so much in response to the allegations brought by the police against Legacy but, rather, as part of a strategic plan that was already in place to improve technology in the school district. He noted that just a few years ago, there was no technology department in the district.

Language that was added to the information technology director description concerns non-security matters -- coordinating training for school employees and overseeing computer systems that deal with school attendance, lunch and other functions -- but also "development of policies and procedures related to computer use and network safety and security."

Pearson described the network manager and information technology director jobs, under the revisions, as splitting some duties and acting to counterbalance each other.

According to reports filed in the court case, Charles Michael Chandler, the School Department's current network manager, notified schools Supt. Donna Morelle on April 1 that he had concerns about the loss of computers, which, according to police reports, were disappearing from a secured storage room in a school district administration building that is on the Cumberland High School campus.

Kevin Legacy had worked for several months at Hub Technical Services of Massachusetts, the company that provided the 30 Hewlett-Packard laptops to Cumberland in the summer of 2008.