The School Committee was expected to address the situation with Member Donna Wood Pruitt late Tuesday night at its regular meeting, with sources close to the situation saying they would likely call for her resignation.
Already Mayor Dan Rizzo (who is also the chair of the School Committee) has publicly called for Pruitt to resign.
Rizzo confirmed that to the Journal, but had no further comment until after the meeting. Sources said the mayor had submitted a letter to other School Committee members detailing his rationale in calling for her to resign.
“The Committee will be taking a vote Tuesday night to ask for her resignation,†said the source close to the situation that requested anonymity. “I think there’s momentum on the Committee that this has to be done. It would be a major change in thinking if it were not to hit the agenda.â€
Wood Pruitt has been on the School Committee for more than a decade and was planning on running again for re-election this year.
Last week, Revere Police reported that Wood Pruitt had been summonsed to court in June for charges of selling a Class E drug to an undercover officer.
Class E substances are non-narcotic and are typically medications.
Wood Pruitt told the Journal that she had sold her and her husband’s diabetes and cholesterol medication to an undercover officer who was brought to her home by a family friend.
Wood Pruitt had briefly posted the medications for sale on her Facebook page, but said she took it down very quickly when she was told that was permitted.
When the family friend contacted her about the medications, she said she didn’t want them to go to waste, so she sold them to the friend and another man with him. That man turned out to be an undercover police officer.
The medication was left over, she said, because her doctor had suddenly taken her off the medications.
Were there to be a vacancy in the Committee, state law prescribes that within 30 days a joint meeting of the School Committee and City Council must meet to select the runner up from the last election. In this case, were Wood Pruitt to leave the Committee, the runner up would be former School Committeeman Fred Sannella.
