Baldwin High School Principal Resigns

Kevin O'Toole Resigns

Baldwin High School Principal Kevin O'Toole resigned this week following a lengthy leave of absence.

O'Toole, the principal at Baldwin High since 2011, has been absent from the Baldwin-Whitehall School District since January when the B-W School Board granted him a leave that lasted throughout the spring semester.

The school board accepted O'Toole's resignation on Wednesday evening by an 8-0 vote. (Board member Larry Pantuso was absent.)

District officials have not publicly said why O'Toole was away for five months or why he resigned.

John L. Wolicki, a Latrobe-area resident, was hired in March by the school board as Baldwin's interim principal and was paid $350 per day.

District officials have yet to comment on whether or not Wolicki or someone else will serve as a permanent replacement for O'Toole.

Ed Lawrence Resigns

Wednesday night was also one of district solicitor Ed Lawrence's final school board meetings. Lawrence's resignation goes into effect on June 30, and board members said that they were sad to see him go.

Lawrence, who is in his 70s, has worked with the B-W School District since the 1970s following a teachers strike.

"I've learned so much from him ... and we've gone head to head on lots of issues," board President Nancy Sciulli DiNardo said. "And I'd like to think I've kept his heart pumping many a Wednesday night, but I learned a lot from him."

The district's student board representatives also bid Lawrence farewell, with one of the students referring to the solicitor as "really cool."

"I've heard him called a lot of things, but tonight was the first time I've heard him called 'cool,' of all things," board Vice President Kevin J. Fischer said, eliciting laughter from Lawrence's family members, who were in the audience during the meeting.

Lawrence gave no public reason in May for his resignation and told the Baldwin-Whitehall Patch that he had no comment on the matter.

A Whitehall Borough resident, Lawrence works for numerous school districts as a representative of Tucker|Arensberg Attorneys, but he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in a 2011 article that "Baldwin-Whitehall is (his) district."