Friends with Benefits

Before this blog, I experienced several years of impotent frustration dealing with our superintendent and other board members. Those of you who have reading along from the beginning (Thank You!) may remember that there were two issues that provoked me into starting the blog last summer - the closing of the teen parent center and the renegotiation of the superintendent's contract. The latter issue has returned to bite us once again.

The board chair (Susan Stoops) and vice chair (Traci Hamilton) negotiated with the superintendent for the board. The rest of the board got to see the new contract just minutes before they were to approve it. The discussion at the time focused on changes regarding possible termination of the superintendent's contract. For details of that discussion you can see my blog posts from July and also the minutes of the July board meeting which can be found under "School Board" on the district website.

One issue I have no memory of even having been mentioned is the "cash out" for the supposedly unused vacation days. Under the old contract, the superintendent was entitled to receive a cash payment in lieu of up to ten vacation days each year. As I have reported elsewhere on this blog, it is my contention that he has been taking the days off but not reporting it so that he could also receive the cash out. That was bad enough. According to the new contract language he is now allowed to cash out any unused vacation days - up to the max of 22 days. The only reference to this issue in the official minutes of the meeting says "The vacation language is updated to what other employee groups" (p. 4 Board Meeting Minutes 1/12/10). This statement makes no sense because 1) it is an incomplete sentence whose meaning is unclear, and 2) no other employees receive the cash out option.

I don't think board members really noticed the change in language since it is very close to that in the old contract. How could they? They only got to see the new contract at the meeting where they were being asked to approve it. Why didn't the chair and vice-chair, who had been part of the negotiations, make sure to point it out? Why didn't the chair make sure that other board members had a chance to see the contract in advance and review it carefully? The whole thing smacks of trickery and collusion between the chairs and the superintendent. The contract was approved by a vote of 4-3. Stoops, Hamilton, Ramirez, and Plude voted in favor; Evans, Shellenbarger, and Zehner voted against.

And what has been the result? The superintendent cashed out 80 hours of vacation at the end of June at an approximate cost to the district of $4,723. Those 80 hours represent the maximum he was allowed under the old contract which ended on June 30. And now he has cashed out an additional 90 hours (actual cost: $5, 313.60). The timing is also very interesting. The latest cash out occurred on January 21 a few weeks after the investigator's report on my complaint (part of which involved the vacation issue) had been received but not yet seen by most of the board and within days of new complaints apparently being received (based on the agenda of the last two hastily arranged executive sessions).

So here we are in the most serious economic crisis in our lifetimes, the district is facing massive cuts that will seriously impact teachers and students, and the board votes to give him thousands of dollars more in "hidden" compensation. Remember that when Susan Stoops says she is "doing the right things for the district." Remember that when they say "regrettably" that they just don't have money for a performance audit. Remember that when we ask you to sign a recall petition.