Uproar over contract

MARYSVILLE — In one of its last acts before three of its members are replaced, the Marysville School Board voted under heavy criticism Monday night to extend Superintendent Linda Whitehead’s contract for a third year.

Unknown to the overflow crowd was the fact that the embattled superintendent’s $130,000 contract was included as part of a revised consent agenda, meaning it was included with several routine items voted on simultaneously at the beginning of the meeting.

News that the vote had been taken before public testimony infuriated many in the audience who often jeered after school board members spoke.

"Unmitigated gall," said diana Mackin, a Marysville mother with two children in the schools who does not capitalize the first letter in her first name.

Teri Tyo, a co-founder of AIMS, a district watchdog group formed during the strike, questioned whether the community can heal after repeated unpopular decisions from the board, including the contract extension.

"You just guaranteed she would be paid another $130,000," Tyo said. "I want to know what you are getting out of this. You are not giving our community what they are asking for. What you have done is you guaranteed that more money out of an already strained budget will have to come out of this pocket in order to heal our community. How can you sleep at night?"

Whitehead and the existing school board came under fire during the recent 49-day teachers strike, the longest in state history. Incumbents Mark Johnson, Cary Peterson and Erik Olson all soundly lost their re-election campaigns Nov. 4.

Johnson said after the meeting that the superintendent’s contract extensions have been routinely handled as part of the consent agenda in the past.

Newly elected board members Carol Jason, Vicki Gates and Michael Kundu, who take office Dec. 1, wanted the existing board to let them decide whether to extend Whitehead’s contract.

District critics said they are troubled by events that have happened since the existing board evaluated Whitehead in the spring. Among other things, the strike further damaged relations between teachers and the district office, enrollment plummeted as families pulled children from the district during the strike and a scathing state audit was released. Also, the district still doesn’t have contracts with its teachers and many of its other employees.

Helen Mount, the school board president, said the board gave Whitehead high marks in an evaluation in March but had not gotten around to formally taking the vote to extend her contract.

Jason said afterward she thought the board made a mistake.

"They really thumbed their nose at the community," Jason said, adding that she didn’t think it was financially responsible. She questioned whether the district can pass bonds to build and renovate schools with Whitehead as superintendent. Jason also said the new board will look at the legal obligations of Whitehead’s contract.

Sherley Chester, a Marysville resident with a son in the schools, called for Whitehead’s dismissal and said the administration is overpaid. She also requested resignations from school board members Mount and Ronald Young, who were not up for election this year.

"You have not thwarted our efforts…." she said. "You guys should be ashamed of yourselves."

Although it had not taken a formal vote, Mount said the board made Whitehead the extension offer after her evaluation and during a retreat in March.

"While there may not be a clear legal obligation, there was an ethical obligation when you make an offer," Mount said after the meeting.

She said the board became preoccupied with financial issues over the summer when it should have extended Whitehead’s contract. Otherwise, "this would have come before us, probably late July, early August, for a formal vote," she said.

Typically, superintendents in the state are given three-year contracts when they are hired. After that, the contracts are extended each year.

Superintendents are rarely fired, because their contracts include a provision for "just cause," which provides legal protection, said experts familiar with superintendent contracts. More often, they leave their districts when the school board doesn’t extend their contracts for the third year or they reach a buyout settlement.

Whitehead said last week that she felt the board made "a verbal commitment" to extend her contract, which pays about $130,000 a year. The previous board set her goals, and she achieved them, she said.

Whitehead was not at Monday’s meeting. Mount said she had been excused because she had a speaking engagement elsewhere.

At the end of the meeting, Johnson and Olson wished new board members well in meeting the challenges the district will face in the years ahead.

Of particular concern to Johnson is the large percentage of the district’s high school students, estimated between a quarter and one-third, who do not graduate. It will be particularly daunting with state exams on the horizon in a few years that students will need to pass to graduate, he said.

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