McCleary School District staff and teachers voted “no confidence” last month in district Superintendent Dan Casler and business manager Lynette Hill.
The vote came in the context of ongoing contract collective bargaining for classified staff. Teachers came to a contract agreement with the district in August.
Leslie Gasper, a regional representative for the Washington Education Association (WEA), acknowledged the vote is mostly symbolic but said several grievances have been filed against the district on behalf of both staff and teachers for bad business and management practices. She said the district has maintained a fund balance for a number of years that exceeds both the state’s recommendations and that which is typically maintained by comparably-sized school districts.
“It just gives the school board notice, and the community notice, that the staff don’t have any trust or faith that the superintendent is running the school district in an appropriate manner either financially or otherwise,” Gasper said of the no confidence vote.
According to a statement provided by Gasper, the district’s 2016-17 fund balance had carried over 16 percent, more than twice what is recommended for districts of its size. The district has $636,000 currently in reserves with more than $600,000 in additional funding coming from the state this year, according to the same statement.
“They have a very healthy ending fund balance, which means money that is not allocated to be spent in any certain way,” Gasper said.
Gasper went on to say that the district has not run its local levy at the highest rate possible, meaning it’s not collecting all the tax revenues it could. The district’s claims that the implementation of EHB (educational house bill) 2242, which deals with reforms to the state’s educational funding system, may result in a loss of funds to the district are spurious, she added.
“This is really the first year that they’ve gone in and asked for money, and they’re asking for a very modest amount that the district could easily fund with their very large fund balance,” Gasper said of the staff demands.
Superintendent Dan Casler declined to address most of the Gasper’s specific claims, saying he would look to draft a statement in answer to the WEA in the near future with the help of the school board. He said the district is in the position of contract bargaining while simultaneously trying to understand the implications of EHB 2242. He emphasized the questions surrounding what implementation of the legislation will look like in practice.
“What’s importance in all this for us is that there is tremendous uncertainty. … It is very, very uncertain what funding, in the end, is going to come into school districts,” Casler said. “Until you actually see that funding come through from the state, based on your current enrollment, you don’t know what your budget is. We’ve been fortunate to have a fairly healthy fund balance. Given a tremendous amount of uncertainty, we’re worried.”
According to Casler, the figures presented by WEA are not completely accurate and are based on past projections that don’t fully incorporate current legislative changes. He said the district has not run its levy at the highest rate in part because district taxpayers are also currently paying on a school construction bond and the levy will be a matter of school board discussion going forward.
Asked about the salaries of McCleary’s classified staff as compared to districts of a similar size, Casler said negotiations are ongoing and that nothing has yet been finalized.
“As far as bargaining goes, we will come to an agreement and it will work. And it will be fair,” he said.
On the effect of the vote of no confidence Casler said, “I think the net impact of how those sorts of choices impact the community will speak for itself. I think the community expects us to be financially responsible and serve kids first. I’m in no place to want to portray our staff, our kids, anybody, in a way that’s going to hurt our community.”
