Despite concerns from one member, the Montezuma-Cortez Re-1 School Board is moving forward with an aggressively speedy process for hiring a new district superintendent.
At a special meeting Thursday night that lasted more than two hours, the board hashed out a job description and salary range for the person who will replace current Superintendent Tom Burris. He announced his resignation at the board’s regular meeting Sept. 16, saying he would give them 60 days to find a replacement.
The timeline now calls for applications to be taken until Sept. 29, a board subcommittee to then select one or more finalists, the community to have a 14-day period to give feedback, and the board to vote on hiring someone at its regular meeting on Oct. 21 – before the Nov. 4 board election.
Jason Hall, who was appointed to the board at the Sept. 16 meeting to fill a vacancy in District C, said during Thursday’s meeting that the timeframe is too short.
He noted that five of seven board positions are up for election and the new superintendent will have to work with the newly elected board.
Hall and Mike Lynch are the only two people currently on the board who will definitely remain on it, because their districts aren’t up for election this year.
Incumbents Tiffany Cheney, Leland Collins, and Ed Rice are running for re-election. Current board President Sheri Noyes is term-limited, and Paul Beckler is not seeking re-election.
The races are contested in all but one of the five open seats.
On Thursday, Hall repeatedly argued that the decision about who will succeed Burris should be up to the new board.
“The community will vote in November and ultimately it is the community’s decision to choose a board and that board chooses a superintendent,” he said.
Hall sought to make a motion to extend the process past Burris’s 60-day schedule, voicing concern that the district may not get as many qualified applicants with the speedy timeline.
But Lynch said it’s the group’s responsibility to take on tasks and duties when they come before it.
“It’s our duty to do the job because it came to us before the election,” Lynch said. “It’s the duty of the new board to do the work that comes before that board.”
Lynch said if not enough good candidates apply during the current timeframe, a new hiring process can be launched.
Burris has said that if a new superintendent can’t be hired within 60 days, he will remain in the job.
Lynch also noted that the timeline was not on Thursday night’s agenda, saying it therefore could not be voted on and should not even be discussed.
In response to questions from Hall, Lynch said the timeline was developed by the district’s lawyer, the administration, and two board members.
Hall asked why the entire board wasn’t involved in drafting the timeline.
Lynch said if more than two members were present, that would entail an actual meeting, which would therefore have to be public.
“Shouldn’t we have done it as a board?” Hall asked.
He repeated that he thought that 60 days was not enough time, saying that an interim superintendent could be hired until the end of the school year, which is when Burris’s contract runs out.
He asked whether the district will have to pay Burris through the end of June even if someone else has been hired.
Noyes said that Burris has told her he only wants to be paid through the day that he leaves, though she could not guarantee that that might not change.
Hall repeatedly said that the speed of the process might cut down on the number of people who apply.
“The fact that we’re going so fast seems like we don’t have enough time to find. . . as many qualified people,” he said.
Hall also said that trying to find someone in the middle of a school year means they’ll mostly receive applications from people coming out of retirement, because superintendents don’t want to abandon a district mid-year.
But Lynch said having multiple candidates may not be necessary.
“We don’t have to have more than one [qualified] candidate,” he said. “I feel pretty confident we’ll have one in this time frame.”
Cheney agreed, saying, “I feel we’ll just have to make 60 days work.”
Hall said he would like to be able to find someone who will stay in the position for a fair amount of time. Burris has been superintendent for three and a half years.
But Noyes and Justin Schmitt, the executive director of human resources, said superintendents typically don’t stay in one place for a long time, even in other districts. He said they often leave because boards change and priorities change.
Noyes said she’s worked with four different superintendents during her ten years on the Re-1 board.
The group also debated whether to seek to hire someone internal to the district rather than an outsider, with Cheney saying it would be good to have someone familiar with the district and its issues.
Lynch, however, said hiring someone from within the district who doesn’t have previous experience as a superintendent would mean “we would lose two years while the superintendent learns to be a superintendent.”
Schmitt commented, “This is not an easy position. . . . This is a challenging position.”
The board finally decided to change the draft job description so that, instead of three years’ experience as a district superintendent being a requirement, superintendent experience will become a preference, and three years will not be specified.
They also made some other changes to the draft job description, stated that the start date for the job would be negotiable, and set the salary at $155,000 to $180,000 annually, with perks negotiable.
The subcommittee that was selected to review the applications and make recommendations to the board will consist of board members Noyes, Lynch, and Collins; Schmitt; and HR generalist Rhonda Tracy.
