PHOENIX — Taxpayer money is being paid out to Arizona school superintendents after their school boards dismiss them early.
Most recently, the Phoenix Elementary School District voted 3-2 to dismiss their current superintendent. She was only with the district for just over a year.
During a board meeting, Reggie Carrillo, a board member who voted against it, said they’d have to pay out more than $330,000.
“That money is still going to climb to part ways with the superintendent and it is unreasonable,” Carrillo said in the board meeting in mid-November.
Superintendent Ibi Davila Haghighat was put on leave and now joins a list of other superintendents who were dismissed before their contracts were up.
Paul Tighe, the executive director of the Arizona School Administrators, says that money typically comes from the maintenance and operations budget, which is the operating budget of a school district.
That money helps fund teacher salaries, benefits and oftentimes different academic offerings such as music, art and physical education electives.
“Ultimately, that takes away from other educational purposes, which is unfortunate, and perhaps fiscally irresponsible when boards terminate superintendents who are doing well in their jobs, so there's no cause for termination,” Tighe said.
In Apache Junction, the district had to pay out its superintendent more than $96,000. The board voted 3-2 in April to part ways with Heather Wallace. There was public outcry over the move even though the board agenda item said it was a “mutual agreement.”
“They're going to say that this was a mutual decision but it was not,” Bobby Bauders said in April. Bauders is an Apache Junction Unified School board member who voted against cutting ties with Wallace.
Casa Grande Union High School District and former superintendent Anna Battle had a severance agreement that paid her out more than $358,000.
Last year, Dysart Unified School District paid out then-superintendent Quinn Kellis around $312,000.
In Arizona public education, every dollar counts as the state has among the lowest per-pupil spending in the nation.
The changes in a school district’s top leaders could also have an impact in classrooms.
“It is concerning when there is a high turnover in leadership positions because it does have an adverse impact on student learning,” Tighe said, adding that sometimes if a superintendent does leave, so do some other administrators and in turn teachers as well.
It’s also become difficult to help fill superintendent positions with qualified people.
“In challenging educational times, we need the best and brightest leading our school districts,” Tighe continued. “It’s harder to recruit and retain them when they have to be fearful of their jobs for no performance reasons, more for political reasons.”
In the recent superintendent separations ABC15 has covered, board members who voted yes did not give reasons why. When reaching out to school district officials regarding the separations, districts often say it’s a confidential personnel matter that cannot be discussed.
“It’s within their legal prerogative if you get a majority of the board to vote for something then that’s the action on behalf of the school district,” Tighe added.