LITTLE ROCK — In his last regular meeting as a Little Rock School Board member, Mike Daugherty on Thursday tried to win a two-year contract extension for Superintendent Linda Watson, whose contract is set to expire at the end of this 2010-11 school year.
However, no vote was taken on the proposed extension after other board members argued that it would be necessary to suspend the rules to amend the board’s meeting agenda. Suspension of the rules to amend the agenda requires at least five board members to vote affirmatively.
The issue of Watson’s contract came up during a meeting in which the board voted 6-1 for a 2010-11 budget of $352 million and approved the refinancing of an $82 million bond issue at a 3.625 percent interest rate. The refinancing will generate savings of $11.9 million that can be used for capital-improvement projects in the district.
Daugherty, who was defeated Tuesday in his bid for re-election to a three year board term, made the motion to extend Watson’s contract when fellow board member Baker Kurrus urged the board to quickly establish a process for finding a successor to Watson by June 30, when her con-tract expires.
Kurrus, who was also serving at his last regular meeting before he is replaced, had asked earlier this month that the matter be put on the board’s agenda. On Thursday, he said he thought the community should be involved in what he believed should be a national search for a chief executive.
“We need systematic, deep change,” Kurrus said. “We are in a period of decline. It’s slow, but it’s steady. We continue not to reach kids who need to be reached, and we continue to lose kids who have choices and options. We need a process that involves community input. Do we want to stay on the path we are on? Do we want to continue to do the things we’ve been doing? Some people do. I don’t. People will have different opinions, and they are all important. We need a process that needs to be initiated soon.”
Daugherty responded by making the motion for the extension that was seconded by board member Katherine Mitchell.
“I see Dr. Watson and the work that she has done. I see where we were and where we have come in such a short time,” Daugherty said as some members of the audience applauded.
Daugherty made a similar motion for a one-year extension earlier this summer that was defeated in a 4-3 vote.
Kurrus objected that the motion didn’t conform to the agenda item and that a suspension of the rules was necessary to vote on the extension.
Board President Charles Armstrong called a break in the meeting to check the rules for board procedure. When he returned, Daugherty withdrew his motion. Armstrong then asked that the board move into an executive session, but no board member made the motion to do so. The board instead took a break and, upon returning, moved on to other agenda items.
Kurrus’ calls for change carried over into the board’s discussion of the new budget.
The district is projecting total revenue, including federal grants, of nearly $349 million and anticipating total expenses of more than $352 million, which includes a one-time debt repayment. The district is projected to end the school year with total reserves of $23 million.
This year’s budget, which is due at the Arkansas Department of Education by Sept. 30, includes an experience step increase of about 3 percent for all eligible employees for their additional year of work experience. There is a $2,000 stipend for teachers who have reached the top of the pay schedule and are ineligible for the step increase.
The new budget does not include an across-the-board pay raise for employees that could come during the course of the year. Last year, a raise was approved at midyear that was retroactive to the beginning of the school year. That consisted of a 1.25 percent raise for teachers, 2 percent for bus drivers, custodians, food service workers and aides, and 1 percent for other personnel groups.
The budget reflects a 2.1 percent increase in revenue from state sources. That includes a $118 per student increase in state foundation funding and a loss of $35 per student in the state’s enhanced education funding. There is a projected 0.9 percent increase in local revenue.
The district is projected to receive a total of $98.9 million in federal funds, compared with actual federal funding this past year of $65.5 million. The increase is the result of increases in the federal grants, a projected $59.8 million this year as compared with $27 million in actual funding this past year. The increase is partly the result of anticipated, one-time federal stimulus funding to the district.
Kurrus, who earlier in the meeting called on the district to forgo a litany of academic programs and instead raise starting teacher salaries to a more competitive $40,000 a year, called the annual spending plan an “inertia budget.”
“We don’t identify revenues and expenses relative to students,” he said. “Ultimately, in order for this budget process to be comprehensible, we have to have clearly articulated goals and decide how we should accomplish those goals and what resources we need to do that and then we need to spend money on those things and those things alone.
“Right now all we do is an inertia budget. It’s last year’s budget plus anything, less anything that flies in the room. The numbers add up but they don’t make sense to somebody who wants to understand what our mission is.”
He said the district is “awash” in money, in part from federal stimulus funds and other grant money, but that kind of funding won’t continue.
Board members Melanie Fox and Jody Carreiro also had concerns about the budget’s failure to show direct links to academic achievement goals.
“We’ve got to start integrating our organizational planning, our improvement planning and our budget planning. Until we have that linkage, our day-to-day work is going to be disconnected from our strategic plan,” Fox said.
Arkansas, Pages 9 on 09/24/2010