By Anna Pier
At the June 5 regular meeting of the Sonoma Valley Unified School District trustees, County Superintendent of Schools Dr. Amie Carter (pictured) presented a proposal for a collaborative intervention with the District, focused on two essential issues: the budget deficit and the search for a new Superintendent.
Dr. Carter stated that under AB 1240, the County Office of Education has a duty to support individual districts. She said that her team, after reflecting on what that duty entails, given the challenges Sonoma is facing, had come to offer a partnership to the Board.
The Sonoma County Office of Education (SCOE) is offering, entirely at SCOE’s expense, to have the Fiscal Crisis Management team come in to review the books, look at the fiscal health, and offer the board a report on where they are fiscally. She emphasized that this is not a state takeover. Superintendent Carter acknowledged that the District has a “hard-working CBO (Chief Business Officer Rena Seifts),” but said the proposal will ensure that the District has a concrete plan in place to stop deficit spending and meet the required minimum three percent reserve at the end of 2025.
On the question of finding a new superintendent, Dr. Carter offered extended leadership support for the Board at this time of transition. This includes support for either an EDJOIN search or working with the District’s own Human Resources department. The support is the expertise of two former superintendents, Dr. Vincent Matthews, who worked successfully for many years at the San Francisco Unified School District, and Dr. Dian Kitamura, who most recently was in Dr. Carter’s office. These advisors will serve during the transition to a new superintendent, bridge leadership, and stay in place to support that new superintendent.
An additional area of support that SCOE is offering is in communications, especially with the community.
There is unanimous appreciation among the five trustees for this partnership and support offered by the County Office of Education. To facilitate the work of this partnership, Dr. Carter requested the appointment of an ad hoc advisory committee, “less than a quorum,” of Board members. The Board voted to establish that committee as Board President Catarina Landry and Trustee David Bell. This SCOE partnership will be in force until the end of October.
In her letter to the community, Board chair Catarina Landry reported on all the support being offered by SCOE as “we navigate this period of transition and address our fiscal challenges. Their deep experience and understanding of public education will help inform our priorities and strengthen our path forward.” Landry stated that the two advisors have begun working with Acting Superintendent Seifts and the Board to establish clear areas of focus for the coming school year.
The arrangement was outlined in a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on the Agenda for approval by the trustees at their Regular Meeting on June 17.
Thank you SCOE for this positive step forward. Regrettably, it is not the initial step. Over two decades ago, the Grand Jury conducted a review of the relationship between the size of Sonoma County school districts and their operational costs. Among their findings were:
• Sonoma County has an excessive number of school districts relative to its demographics.
• Collaboration among districts can be a significant strategy for reducing costs or increasing the proportion of funds allocated to instruction.
• Consolidation and unification of school districts should be seriously considered.
Currently, we are consolidating classrooms when consolidation should be occurring at the district level. Sonoma County’s supervisors and mayors must intervene and guide the consolidation process. Failure to do so will result in another twenty years and another generation passing us by.
https://sonoma.courts.ca.gov/system/files/public.pdf
https://sonoma.courts.ca.gov/system/files/7school.pdf