Interim Superintendent Steve Betando and the Morgan Hill Unified School District’s Board of Education have ironed out a new contract for the top leader. This is the first order of business for Tuesday’s school board meeting.
The public session is scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. (following a closed session at 5 p.m.) inside the district office located at the 15600 Concord Circle.
The first public agenda item (Exhibit G-1), is listed as an action item, meaning the seven-member Board will put it to vote. It reads, “appoint and approve employment contract for Steve Betando as superintendent.”
“President (Don) Moody, as chief negotiator for the superintendent, has conferred with the Board in closed session and with Mr. Betando to present a contract for Board approval in open session at a regular meeting as required by law,” the agenda item concludes.
A draft of the actual contract, however, is not included with the agenda packet. Rather, the agenda item explains it is the Board’s discretion to determine “the scope of the search” for the hiring of a superintendent. The Board could opt to “promote from within the district or broaden the search to include both internal and external candidates.”
The Board chose to not hire a search firm and promote Betando – who was the Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources at the time – based on his performance since taking over as interim superintendent in July 2013.
Last week, sources stated that Betando was looking for a $225,000 yearly salary over a three-year term. A finalized contract, however, was not made public after four closed-door meetings between the Board of Education and Betando over the last two weeks. The last closed session with the sole purpose of negotiating the superintendent’s contract was held last week, Wednesday morning.
“During the past six months as interim superintendent, Mr. Betando has guided the district in a unified direction with the development of a Vision Mission Values statement, partnered with local government and nonprofit agencies, engaged the community in the Local Control Accountability Plan process, maintained strong employer-employee relations, collaborated with other districts for the benefit of students, maintained a district focus on increasing student achievement levels, and courageously advocated for best practices for student learning and for local control at both the state and local levels,” reads the agenda item.
The Board will also vote on contract extensions for Kirsten Perez, assistant superintendent of Business Services; Norma Martinez-Palmer, assistant superintendent of Educational Services; and Fawn Myers, assistant superintendent of Human Resources, who replaced Betando on an interim basis when he was promoted to interim superintendent in July 2013.
Six months into his one-year interim post that pays $192,000, Betando replaced outgoing Superintendent Wes Smith at a tumultuous time. In his first superintendent’s job, Betando led the charge to repel two charter school management companies petitioning to open new schools within MHUSD boundaries by fall 2014. One of these organizations – Redwood City-based Rocketship Education – withdrew its petition. The other, Gilroy-based Navigator Schools, is taking its appeal all the way to the state after MHUSD denied the petition and the County School Board upheld that position on appeal on a 4-3 vote.
