Editorial rebuttal: Misleading statements regarding PUSD chief’s contract

By Todd Gutschow

Recently, this newspaper and several other media outlets have made statements regarding the proposed contract extension for Poway Unified School District Superintendent John Collins. Several of these statements are either misleading and/or untrue.

Perhaps the most serious of these erroneous statements is the one suggesting that the proposed contract extension provides a large raise for Dr. Collins. This is absolutely false. It is true that the proposed contract extension increases Dr. Collins base salary. However, it also eliminates the retirement service credit provision of his current contract. The net impact of these two changes results in Dr. Collins taking a pay cut, not a raise, under the proposed contract extension.

It has also been suggested that the public did not have an opportunity to provide input on the superintendent’s evaluation and contract. In fact, since the board began its work on this matter in July 2013, the superintendent’s evaluation has been on our agenda 10 times prior to the March 17 regular board meeting. This includes every regular board meeting between August and February. At each of these 10 meetings, public comment was available and yet not a single person provided input to the board.

The March 24 special board meeting has been described as hastily scheduled in an attempt to limit community input on the superintendent’s proposed contract extension. While the board was pleased to hear input from the community, the purpose of this meeting was to address concerns raised by some board members over the language in a few sections of the contract. These concerns were the reason the contract was pulled from the March 17 regular board meeting agenda. The board needed to address these concerns prior to the next regular board meeting on April 23. This could only be accomplished by calling a special board meeting. Given board member schedules and the district spring break, March 24 was the best date to hold this meeting.

Finally, the question has been raised as to why the board is considering a contract extension at this time. The answer is twofold. First, the board has been working on this extension since last September when we concluded the superintendent’s annual performance review. In an effort to make the contract easier to understand and more transparent, we chose to re-write it rather than simply extend the current contract. Second, all organizations be they private sector, public sector, or non-profits use a variety of mechanisms such as contract extensions, executive bonuses, and stock vesting to retain their high performing CEOs. Extending Dr. Collins’ contract at this time will accomplish this for PUSD.

We have so many wonderful things happening in our district that we sometimes take them for granted. Rising test scores, increasing passage rates on AP exams, a 99%+ graduation rate, high quality facilities, and successful arts, athletic and extra-curricular programs are just a few examples. Great school districts do not just happen. Leadership does matter. Dr. Collins has provided the outstanding leadership needed to keep PUSD moving forward during these challenging times.