Superintendent pay not just salary
A $1 million - dollar life insurance policy.
A $700 monthly car allowance.
Extra pay for attending football games, plays and other school events.
Those are some of the perks taxpayers are providing for various public school superintendents.
A review of contracts for school districts’ top executives in Spokane County and North Idaho show some superintendents earning thousands more than their base salaries – the figures often reported to the public.
Schools are among the region’s biggest employers, with superintendents overseeing hundreds of employees and budgets that can reach tens hundreds of millions of dollars. Superintendents also face growing pressure for their districts to meet state and federal education requirements.
Their pay is not high when compared with leaders of private companies. The average CEO’s pay among 14 publicly traded companies in the Inland Northwest last year was about $1.8 million. The CEO of nonprofit Sacred Heart Medical Center is this sacred heart or providence? , for instance, gets more than three times the pay of Spokane Public Schools Superintendent Nancy Stowell, even though Stowell oversees 2,000 more employees.
“In this era of school reform, high-stakes graduation requirements and school safety issues, the job of superintendent is frequently stressful,” said West Valley School District’s Polly Crowley, whose compensation package rivals Spokane Public Schools Superintendent Nancy Stowell’s, in a district that’s less than a quarter the size of the Spokane district. “Compensation packages, including benefits, relate to highly qualified leadership and stability for the school district.”
School boards have broad discretion over superintendent compensation, but experts say competitive packages are necessary to draw top candidates.
But as many districts struggle financially, some teachers and parents question the salaries of the region’s top educators and wonder if the money could n’t be better spent elsewhere. Spokane Public Schools recently cut $10.8 million from its budget, closing an elementary school and laying off some staff, among other measures. East Valley School District cut staff and programs to deal with a $1.3 million budget hole. West Valley and Central Valley school districts are financially stable, but the WV teachers’ contract expired Aug. 31 and has gone to mediation, and CV voters have twice have rejected bonds to build new schools to address overcrowding.
“From my perspective, the priorities tend to be not toward the classroom as much as it should be and too much toward administrators,” said Mike Boyer, a representative for the Washington Education Association/Eastern Washington. “The administrators seem to always do fine no matter what the budget looks like; but everything else in the budget sure seems to take a beating.”
Kirsten Witham, whose son attends West Valley’s Pasadena Park Elementary School, said she is “constantly told there is no money” as she fights for additional special education services for her child. “That is unfortunate, that we are putting that much money into perks (for superintendents) when the school district is groaning under special needs. That’s frustrating to hear as a taxpayer and a parent.”
West Valley’s Crowley, who oversees a district of 3,900 students, earns a base salary of $134,795, near the top statewide for similarly sized districts. With her benefits, she has the potential to earn $182,000 per year.
Added to her contract is a $700 monthly car allowance; $1,000 a month for a life-insurance policy; and $1,100 a month for annuity payments. That annuity, plus another $13,000 in retirement money, is in addition to the standard state retirement plan.
The district also makes her $75 monthly cell phone payments.
Like most other superintendents, Crowley is reimbursed for vacation and sick days she doesn’t use.
“She’s very highly rated; I can’t think of a negative that we have had on any of her evaluations,” said Jim Williams, West Valley school board member.
Williams said the school board considered the base salary of other local superintendents when deciding on Crowley’s, but he was unaware of the benefits provided to other superintendents.
“We try to keep our people in line with other local superintendents; and we are a smaller district,” Williams said.
Spokane’s Stowell, who oversees the third-largest district in the state with about 28,000 students, earns a base salary of $159,500. Her predecessor, Brian Benzel, was earning a base salary of $165,782 when he retired this year.
Stowell’s contract includes annuity payments of about $19,000 per year paid in monthly installments and gets a bonus of about $9,000 a year for having a Ph.D.
“It’s never really been a focus for me,” Stowell said of her contract with the district.
In Spokane County, the average base salary for school superintendents is $110,000. Here are some of the particulars:
“ Tom Rockefeller, of the Mead School District (8,500 students), has a base salary of $145,375. Rockefeller, whose district has 9,000 students, also receives $15,000 a year toward retirement, in addition to the standard state retirement plan.
“ Mike Dunn, of Cheney Public Schools (2,600 students), earns $120,821, plus a monthly car allowance of $600 and $935 toward a retirement annuity.
“ Sergio Hernandez, of Freeman School District (900 students), receives a $4,000 annual stipend for meeting board goals, in addition to his salary of $108,200. The district also gives him $150 a month toward life insurance and $450 in car allowance.
“ Debra Howard, of East Valley (4,900 students), earns $116,800 and gets a $300 monthly car allowance. She pays nothing for health benefits.
“ Mike Pearson, of Central Valley (12,000 students), makes $145,000. But he can get up to an additional other 20 days’ pay by attending football games, plays and other after-school events.
Like Rockefeller, Pearson gets about $15,000 a year toward retirement, in addition to the standard state retirement plan. Pearson also gets a $125 monthly cell phone allowance.
“ Bill Motsenbocker of Liberty (470 students) earns $93,000, with the same benefits as the district’s other administrative employees.
In Idaho, the statewide average full-time superintendent’s salary was $94,664 for 2006-07. Superintendents in the Gem State don’t appear to get the same level of perks enjoyed by some of their Washington counterparts. Some examples:
“ Harry Amend, of the Coeur d’Alene School District (10,300 students), makes $124,800 – sixth highest in the state. His car allowance is $600 a month.
Amend has given up a district-funded gym membership that he rarely used. “The board pushed really hard for that for my own health,” he said.
“ Dave Cox, of St. Maries (1,170 students), earns $110,619; Jerry Keane, of Post Falls (5,400 students), earns $104,910; Chuck Kinsey, of Lakeland (4,450 students), earns $103,530; Bob Ranells, of Wallace (600 students), earns $88,000; and George Olsen, of the Plummer-Worley School District (500 students), earns $76,385. They receive the standard insurance offered to all employees in their districts.
“ Don Bartling, of the Boundary County School District (1,500 students), earns $88,651, but pays nothing for insurance benefits.
Car allowances vary greatly, from one district to another, but Crowley’s $700 monthly allowance is allowances are the most generous, followed by Amend’s and Dunn’s at $600. Dunn and Crowley have offices no more than three miles from any school within their respective districts.
The Superintendents of most districts – including Spokane, Mead, Central Valley and most in North Idaho – keep track of their mileage and are reimbursed at the same rate as other district employees – typically 48 cents a mile.
Kinsey drives a district-owned car while on the job – a 1990 Chevy Cavalier that was retired from Lakeland’s driver’s education program. “It’d be hard to be considered much of a benefit,” Kinsey said. “It’s probably a savings to the district because it’s cheaper than paying me mileage.”
Bartling, superintendent of the Boundary County School District in Idaho, has an $83.33 monthly expense account for in-district travel.
According to a national survey of salaries complied by Educational Research Service, in 2005-2006 superintendents in urban districts with enrollments of at least 25,000 students – comparable to Spokane Public Schools – earned an average of $172,000 in base pay annually.
Executives for medium-sized and suburban school district – comparable to Central Valley and Mead – earned about $148,000. Superintendents in small rural districts, like Liberty, earned between $91,600 and $108,000.
“Selecting a leader is one of the most difficult decisions that a school board will make,” said Les Portner, who retired as superintendent of East Valley School District.
Portner is a partner in a superintendent search firm, Education Consultants LLC, that works to fill about three positions a year in the Inland Northwest. He is now work ing with the Nine Mile district.
When a district needs is looking to fill the top post, often the board will often looks to other similarly sized districts to determine compensation, Portner said. The regional cost of living is taken into account; for instance, the superintendent in Tacoma makes significantly more than the superintendent in Spokane, even though the districts are similar.
But sometimes local superintendents rise to the top of the pay scale when compared with their colleagues statewide.
In 2006, for instance, Crowley ranked fifth out of 20 superintendents running Washington districts that are similarly sized to West Valley. Above her: the superintendents for Mercer Island, Bainbridge Island, Enumclaw and Fife – all in Western Washington.
Dick Cvitanich, superintendent of the Lake Pend Oreille School District in Sandpoint, earns $118,450 per year – more than the superintendents of the larger Lakeland and Post Falls districts. Cvitanich, who is in his second year at the district of 3,800 students, moved to North Idaho from Bellevue, a factor that was weighed when his salary was set, board chairwoman Vicki Pfeifer said.
“We knew we were going to have to pay more for a superintendent just to move here because it’s so expensive to live here,” Pfeifer said.
Sara Leaming can be reached at (509) 459-5533 or by e-mail at sarale@spokesman.com. Meghann M. Cuniff can be reached at (208) 765-7129 or by e-mail at meghannc@spokesman.com.