Sausalito Marin City School District in tumult over dean position

Sausalito Marin City School District parents, teachers and trustees are upset over confusion and uncertainty regarding a proposed dean of students position for the middle school this fall.

The position was suggested by superintendent LaResha Huffman at the last board meeting on May 9 as a zero-cost staffing option that would be handled through an “internal arrangement.” Huffman declined at the time to elaborate.

However, teachers said privately they became aware that the arrangement had fallen through at a recent planning session with David Finnane, principal of the district’s school, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Academy. Parents heard about the issue from teachers.

“It has come to our attention that there is apparently no longer funding available for this position and there will not be a dean for the middle school next year,” parent Kirsti Neely said in one of five letters attached to the agenda for the trustees’ special board meeting on Thursday.

“This news is both distressing and very surprising as the trustees were told they did not have to prioritize funding a dean, only to now have us find out that funding is not available,” Neely said.

Neely and other letter-writers demanded that the issue be added to the agenda for Thursday’s special board meeting. But it appeared their request was too late because no agenda item was listed.

Huffman, meanwhile, responding to the growing community uproar, sent out emails, texts and robocalls to everyone in the school community before Thursday’s meeting.

“We are in fact in support of ensuring the middle school has what it needs to be successful,” Huffman wrote in one of the emails. “However, this will require us to look at our finances first and then plan ahead for what is still needed for both the academic and social-emotional success of all of our students, but most importantly our middle school students.”

She advised that even though the dean issue was not agendized, that it would be discussed in connection with the third interim budget approval.

At the meeting, trustee Alena Maunder said she was upset that the trustees were not informed that the internal deal had fallen through. She also strenuously objected to Huffman’s use of the robocalls.

“Is that normal?” Maunder said, standing up and speaking in a loud voice. “To send robocalls out to the whole community?”

After some testy back and forth between Maunder and Huffman, the board agreed with a suggestion from trustee Bonnie Hough to discuss the appropriate use of robocalls at their next retreat.

As to the dean, Huffman said she would develop a funding plan for the position and bring it to the trustees at the next board meeting. She did not detail what her earlier no-cost plan had been, or why it fell through, except to say that there were some concerns about whether the post would be certificated, with teaching credentials, or non-certificated, such as a support or classified staff worker.

Regarding finances, the trustees on Thursday voted unanimously to approve the district’s third interim budget for 2023-24. The district has self-certified the spending plan as positive, according to Gina Murphy-Garrett, chief business officer.

The positive certification, which covers the current year and is projected out for two subsequent years, shows healthy reserves at 16% to 18% in each year. The minimum reserve amount allowed by the state for the district is 5%.

The spending plan is a step up from earlier in the year, when the budget was in “qualified” status, meaning the district was not certain it could pay its bills.

Murphy-Garrett said revenues from various local, state and federal sources were up in the most recent reporting period, including a contribution from the now-closed Willow Creek Academy charter school, formerly run in Sausalito under district authorization.

The result was that deficit spending, or balancing the budget by spending down the district’s reserves fund, was substantially reduced from when the district reported a $1.4 million deficit in February.

The district had total revenues of about $12.4 million in the current reporting period, compared to expenses of about $13.2 million. The resulting deficit of $842,390 was offset by a $327,495 contribution from Willow Creek.

That lowered the deficit to $514,895, leaving the district with about $3.29 million in reserves, Murphy-Garrett said.

Trustee Lauren Walters said it appeared that the district could afford to hire a dean of students in the range of about $99,000 to $150,000 annually without benefits, or $130,000 to $200,000, with benefits. He said he would support the dean position.

At least a half-dozen parents and teachers at Thursday’s meeting in person and online agreed.

“This is a highly needed position,” said teacher Zuhra St. Denny. “It’s non-negotiable.”

In a series of harshly contested split votes this month, trustees agreed to consolidate classes for transitional kindergarten through eighth grade at the Sausalito campus beginning this fall.

Specifically, the board voted in favor of moving the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Academy middle school students from Marin City to Sausalito to be able to pool and strengthen resources.

“The idea of combining the campuses was only considered with a dean of students for the middle school,” St. Denny said. “We need to know what changed.”