San Dieguito superintendent, executive cabinet receive salary increases

The San Dieguito Union School District (SDUHSD) board approved 3.5% salary increases for the superintendent, deputy superintendent and three associate superintendents at the March 19 board meeting.

The group of employees was the last San Dieguito employees to receive raises following the 3.5% raises that were given to the certificated teaching staff in December 2019 and 3.5% raises that were given to classified staff and non-union represented supervisory and management employees in January. All salary increases are retroactive to July 1, 2019.

In January, the classified staff also received a 1% pay increase retroactive to July 1, 2018 following their negotiations process that began last summer—the same 1% raise was given to certificated teachers in March 2019.

Following the 3.5% salary increase, these are the executive cabinet’s annual salaries: Associate Superintendent of Business Services Tina Douglas: $205,352; Associate Superintendent of Educational Services Bryan Marcus: $205,352; Associate Superintendent of Human Resources Cindy Frazee: $205,352; Deputy Superintendent Mark Miller: $210,485 and Superintendent Robert Haley: $270,746.

The total cost of the salary increases for the executive cabinet team is $37,108.

All of the raises were approved unanimously by the board, except for Superintendent Haley’s; Vice President Mo Muir voted against it.

“We haven’t given him an evaluation and we shouldn’t be giving him an automatic raise, that’s not appropriate,” said Muir, noting she would like to postpone the salary increase until after they do another evaluation at the end of the current school year.

Fellow board members noted that the board did complete a superintendent evaluation in August 2019 at Haley’s 11-month mark with the district, without a compensation increase. “As a result of that evaluation, he should be granted a raise,” said trustee Joyce Dalessandro.

District taxpayer Wendy Gumb provided written public comment asking for the board to table the salary increases

“Every time one of the bargaining units gets a raise it now seems so does this group, whose job it is to negotiate the contracts,” Gumb submitted, suggesting that the board pass a resolution dictating when unrepresented employees can bring forward raise requests and that their raise will not exceed the statutory cost of living adjustment (COLA) established each May by the California Department of Education.

“A resolution and a process will remove confusion on the part of the community as well as this governing body as to how many raises and how often this group is getting raises,” Gumb wrote.

SDUHSD President Beth Hergesheimer said that the board has been working toward a comprehensive package that would cover some multi-year agreements with their executive staff that would keep it from being an annual conversation. Hergesheimer said at this time they do not have that package ready, “I still felt it was important to keep this on the agenda and to acknowledge all the hard work staff has been doing for us.”