Guest Column: What Went Wrong With Our Laguna Beach School Board ... THIS Time?

By Howard Hills

At the June 25 meeting of our Laguna Beach School Board, members put a hold on hiring, promotions and salary increases for two senior LBUSD administrators that had been approved by the Board at its June 11 meeting.  I applaud the Board members whose heightened sense of vigilance enabled them to discern performance and procedural deficiencies related to the hiring and personnel actions recommended by Superintendent Smith and approved by the Board on June 11.

In addition, on June 25, the Board heard substantial testimony on a third personnel action recommended by Smith, in which a respected classroom teacher who also heads the local chapter of the teacher's union was taken out of the classroom and appointed to an administrative position under Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum Deni Christensen.  While no one questioned the qualifications of the appointee, there were legitimate questions about whether the administrative role she would play would create conflicts with her union role, as well as concerns that the appointment process did not allow other teachers to apply for the administrative assignment.

Ironically, there were no complaints about Christensen at the June 25 meeting, although there have been questions about Superintendent Smith's conduct in procedures she adopted in connection with hiring three members of her senior staff, including Christensen.

After Christensen's resignation on Friday, Smith launched one of her now signature verbal assaults on critics of the Superintendent herself, in a lame and pathetic attempt to shift her own blame for Christensen's departure to others.  Of course, it was Superintendent Smith's abuse of hiring authority that put those close associates she hired in awkward and untenable positions, and it was the Board's failure to adequately supervise Smith that enabled those abuses to become another fiasco detracting from the public school success story this community works so hard to sustain for our kids and their futures.

Before this current debacle runs its course, it may turn out that Christensen was wise to look over the horizon at the storm brewing and get out of here while the getting is good. As I said at the June 25 meeting, I personally like Christensen, and I am sure she is a "great educator and wonderful person."  Same with the teacher appointed to an administrative post without a well-managed selection process.  It has been the short cuts and abuse of discretionary authority by the Superintendent and the School Board's lack of oversight that put those two educators under a cloud, along with the far more controversial personnel actions that the Board put on hold during the June 25 meeting.  Having been there myself, I could relate when Christensen said she had never had her professionalism questioned, and she was not going to stay around and continue to be caught in the crossfire as act two in this drama is played out.

That brings us to the question of what went wrong here. There are no quick and easy answers, so a rigorous discussion of the June 25 meeting and its implications is provided below for those who really want to get past the platitudes.

First, an informed narrative on this situation must proceed from recognition that under both national and state ethics codes for public officials, it is a fundamental principle that even the appearance of conflict of interest undermines public trust.  Thus, when the local Superintendent of Schools wanted to hire personal friends and co-workers from former jobs, the School Board had an ethical duty to ensure that all such hiring was done in a manner that could withstand scrutiny.

Instead, there was no open, transparent, merit-based competitive hiring process, much less full public disclosure of any potential conflict of interest on the part of the Superintendent.  Now many in the public at large and the school employee community have lost confidence and trust in the School Board and the Superintendent.

Instead of recognizing the problem, at its June 25 meeting, the School Board dithered about how to undo the unsustainable personnel actions it had ratified on June 11 based on recommendations by the Superintendent.  It didn’t help that these actions were buried in the Board’s end of the school year agenda when no one was watching, at a meeting that no one could listen to because -- contrary to Board procedures -- it was not recorded and podcast on the School District website. 

Astonishingly, at the June 25 meeting, School Board member Theresa O'Hare was in full-blown denial that anything was amiss, and actually scolded teachers, parents and citizens who gave up their evening to come oppose glaringly obvious hiring and salary abuses.  In patronizing and condescending tones, she feigned surprise that those with grievances had not protested what she saw as similar personnel practices in years past. Her bizarre predicate was that public acceptance of random isolated personnel actions in the past made public opposition to multiple clearly unethical recent practices somehow surprising to her, and thus without merit. 

Of course, School District staffing actions in the past to which O’Hare referred in some cases were successful, while other hires were flawed, but unlike the current mess, in the past there was not a consistent pattern of strong evidence that the integrity of hiring procedures intentionally had been compromised.  Those who courageously did their unwelcome but solemn civic duty by questioning abuses were confronted by O'Hare's thinly veiled recriminations, unconvincingly disguised as civic discourse on what she insists is the sterling record of the School Board.  

Yet, in recent months, the Board’s stunningly botched tampering with an 80-year school calendar tradition enabling students to work until summer ends was grudgingly reversed only after weeks of stubborn obstinacy by the Board. That was preceded by the Board’s acquiescence in use of salaried public school employees for political lobbying down at City Hall.  Enlisted by O'Hare, public employees acting in their official capacity abandoned political neutrality on issues outside the scope of their employment that were contested in a political election campaign.

Now the School Board has failed to supervise the Superintendent and ensure taxpayers get full value for the high salaries we pay to get the best for our students.  This was a disservice not only to students and taxpayers, but also to professional educators implicated in the hiring fiasco.  The most recent mismanagement of human and fiscal resources is the direct result of the School Board decision to hire a Superintendent with a record of controversy in previous posts.  

Still, O'Hare saw fit to lecture the public on so-called savings achieved by the Board in hiring replacements for senior staff retirees, who after decades with LBUSD had been receiving very high salaries. Of course, typically replacements lacking equivalent experience and seniority were hired at lower beginning rates, realizing some temporary budget reduction. But in selective cases the Board allowed inexperienced staff hired by the Superintendent from among her former colleagues and friends to be paid at rates higher than their more experienced predecessors. 

Worse still, the School Board allowed the Superintendent to hire pals whose skill were not matched well to their duties, and who in some cases proved too inexperienced to do their jobs.  As a result, support staff had to be hired and duties had to be shuffled between veteran staff and yet more new employees hired to compensate for performance deficiencies of their supervisors.  This was unfair to all involved, and was well on the way to increasing rather than reducing the overall cost of the District's hiring, salary, benefits and staffing practices.  

When that gave rise to complaints of cronyism the Superintendent insisted that none of her new staff had "any performance deficiencies." Yet, the School Board admitted on the record in public meetings that the calendar fiasco and hiring abuses occurring under supervision by her hand-picked staff had "broken down" and "failed."  O'Hare joined the Superintendent in insisting all is well and denying any performance deficiencies.

Instead of misleading the public then berating them for asking questions or criticizing public school officials, what we need most of all on the School Board is new thinking and new attitudes about how to manage change and progress in our schools.  We also need to restore traditional standards of public ethics in school governance reflecting the values of our community.  

Howard Hills is former President of the LBHS Alumni Association. Views expressed are his personal opinions.