Schools

Is $265,961 Too Much?

The San Lorenzo Unified School District serves 11,000 students, so why does this working-class district pay its superintendent more than the chancellor of the New York City Schools, a district 100 times the size? Patch reports.

Like others across California, the has spent the last several years making cuts to its core services, pink slipping record numbers of teachers and classified staff in an effort to cope with Sacramento’s chronic fiscal uncertainty and the state’s deep cuts to K-12 education.

So you wouldn’t expect this small school district, which serves 11,000 students from a largely working-class community, to top the list of big spenders.

Yet a database of public employee salaries compiled by the Bay Area News Group reveals that the district paid its "tremendously active" Superintendent Dr. Dennis Byas a base salary of nearly $266,000 in 2010, higher than the salaries of superintendents in far tonier Bay districts in Marin County, Menlo Park, San Ramon and Walnut Creek. 

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"The board loves him," said Cathy Lee, president of the district's techer's union. 

Beloved or not—and Byas is certainly well liked, not only by the school board but in much of the broader community—his salary tops all but two public school educators in the entire Bay Area.

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To put that number in perspective, the chancellor of the New York City Schools—the largest district in the country, with 1.1 million students, exactly 100 times as many as attend San Lorenzo Unified schools— earned a base salary of just under $250,000 in 2009, the last year for which data is available. 

Salary information for employees in the San Leandro Unified School District was not included in the database. However, according to information provided to Patch, SLUSD Superintendent Cindy Cathay's earnings totaled $186,455 in 2010.

In contrast, Byas takes home a gross of more than $331,000, including additional cash payments, the highest in the region. His total cost of employment (a number that includes health care expenditures and pension payouts—not what most workers include when they tabulate their earnings) is more than $400,000.

"Experience and education gets converted into dollars and cents on salary schedules," said School Board President Norman Fobert. 

But even with his experience and education, why does a struggling community pay its top administrator so much?

The short answer is that Byas stepped into his salary, a windfall from previous Superintendent Arnie Glassberg, then the most experienced school chief in the county.

A decade ago, when the state was flush, Glassberg presided over a hefty across-the-board raise for district employees, including the superintendent. 

Fobert pointed out that Byas still costs the district less in per-pupil dollars than neighboring superintendents in Castro Valley or San Leandro. 

And as the district’s economic circumstances have changed, Byas has made many concessions, waiving several steps in his salary and forgoing his housing stipend beginning in July of this year. He has also personally donated more than $35,000 to the district. 

"Dr. Byas has given back quite a bit," said Alameda County Office of Education Superintendent Sheila Jordan. "He’s made a number of contributions back to the district." 

But there may be another, more subtle element in play. 

Though she didn't believe it had any influence on salary, Jordan said the San Lorenzo superintendent had a unique role in the unincorporated community. 

"San Lorenzo is unusual. It’s a very working class, pretty low income community, but it’s a very tight community, and they don’t have any public officials there," Jordan said.

"They don’t have a mayor or city council member, so the superintendent is the main figure, and he’s a very important official in San Lorenzo."


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