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Commissioners on the Syracuse City School District Board of Education must stop hiding and explain to the public why they want to pay $250,000 for consulting services from two retired district executives. The seven members of the board are elected by the voters. Their policy of refusing to publicly explain their work continues to be an embarrassment. The latest proposal to come under scrutiny is a plan to rehire Superintendent Anthony Davis, who retired Oct. 31, on a $125,000 consulting contract through the end of the school year. According to district spokesperson Amanda Malinowski, Davis would coach new high school principals and administrators. Why is this needed? The new superintendent, Pamela Odom, is an impressive educator who attended city schools and has spent her entire career in the district. She knows how to coach her leadership team. So why does Davis need to hang around? The retiring superintendent did not feel the need to explain, even while still on the district payroll. Davis ignored several requests for comment from syracuse.com | The Post-Standard staff writer Emalyn Muzzy. The district said that staff “pursued” some “bids” from other consultants for the contract they want to give to Davis, their boss. But no competitive bids were sought for the $125,000, two-year consulting contract they approved for Tim Moon, the district’s former chief information officer. Moon claims he didn’t have time to train his replacement on a complicated state data reporting system before he retired this summer. Why not? Didn’t the district know he was retiring? Furthermore, why is it necessary to keep him on retainer for two years? Is teaching the system to someone else really that complicated? Whoever decided it would be a good idea to hire back these retired executives should be willing to explain it and defend it. That’s part of the deal when you hold public office and are entrusted with spending public money: Your decisions are scrutinized, and you are held accountable for them. This board has a well-documented transparency problem. Its members adopted a policy that attempts to prevent anyone but Board President Tamica Barnett from speaking to reporters. (It is worth noting that even Barnett declined to be interviewed for Muzzy’s story about the consulting contracts.) Board members are content to remain silent, cast their votes and collect their $15,000-a-year paycheck. And why not? They get to make decisions and never have to answer for them. For example, Commissioner Karen Cordano still has not explained why she was the only member of the board to vote “no” on Odom’s appointment as superintendent. Cordano and Nyatwa Bullock, who are both running for reelection, said they would not discuss board decisions in our pre-election interviews, including the proposed consulting contract with Davis. If the incumbents won’t discuss the votes they’ve taken, how are voters supposed to decide if they should continue serving on the board? This creates an absurd Catch-22. When the official posture of the district is a defensive crouch, the next logical question is: What are they hiding? The Syracuse City School District is an important community asset with a big job: educating more than 19,000 children from pre-K to grade 12. It is also a major employer, with 4,600 full-time-equivalent staff. And it spends a lot of taxpayer money, with an annual budget of $611 million. Administrators and the board have a lot of stakeholders and are responsible to all of them. The district also has a lot of good stories to tell. Students, teachers and staff regularly do outstanding work, often against the odds, to mold impressive young adults. We call on Odom, as the district’s new leader, to model openness with the public. Tell the board to knock off the silent treatment. Take the muzzle off the teachers and staff. Let them tell the district’s stories with confidence and accountability. Rejecting fear and secrecy would be a great lesson for students and members of the wider community who care about the district and want it to succeed. About Syracuse.com editorials Editorials represent the collective opinion of the Advance Media New York editorial board. Our opinions are independent of news coverage. Read our mission statement. Members of the editorial board are Tim Kennedy, Trish LaMonte and Marie Morelli. To respond to this editorial: Submit a letter or commentary to letters@syracuse.com. Read our submission guidelines. If you have questions about the Opinions & Editorials section, contact Marie Morelli, editorial/opinion lead, at mmorelli@syracuse.com
