Española School Board members, Pablo Lujan and Andrew Chavez, at the July 16 Board meeting, expressed doubts regarding Superintendent Danny Trujillo’s ability to manage money and some of his policies.
Both members raised budget issues and asked District directors to address the Board to answer their questions.
Lujan questioned Human Resources Director Esther Romero, regarding employee issues, while Chavez queried Finance Director Jeannette Trujillo about the accounts payable records for June.
Lujan said he was concerned about the expanding employee salaries, and how they are growing the budget to a level above what Board members had originally approved.
Lujan used the associate superintendent position as an example. Associate Superintendent Myra Martinez will be paid $92,000 — $7,000 more than Board members originally agreed to.
“First of all, you have to realize there is no experience,” Lujan said. She is coming from principal to associate superintendent. So how do you justify giving a $7,000 raise, which you had already balanced before, which you had already figured out? I think the original (salary) is legitimate. I think it is a decent amount to make.”
Chavez also gave his opinion.
“We’ve developed a budget,” Chavez said. “Our expectation is that the budget is followed to the letter. Sometimes it can get off kilter a little bit, but miniscule.”
As a Board member, Lujan said it is his responsibility to make sure the District is operating within the budget. He said the Board laid out a budget for the academic year, including employee salaries, and he wondered why the budget is not being followed.
Trujillo justified the salary he gave to Martinez and all District employees he hired.
“She (Martinez) is in the process of getting her doctorate degree so she has the qualifications to receive a higher salary,” Danny Trujillo said in a later interview.
Trujillo gave an example. He said a typical network administrator makes upwards of $140,000 per year and Trujillo said he has to provide a similar salary if he hopes to hire one for the District. The associate superintendent position is no different.
“I have to pay people according to their qualifications,” Trujillo said. “If I do not offer them a salary that matches their experience or education, they will not take the position.”
Chavez disputed Trujillo’s claim that salaries must be increased to hire a qualified candidate for the position.
“I would suspect that if it is properly advertised, the correct candidate could be found,” Chavez said.
Lujan said he had issues with the District’s salary schedule. He said there is no consistency with its structure. Some employees are paid less while others are paid more, even though people’s qualifications are different.
“My problems with the salary schedule is, how do you justify one being a manager and one being a director three?” Lujan asked. “Where the director three doesn’t have any licenses, but a director two has a level three administrative license. When you develop a salary schedule you should have growth. There is no growth.”
The schedule is a matrix that lists the different salaries District employees can earn, depending on their years of experience and the amount of education they have. A candidate’s education level can be degrees they earned, credits they accumulated or certifications they received.
Finally, Lujan questioned a professional services contract for Hearing Officer Arthur Salazar.
“Why are we paying someone to be a hearing officer when I thought we already had one?” Lujan said. “Who is the person who has been doing this and why do we need another person to do the job?”
Trujillo said he was acting as the hearing officer for the District but he needed someone who has experience with the job.
He said some of the documents are very difficult to translate and Salazar has demonstrated he is capable.
The hearing officer would translate the Districts documents from English to Spanish and vice versa.
Chavez probed Jeannette Trujillo about several payments that were made to a contract employee and the Santa Claran Hotel and Casino.
District administrators paid Odelia Maestas to conduct an inventory of all supplies in their possession and Chavez wondered why a contractor was performing the inventory.
“I thought we were going to go in-house with those (inventory) services?” Chavez asked.
Danny Trujillo told Chavez that Maestas is in the final phases of the inventory, once the process is completed an in-house employee will take over.
Jeannette Trujillo said the inventory process is complicated, there is no one in the District who has the knowledge of the software, so she contracted the work.
“I was under the understanding that we had someone in-house that should be doing this (inventory),” Chavez said.
Jeannette Trujillo shook her head and said “no.”
Chavez then wondered why the District was spending money at the Santa Claran.
“Last year we had the North Central Association accreditation and part of the agreement is that we must provide accommodations so we basically contract with the lowest cost and the Santa Claran provided the lowest cost.”
Despite the debate, Board members approved nearly all of the budget items that were on the agenda, per Danny Trujillo’s recommendation.
The one exception was the District’s collective bargaining agreement. Lujan asked the Board to table that agenda item for a future meeting.