Taxpayers feel pinch with ‘separation’ deals
HOW is this for a sweet deal — allegedly commit a fireable offense on the job, and as part of a “resignation agreement,” get paid nearly a full year’s worth of your considerable salary.
This is what transpired recently in Bixby, where the superintendent of schools was let go last week for allegedly failing to notify authorities in a timely manner of a student’s report that he had been sodomized by football teammates using a pool cue — at the superintendent’s home.
Kyle Wood earned a base salary of $166,663 as superintendent, along with fringe benefits totaling $18,633. Several weeks after news broke of the alleged assault, which reportedly occurred during a football function in September, Wood was dismissed in a vote of the school board.
Before that move occurred, the Tulsa World reports, Wood was paid a $1,000 bonus for each of four annual management objectives that were in his contract. He also received a $2,000 one-time stipend received by all employees of Bixby Public Schools.
And, the resignation agreement has Wood receiving his full salary and benefits through Oct. 31, 2018 — totaling $154,413. (His contract was scheduled to run through June 2020.) Throw in a lump-sum payment of $12,615 for unused sick days and vacation and January, and Wood’s parachute totals $167,028.
(Wood also became eligible for state retirement when he turned 52 in November. He qualified under the “rule of 80,” which was in place in 1989 when he became a member of the retirement system for public school educators. That rule said clients could retire with full benefits at age 62, or when their age and years of service total 80; Wood’s 28 years of service made him eligible.)
Law enforcement obtained search warrants to look at school district records, as well as emails of Wood, the high school principal, the football coach and the athletic director, and some cellphone records. One officer wrote in a search warrant affidavit that, “It is unclear when school officials reported this sexual assault of a child to the authorities, although it was certainly delayed for days.”
This resignation agreement should leave a bitter taste in the mouths of taxpayers, although Wood is hardly alone in securing such a good deal. The World noted the former superintendent in Sapulpa was fired in June 2016 and given 12 months’ severance pay. A “separation agreement” with the former superintendent in Broken Arrow paid him $103,100 for six months’ pay and unused vacation.
In Oklahoma City, a deal in which former Superintendent Rob Neu was shown the door provided him three months’ salary and a lump sum of $75,000.
The president of the Bixby school board says it will “continue to make disciplinary decisions as it deems necessary based on the results of its international investigation.” That’s as it should be, but it also means more “separations” could occur — and that more likely than not, taxpayers will feel the pinch.