Superintendent switches continue in troubled Questa school district
Seventh leader in just over two years in post on interim basis
QUESTA — Billy Vigil wakes his daughter long before the sun rises to get her to school.
The school the fifth grader used to attend, Rio Costilla Southwest Learning Academy, closed this fall, and instead of attending Alta Vista Elementary — part of the Questa Independent School District — Vigil started a car pool with two other families to transport their kids across the state line to a bus stop about 35 miles north of town. From there, five former Rio Costilla students catch a bus to Sierra Grande School in Blanca, Colo.
“She wakes up at 5:30 a.m., and she doesn’t get off the bus until 4:25 in the afternoon,” Vigil said of his daughter. “She wasn’t used to waking up that early. I really do feel bad. I can tell she’s exhausted in the morning. As far as Questa goes though, their board members are so immature. It would be crazy for me to keep sending my kid there.”
Dissatisfaction and infighting at the highest levels of leadership are nothing new in Questa, which recently hired its seventh superintendent in just over two years. And though unhappy parents, board members and former employees agree the constant turnover and disruptions are not good for the educational process, it hasn’t stopped the merry-goround at a far-flung school district that serves about 345 students.
School Board President Daryl Ortega bid farewell to Superintendent Michael Lovato without hesitation at a special board meeting Sept. 13. It was Lovato who made the decision to temporarily close the Rio Costilla school north of Questa this summer amid health concerns at the building before the board officially closed it Tuesday.
Although the board acknowledged it could have asked Lovato to stay on for a month, it signed off, 4-1, on both his resignation and his wish to leave in just seven days. His interim successor is Questa High School Principal Kathy Gallegos.
Some critics say it’s Ortega who deserves much of the blame for the turmoil in Questa, contending he has created a toxic work environment and micromanages the district in ways that far exceed his role as a board member. For his part, Ortega, who co-owns a local plumbing company, said the turnover in the superintendent’s office is a result of other board members’ actions — and the difficulty of attracting and keeping qualified employees in a rural community 30 miles north of Taos.
“Getting somebody from the community would be great, but we can’t get anybody from the community to step up to be principal. Why would they want to be superintendent?” Ortega said. “There’s so much politics in this area. Anybody knows you won’t be here long if you don’t go with the flow.”
Lovato, who was hired in February, accepted a job as director of special education at Lowell Public Schools in Massachusetts, where former Santa Fe Public Schools Superintendent Joel Boyd is the boss. In a phone interview with The New Mexican on Sept. 12, Lovato said he was leaving because the job on the East Coast was too good to pass up.
“It’s just a great opportunity,” Lovato said, though he added: “Whatever superintendent comes in next, I think the school board and superintendent have to agree on the overall mission of the district.”
At the Sept. 13 board meeting, Lovato and Ortega pinned the resignation on board member Tammy Jaramillo, who earlier this month requested the mileage on the district-owned vehicle that she said Lovato’s contract allowed him to use for school-related business.
Jaramillo said she wanted to ensure Lovato was not using the vehicle for personal reasons.
“I asked, but I don’t think they would ever actually give me an answer to that question. The current board that is in place, we’re dysfunctional, bottom line,” Jaramillo said. “If our community does not trust us, it’s going to be very difficult to educate our kids because it trickles down.”
In New Mexico districts, whether small or large, school board infighting is far from uncommon. The state Public Education Department has the authority to suspend the authority of a board and take over a school district’s finances. But state officials say elected school boards are granted substantial leeway before state intervention.
“Educational systems face challenges of maintaining leadership. It’s not unique to Questa, but I would say Questa is an outlier as far as the spectrum of turnover that we’ve seen,” Public Education Department Deputy Secretary of Finance and Operations Adán Delgado said.
“From the PED’s point of view, the threshold for intervention is pretty high,” he added. “Boards are locally elected officials, and the public has lots of latitude in terms of who they elect.”
Ortega was a sitting board member in 2012 when the Public Education Department suspended the authority of the Questa school board for behavior that exceeded the powers and duties granted under state law and encroached on the authority of the superintendent. A decision from then-department Secretarydesignate Hanna Skandera specifically identified Ortega for “pressuring superintendents to fire school personnel and engaging in conflicts of interest” — namely, a contract for services that would have directly benefited his company, according to The Taos News.
Ortega lost a reelection bid in 2013 before winning his seat back by seven votes in 2015. At the time, Taos County Clerk Anna Martínez told The Taos News that 49 absentee ballots were submitted outside of normal business hours and Ortega and “a helper” delivered handfuls of absentee ballots to the clerk’s office before Election Day. According to the Secretary of State’s Office, an unrelated third party may not deliver a voter’s ballot.
In April 2016, the Questa school board voted 4-1 to censure Ortega, asking that he be investigated by the Attorney General’s Office and the secretary of state. The censure statement alleged Ortega improperly influenced contract negotiations to benefit his family, improperly involved himself in student and staff matters, and belittled staff members at board meetings. But the statement did not result in any further action by the district or a state agency.
“Nothing came of that statement.
It was nothing but false allegations,” Ortega said. “I’m the board member who is here for the kids the most. Anything they ask. I’m here for staff. I’m here for kids.”
Megan Jenkins, who began working with the Questa district in 2013, said she served as a secretary, high school counselor’s assistant, librarian, assistant business manager and first grade teacher before resigning in August. She and Joe Ben Mandonado, a custodian and maintenance staff member who said he was in the district for 23 years before submitting his resignation, said Ortega visits the district’s central office on a daily basis, where he frequently makes comments about district employees’ job performance and meddles in student discipline.
Ortega is running for reelection in November and has a challenger.
“There’s a lot of micromanaging,” Mandonado said. “As long as Ortega is president, the district is one big hostile working environment.”
Ortega said he visits the central office only when the superintendent requests his assistance, and he added that the consistent changes in leadership are harmful for students.
“Stability is a necessity for this district. We need that. The staff needs that. Our principals need that. Our students need that,” Ortega said. “All this turnover, its not good for anybody, it’s not a healthy environment.”