The Abridged version:
- The Sacramento City Unified school board was considering raising pay for its trustees from $826 to $3,000 per month.
- After a wave of public backlash, Trustee Taylor Kayatta confirmed that the board will pull its proposed raises at its Thursday night meeting.
- The decision arrives as the school district is facing a $150 million budget shortfall and is entrenched in a political battle aimed at avoiding state receivership.
A proposal to nearly triple the compensation for trustees on the Sacramento City Unified school board is off the table.
School board trustees plan to withdraw the item from their Thursday night meeting agenda, Trustee Taylor Kayatta said.
“We will pull the compensation policy and related regulation from that larger package of regulations,” Kayatta told Abridged by PBS KVIE in a text message.
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The decision to pull the proposed raises follows a wave of public backlash that ensued after trustees posted the meeting materials outlining the planned monthly raises. The plan to walk back the initial proposal was first reported by The Sacramento Bee.
Trustees had pitched raising their monthly stipends from $826 to $3,000 a month. The pay raise was considered under a new state law that went into effect this year allowing school board members across the state to raise their pay for the first time in decades.
The pay increase only would have gone into effect if the school district achieved a non-negative check of its finances or if the district went into state receivership.
The plan to raise trustee pay arrives as Sac City Unified continues to face a multi-million dollar budget crisis and remains entrenched in a political battle to avoid going into state receivership. The district is currently looking to fill a $150 million shortfall by next spring.
In a Facebook post, Kayatta said he heard the community feed back “loud and clear,” as members of the public took issue with the appearance of the board looking to increase its pay while making district-wide budget cuts.
“The draft policy and resolution missed the mark,” Kayatta wrote. “This is not the time to talk about increasing board compensation, even if that increase is deferred.”
