Less than two weeks after having the ongoing Golbow Elementary controversy featured in the nationally-published Scholastic Administrator magazine, Katy ISD is once again the subject of an unflattering article from a major publication, this time over “hefty” raises given to top-level administrators.
In an article entitled “Administrators Get Hefty Raises in Katy ISD” published today in Texas Budget Source, journalist Curt W. Olson uses information obtained from the school district through the Texas Public Information Act to show how front office administrators and some principals received large pay increases while classroom teachers averaged a salary of $50,799 per year.
Texas Budget Source is published by the Texas Public Policy Foundation and focuses on issues related to government spending and fiscal transparency.
Among those featured in Olson’s article is Superintendent Alton Frailey, who received a pay raise 16.7 percent pay hike from 2008-09 to 2010-11 to become one of the highest-paid school superintendents in Texas.
Some of the other administrators shown getting significant raises were Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Dr. Deborah Harris (18.5 percent), Director of Assessment, Accountability and Research Dr. Freda Corbell (9 percent), Assistant Superintendent for Leadership and Organizational Development Dr. Sharon Boutwell (14.83 percent) and Director of Special Education Sandi Becker (16.1 percent).
Olson also noted Frailey “refused to answer questions” regarding the pay raises, while Harris and Board President Joe Adams did not respond to calls requesting comment.
The report also showed a number of school principals receiving large raises. In 2009-10, principals James Cross received a 36.85 percent increase; Steven Robertson got a raise of 21.2 percent and Cazilda Steele’s salary went up 27.6 percent.
The full article can be read at
http://www.texasbudgetsource.com/2011/09/administrators-get-hefty-raises-in-katy-isd/.
It is also posted, unedited and in its entirety below:
Administrators get hefty raises in Katy ISD
September 6th 2011 By Curt Olson
Curt W. Olson
COlson@TexasBudgetSource.com
Katy ISD near Houston is a large school district with 60,803 students, according to the district’s website.
That amount of students comes with 7,655 staff members, with 15.7 students per teacher and an average teacher salary of $50,799, the site also states.
However, Katy ISD has dished out hefty raises to administrators the past couple of years, according to an Open Records Request of salary information from 2008-09 to 2010-11. Big raises for administrators were raises for promotions or an effort to keep up with neighbors or districts of similar size.
This was a period when Superintendent Alton Frailey ascended to the district’s top spot. Yet, Katy ISD handed out the largest raises to several high school principals during this same period — 2008-09 to 2010-11.
Frailey received a 16.7 percent pay hike during this time — $247,200 to $288,400. He received a 13.3 percent pay raise when he became superintendent, jumping to $280,000 between 2008-09 and 2009-10. He jumped to $288,400 in 2010-11 after the other employees received their raise, district spokesman Steve Stanford said in an e-mail.
Frailey refused to answer questions. Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Dr. Debbie Harris and School Board President Joe Adams did not return repeated phone calls.
District leaders also refused to respond to follow-up questions from Stanford’s e-mail responses.
“Mr. Frailey’s salary and raises are set by the Katy ISD Board of Trustees, which are then defined in his contract. Mr. Frailey’s contract was renegotiated in 2009, at which time the board increased his compensation in order to maintain a competitive salary structure with districts in similar size to Katy ISD,” Stanford wrote in an e-mail.
Katy ISD leaders seem to have a broad definition of districts of similar size.
The following is a list of ISDs showing the superintendent’s name, the salary earned in 2010 and the most recent student enrollment figures. The salary information came from Texas Budget Source’s “The Texas Pension Calculator,” which contains salary and pension information for about 900,000 public employees in Texas. While data there is for just 2010 now it receives updated information.
• Katy ISD Superintendent Alton Frailey; $280,000; 60,803
• Aldine ISD Superintendent Wanda Bamberg; $208,000; 62,532
• Arlington ISD Superintendent Jerry McCullough; $235,00; 63,385
• El Paso ISD Superintendent Lorenzo Garcia; $280,313; 63,011
• Fort Bend ISD Superintendent Timothy Jenney; $247,800; 69,066
• Garland ISD Superintendent Leonard Culwell; $282,200; 57,654
• Plano ISD Superintendent Doug Otto; $284,601; 54,683
• San Antonio ISD Superintendent Robert Duron; $266,494; 55,086
• Conroe ISD Superintendent Donald Stockton; $257,550; 49,323
The superintendent salaries among this group of ISDs encompass a swing of about 20,000 students and salaries from $208,000 to $282,200. The data shows Katy ISD apparently wanted to stay higher than Conroe ISD, while also competing with Plano and Garland in the Dallas area — although they are districts with less students.
The salary hikes only began with the superintendent.
One of Frailey’s top advisers — Harris — received the biggest jump in pay among top administrators, an 18.5 percent increase from $135,000 to $160,000 during this time frame.
Meanwhile, Dr. Freda Corbell, the director of Assessment, Accountability and Research, received a 9 percent boost in pay during this time; Dr. Sharon Boutwell, the assistant superintendent for Leadership and Organizational Development, 14.83 percent; and Sandi Baecker, director of special education, 16.1 percent.
“Raises are given by the (school) board and/or when job responsibilities are increased substantially and/or when the district is not staying competitive in a certain area. Harris, Corbell, and Baecker gained substantially more responsibilities and some were promotions. Also the district strives to stay competitive with other districts in these areas,” Stanford said in an e-mail.
Boutwell can be added to that group.
This “keep-up-with-the-Joneses” strategy for adjusting pay also benefitted six high school principals during this time.
Existing or newly promoted high school principals received hefty salary increases. Katy ISD leveled the salaries for principals James Cross, Steven Robertson, Cazilda Steele, and Mark Grisdale in 2009-10. These high school leaders saw salaries vault to $120,000 and then $125,000 in 2010-11.
The jumps in pay are striking. Cross rose from $91,339 to $120,000 and then $125,000 —a 36.85 percent salary increase. Robertson jumped from $103,125 to $111,157 in 2008-09 then to $120,000 and $125,00 — a 21.2 percent pay raise. Steele started the 2008-09 years earning $97,964 and jumped to $108,000 then $120,000 and $125,000 — a more than 27.6 percent pay raise.
Grisdale changed job titles multiple times in 2008-09, starting at $83,232, then $96,506 and settling at $104,539 before seeing $120,000 and $125,000 the next two years. This is a jump of more than $40,000 coming with multiple promotions.
David Kendler and Christie Whitbeck are Katy ISD’s highest-paid principals. Kendler jumped from $114,773 to $125,000 and then $130,000 — a 13.27 percent raise. Whitbeck rose from $115,011 to $125,000 and $130,000, a 13 percent pay raise.
Again, the only answer Katy ISD provided on the jumps in pay for high school principals came from Stanford: This “was a result of a review of the district’s competitiveness with other districts. A standard salary was set that reflects the large student population and complexity of our high school sites.”
Katy ISD does not award merit or incentive bonuses.
It’s not uncommon for districts to give principals a consistent salary. For example, in 2010 Fort Worth ISD — a district with more than 80,000 students — paid 12 high school principals $102,804, Meanwhile, Spring Branch ISD in the Houston area paid four high school principals $132,613 in 2010. And in Conroe, near Katy ISD, in 2010, one high school principal was paid $122,784 and a second one was paid $122,741, according to data districts provided Texas Budget Source for its Texas Pension Calculator.
One follow-up question Frailey refused to answer centered on the district’s response to Bureau of Labor Statistics data that shows Katy ISD’s boosts in pay were above Bureau of Labor Statistics data for local government.
The promotions catapulted pay well above the normal raise.
Take Miller Career and Technology Center Principal Dr. Anna Webb-Storey as an example. The leader of the vo-tech school received a 5.9 percent raise during this time, which was standard upon examining Katy ISD data. Webb-Storey’s pay went to $115, 574 in 2010-11 from $109,068 in 2008-09.
Stanford said her pay was not adjusted like other high school principals because Miller Academy is not the typical high school campus.
Private sector salaries in Texas contracted 1.1 percent in 2009 and then went up 3 percent on average in 2010, according to the BLS office in Dallas. Local government salaries in Texas went up 3 percent in 2009 and just .08 percent in 2010.
School board member Terry Huckaby is one of three board members elected in the spring to bring more accountability to Katy ISD. He said he had no idea this was going on.
Katy ISD gained attention in April for using subs to fill in for teachers during a day when the bad news came they would lose their job in 2011-12. That never materialized as most teachers have been rehired. That was a goal of the new school board members — Huckaby, Bill Proctor and Henry Dibrell.
Katy ISD also has received some unwelcome attention with complaints about the leadership of Principal Ann Smith at Golbow Elementary School. Parents have made complaints about intimidation from Smith directed at parents. The controversy recently received attention in Scholastic Administrator magazine.
The controversy at Golbow Elementary has been unrelenting recently. A former staffer at the school has gone public. Read it at http://instantnewskaty.com/2011/08/31/25337
Smith was paid $83,776 in 2009-10 and $86,776 in 2010-11.
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Texas Budget Source is a nonprofit news source that has two missions: government fiscal transparency and accountability and open government. Texas Budget Source is on Facebook. The Twitter handle is TXBudgetSource. Curt Olson’s Twitter handle is olson_curt.
To be clear, these percent increases for two years, correct? They’re still much higher than what teachers received, but I wanted to make sure I understood the article correctly.
Also, a salary increase due to promotion isn’t really the same as a salary increase with no job change. In many industries, there are pretty big jumps between levels. For instance, my boss makes about $50,000 more than I do. If he left and I was promoted to that position, I would expect at least a $40,000 increase.
It looks to me that they aren’t really “leveling” the high school principals, but rather paying them based on years in that position, which makes sense. Cross, Robertson, Steele, and Grisdale all became high school principals in the same year. The other two mentioned high school principals have more years of experience. Does the new principal at Cinco make less than Cross, et al?
Anyway, I think many people in the district are overpaid, especially Frailey and why we keep giving him exorbitant increases, I’ll never know.
Actually Lorenzo Garza, the El Paso ISD Superintendent, isn’t making $280,000 anymore. He was arrested in early August and is in the County Jail.
Read about the charges and HIS contract (which all these superintendents across the state have managed to negotiate for themselves) at http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_18598633
According to the El Paso Times article, “He [Garza] faces mail fraud and other charges allegedly in connection to a scheme to defraud the district and secure a $450,000 sole-source contract under false pretenses. ”
Here are the terms of Mr. Garza’s superintendent contract:
Highlights of EPISD Superintendent Lorenzo García’s latest contract, executed June 22, 2010:
Initial term
First employed February 2006; with contract amended Aug. 28, 2007, to end June 30, 2013.
Compensation and salary
$280,314 annual base salary through July 31, 2011. Effective Aug. 1, 2011, automatic annual increases by amounts corresponding to the average percentage of raises provided to classroom teachers that year.
Annual retention incentive paid to his annuity in the following amounts: $10,000 in 2007; $15,000 in 2008; $20,000 in 2009; $25,000 in 2010
Performance bonus for achieving one or more goals out seven on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills test or other state or federal student performance accountability measures: $3,000 a year for each of up to six goals achieved through 2009 (not to exceed $18,000); with annual increases for a maximum bonus of $36,000 by 2012, paid in cash or salary-deferred payment.
$2,000 a month for in-district travel.
$1,000 a month for cell phone use, including business and personal use.
Up to $3,000 annually for professional development, including travel and membership fees.
$1 million life insurance policy, with cancellation of the policy upon termination of employment.
$1 million professional liability insurance.
100 percent of the superintendent’s contribution to the Texas Teacher Retirement System in the amount required by the system.
Reimbursement of travel on behalf of the district, including airline tickets, hotels, meals and rental cars.
High-option health insurance, with the superintendent responsible for the same portion of his premium as is paid by other district employees
16 vacation days per year, with sick and personal days as awarded to other district employees.
Disability insurance premiums paid by the district up to 60 percent of the annual base salary until the termination of the contract.
Any of you have a contract like that where YOU work???
The business of outrageous salaries for superintendents started right here in Katy. I put up a letter that I wrote to the editor of the Katy Times in 1990 regarding what they were doing. I’ve been pointing out the insanity of school boards that are part of this ruse to bilk the taxpayers ever since. You can read it at http://www.marymcgarr.com Go to Featured Article in the index.
We are among tops in TX in debt/student and have one of the highest paid Supt in the state. Is it unreasonable to expect that every school in KISD should be rated Exemplary?
This just disproves the Katy Koward’s position that throwing lots of money at the problem will solve it. It’s a shame, however, that the Katy Kowards do not seem adept enough to get the message and instead continue to drive our district and schools to the dregs.
Truth is the Katy district is too top heavy compared to other districts in the state. What is their job descriptions and how does it effect my child’s education in the desk seat?
Truth is justifying these large expenses has not been done publicly yet. Complete review of the new budget did not happen this summer under Fraley-Moore-Adams controls. Who voted to put the budget on the consent agenda at the end of August? Wish we were video and audio taping these meetings. Truth needs to be revealed.
Truth is the district has 10 superintendents now! One retired since last May, and one is an opening to be filled later says Mr. Fraley. Why do we need 12 superintendents? Who answers the phone and returns emails to the voters and parents? Truth is many are not answered at all.
Truth is the Fraley-Adams-Fox reign needs to be monitored much closer by the parents and voters of this district. We still have not had a complete audit of all funds and properties within the district.
Nine months after the Powerhouse property purchase, do we know anything more about the plans to use this land? Truth is there are secrets within the district leadership that should not be allowed by the voters and citizens.
I don’t know everyone listed in the article. Three of the principals mentioned are folks I know at least by name and position; Cross, Robertson, and Steele all moved into new positions which required more reponsibility. Certainly that would validate a raise. I think the article slanted it from the beginning to bring negativity to the district. And…the principals got 0% increase this year unless they changed levels. That wasn’t mentioned.
I can say with 99.9% certainty that most CEO’s in the business world make significantly more than any of these folks, yet they put in CEO hours with CEO pressures.
That might be true, but taxpayers don’t pay CEOs.
I don’t think the principals are overpaid. I do think some of the others are.
Very true, lisalou. That’s why we, the teachers, principals, and others who work with the kids, do so because we love it, not for the pay. HA. I would’ve loved a raise to cover the rising cost of living, but I am just thankful to have been able to keep my job! It will be hard to keep up our morale if we continue to see no raises while the upper admin keep getting raises, though.
In the private sector with very high expectations, high pressure, unfailing drive for results, an annual 6 to 8 percen pay increase is to be expected for the best of the best. Raises are based on performance, not years if service. In my opinion, anything more then a 9 percent pay increase in the face of severe budget shortfalls and emotional difficult teacher layoffs is in poor taste. The boards reluctance to even acknowledge the issue at all is more troubling to me then anything else. If you don’t have the time or energy to engage in discussions with the community you serve, perhaps it’s time to retire. I for one will be waiting for the next school board election with much anticipation. I am less then impressed with the behavior and demeanor of Mr. Adams.
I don’t have a problem with what we pay anyone assigned to a campus level position, from the janitor to the school principal. In fact most of them are underpaid for what they do.
My attitude is not the same as we move our vision to the ESC.
I do not understand this concept of taking care of the highest paid people at the expense of the rest, nor do I agree with the “keeping up with the Jones” approach. So what if there is a higher paid person someplace? Who cares? Now if we want to take the twenty highest paid persons in the same job and average them together and make an offer, I might be willing to accept that approach.
The best approach I can think of is MERIT pure and simple, and that should be clearly spelled out in the superintendent’s contract.
I have looked and as far as I can tell there is no reference to what he needs to do to earn an extra dollar. I would like to know what items are measured by the BOT when they evaluate him.
I don’t need to see the actual comments, but I would like to see the sheet the BOT fills out. And for the record, how does that work anyway?
All seven get a sheet and score him? The president tells the BOT what he has recommended and then they vote? Or does Alton score himself and make a recommendation? I suspect it is the later as no one in their right mind would approve the contract he has. Oh no, that might be the problem.
Come on BOT come out and tell us how compensation is determined for the highest paid employees, starting with Alton.
I would like to see the people that received the big raises start to push a broom, clean the bathrooms and clean up after a child throws up in a class room because they fired so many janitors that the people that are left can not do the job efficiently any more.
I would like to see them also drive the kids to and from school in a 20+ year old buses that break down all the time and have no air conditioning. Especially when temperatures are 104* to 107* outside and in the bus????????
Hourly employees that maintain the buildings or drive your children have been told they will not get raises for the next three years. They only make peanuts in compared to them but I have never seen one of them lift a finger to get down right dirty so the kids can have a clean and safe environment.
It is time for our community to start taking back our schools and hire administrators that are looking out for our kids and not their pockets.
Three years with no raise? I sure hope that is a rumor. I truly appreciate the job our custodians do at my school. And I can’t imagine being a bus driver in this weather. But, by the same token, I appreciate the job my principals and AP do for our school. The extra schooling and training they have had in order to achieve their positions make a difference in our students. I am pretty sure they are underpaid. The ESC folks?? Not sure if I can support that sort of salary and raises when none of the rest of us are getting one. Hmmmm
This is the same group of people who took money away from employees so they could change the way they are paid. They also said for the past two years that there would be no re classifications or promotions or raises. Take a look over in HR and see how many Directors they have with no one under them who were reclassified last year to higher paying positions. There are no raises this year except for teachers. But then again Frailey and his cronies made sure they got theirs the past couple of years so it would look like they were going without a raise this year like everyone else. If you are in any type of support positions with the district you are just out of luck.
Let ‘em eat cake!
I recently read where the Katy ISD supertendent stated that he and his administrative staff will seek to cut costs. He might start with buiding schools that are not so elaborate. But again, I’m of a different generation who happened to experience the depression and was educated in small country schools. He and most of the parents of today’s students are so accustomed to having every want satisfied without regrad to the costs will surely lead us into the the same condition our federal government is now experiencing. So will all local governments of large metropolitan areas suffer the same fate. It’s ironic that our governor, now running for the Republican nomination for president,, who is so opposed to federal spending, earlier this week requested that Texas be declared a disaster area because of the fires so that federal assistence can be quickly granted to relieve him of his and Texas’ responsibility. Where is the line drawn–can we expect the federal government cure all the ills with tax money we send it? How disgusting the malaise of the endless spend and tax leaders we have at all levels of government! Obviously I do not believe the superintendent’s empty words about “economizing”. (I might add that this enmail space doesn’t apparently allow one to go back to make corrections–so the misspellings and left out words will have to stay!)
So, there are GREEDY administrators in this A+ district!!! Why did Harris get a big raise…for “Butchering” people’s careers. Ann Smith getting a raise. I bet she is happy for being rewarded for her dirty tricks and lies.
So Frailey and the board saw fit to reward him because he is the SUPERINTENDENT OF a supreme district but not the teachers who make this district what it is!