Baton Rouge school board not rushing to keep job-hunting Sito Narcisse

Even as he pursues a plum job 700-plus miles away, Sito Narcisse has kept alive the possibility of staying longer as the schools leader in Baton Rouge.

The East Baton Rouge Parish School Board, though, has yet to bite.

Narcisse supporters, notably the powerful nonprofit education group Stand For Children Louisiana, have been pressing the board to quickly renew Narcisse’s contract, which is set to expire June 30, 2024. They want the board to act before Narcisse is hired away as superintendent of Broward County, Florida, public schools, the sixth largest district in the country.

A proposal to start contract renewal negotiations with Narcisse has been on ice for months.

Since Narcisse’s application for Broward County superintendent was publicly released May 18, board member Mike Gaudet, who has described Narcisse as a “visionary,” has tried to revive the idea with his colleagues.

Since then, Broward leaders have named Narcisse one of three finalists for the job; they plan to pick a superintendent on June 15.

It looked for a time that Gaudet would force the issue onto the agenda for the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board’s meeting at 5 p.m. Thursday. It’s the first board meeting since the news broke about Narcisse.

On Tuesday, after the initial agenda for Thursday’s meeting was posted online, Gaudet informed his colleagues that he was adding an item to the agenda to start negotiations to renew Narcisse’s contract. School Board rules allow any member to add an item to a meeting agenda.

Late Tuesday, Board President Dadrius Lanus told The Advocate that Gaudet was insisting on a vote and that the item would likely occur unless Gaudet changed his mind by the time Thursday’s agenda was finalized at 5 p.m. Wednesday, 24 hours ahead of the meeting.

At 4:30 p.m, Gaudet wrote in a text to The Advocate, “There will be no item on the agenda.” He would not elaborate as to why.

Gaudet did something similar months ago. He added an item to the Jan. 19 agenda calling for the board to vote to start contract renewal negotiations with Narcisse. Gaudet ended up pulling the item back then. Six of the nine board members were brand new, sworn into office just days earlier, and weren’t ready to take that step.

Narcisse has kept the idea alive.

In the May 18 email Narcisse sent to the board about his Broward County application — the next day, he forwarded it to all district faculty and staff — he made clear he is open to staying in Baton Rouge.

“I continue to be open to conversations about a partnership that ensures my leadership not just today — but for years to come,” Narcisse wrote.

Two days later, Stand For Children launched a public letter-writing campaign to board members: “We call upon board leadership to take IMMEDIATE ACTION to execute a contract with Dr. Narcisse that assures our school district has the sustained, effective leadership we sorely need.”

That prompted Board Vice President Carla Powell to release a statement accusing Gaudet and Stand for Children of “bullying and pressuring” her and other board members so that they would fast-track the renewal of Narcisse’s contract.

“The board is not required to start this conversation until six months prior to the expiration of his current contract — which would take place around November or December,” Powell said.

Concerns about the employee pay raise, and the budget in general, have intertwined with debates about Narcisse’s future.

In her statement, Powell says she won’t consider any contract renewal until the board has sorted out the budget for the 2023-24 fiscal year and figured out how to pay for “sustainable teacher pay raises.”

“I believe that it would be ‘a slap in the face’ to our teachers if we offer such an opportunity to Dr. Narcisse without confirmation of financially sustaining our teachers and the promises that have been made to them,” Powell said.

The budget will be discussed Thursday, the first of at least three meetings the board has scheduled to talk about the budget in June. It calls for $31.7 million in budget reductions — half cuts, half shifting money temporarily to other funding sources.

Narcisse is seeking to increase starting teacher salaries from $47,800 to $51,360 a year, putting the school system second only to Iberville Parish for the Baton Rouge region. That equates to 7.5%, close to the 8% hike that he first promised 11 months ago, though not as far reaching since it leaves out many employees, including support workers.

To cover the teacher-only pay raise, at least for year one, Narcisse wants to raid a fund that voters first created in 1998 to supplement employee salaries. But that fund won’t have enough money to keep that pay raise going in 2024-25.

At a town hall Tuesday night, Board President Lanus promised that any pay increase approved would cover support workers, but he said it may have to come as a one-time stipend. The board would subsequently hunt for a sustainable funding source for a permanent pay raise in the future, though perhaps less than 8%, he said.

Narcisse’s proposed 8% increase, if approved as is, would be very difficult to undo or reduce later if the school system was in financial trouble. Louisiana law forbids lowering school employee salaries once they are permanent, saying that their annual salary “shall not be reduced below the amount of such salary paid during the previous school year.”