USPS Publication Number 16300
T h is C o m mu n i t y N ewsp a p er is a pu bl ica t ion of E sca m bia / S a n t a Rosa B a r Assoc ia t ion
Se r v i ng t he Fi r st Jud icial Ci rcu it
Section A, Page 1
Vol. 19, No. 1
Visit The Summation Weekly Online: www.summationweekly.com
January 2, 2018
1 Section, 12 Pages
Escambia Voted Yes: New School Superintendent to be appointed in 2020
written by Kaitlyn Peacock
While the spotlight of Election Day was on the race for Florida Governorship and the U.S. Senate seat, Escambia County had its own neck-and-neck race. The question: should the Escambia County School District Superintendent be elected or appointed? The results: by a very slim margin, 62,395 voted for appointed and 61,480 voted for elected. With less than a thousand votes, Escambia County decided the Superintendent after three-term elected Superintendent Malcolm Thomas will be appointed by the school board in 2020. This is not the first time the question of elected or appointed School Superintendent has been on the ballot. The referendum failed five times previous to this, with the last vote held in 1994. In February of this year, Thomas decided to bring the issue of the referendum to the school board, where it passed and was given to the County Commissioners. All five Commissioners voted to place the referendum on the ballot. Thomas said it was important for him once he decided he was not going to run for reelection in 2020 to let the community decide on who would replace him, and how. “The question becomes how are you going to select this new superintendent?” He said. “Well, there’s two methods – you can elect them, which is what we have been doing, or you can appoint them. I believed that was a question the community should have debated and then weigh in on to make that decision. That was why I felt like it should be on the ballot.” Proponents of the referendum campaigned on the fact that an appointed Superintendent is more likely to have higher qualifications than an elected
Superintendent, while those in opposition said an appointed Superintendent would require a higher salary and citizens would lose their right to vote for this important county official. The referendum had loud voices on both sides, however Thomas said the process is less important than the person. While the process of finding a new Superintendent will be different than what Escambia County has historically done, the end result
can work and both systems can fail,” Thomas said. “I think what is more important than the process that you use to select your superintendent will be who you select. It’s not the how.” Supporters of the referendum included the Pensacola Young Professionals (PYP), who campaigned for the appointed Superintendent in hopes that a more experienced person in the job will be able to help raise the standard of schools for the dis-
will still be to try to find the best person for the job, and that is the most important part. “The truth is both systems
trict. Whether you are a parent with a child in the school system, want to be a parent or don’t want or have children, the qual-
ity of schools in the district still affects the entire county PYP Vice President of Membership Ruthie Speight said. “We want people to move here, so whether you have kids or not, the school systems will affect whether you will relocate for a job here,” she said. “Navy Federal is trying to bring more and more people from Vienna, Virginia, which has really excellent schools, so why would you want to move here? That’s just one example. It really does affect everyone whether they realize it or not.” PYP President-Elect Walker Wilson said that the PYP membership voted on whether to support the referendum in September, and that many of their members either strongly supported it or didn’t know much about it. Once the decision was made, the campaign began, with the end goal always being to help improve local schools. “The reason we got into this is because we knew we could do better,” Wilson said. “This brings up the accountability factor for the school district and moving forward we hope to see our school district begin to move up in the ranking from where they are now because we think we can do better than where we are now. We need somebody that’s going to come in here and really focus on what’s going on in these poverty-stricken areas, and if they’re not going to go work with the state to secure funding for that, then it’s not going to work.” Now that the referendum has passed, PYP will bring its focus more on educating people who
WE’RE SOCIAL
didn’t know much about the referendum and how it will affect the county moving forward. With the results being so close, as they were expected to be, there are fears in the community on both sides about how smoothly the process will run, and whether or not this vote was for the better of the community. Both PYP and Thomas spoke to the importance of letting the school board look for and find the right person, and that the first person they find might not be the right one. The process will take time, but Thomas asked the community to let it run its course. “I know we are split, I know a lot of people have angst in both directions,” Thomas said. “I think what they need to know now is allow the school board to build a process. Let’s trust that. Stay informed, keep your ear to the ground, but give it a chance to develop. This is what the voters decided, even though it was by a narrow margin. In a democracy, we respect that.” In his last term, Thomas said he will focus on wrapping up several initiatives, including moving West Florida High School to the former Woodland High School location, continue to improve low-performing school and a few other programs. He also has offered to be as involved or as separate from the hiring process of the new Superintendent as the school board wants. As 2020 approaches, he has said he wants to see this vote bring the community together as Escambia County focuses on finding the best person for the job.
CONNECT WITH US ON SOCIAL MEDIA