Popular school leader fired to fix ‘financial crisis.’ Ki-Be parents, teachers outraged

The Kiona-Benton City School Board made the tough decision Wednesday night to cut the job held by an ex-superintendent in hopes of clawing the school district out of a “financial crisis.”

Thursday was the last day of work for Wade Haun, Ki-Be’s director of federal and state programs.

The district also recently let go of vice principal Mike Kantman and chose to not refill four vacant teaching positions.

Altogether, the total personnel savings was about $650,000.

“This is absolutely not personal,” said school board Vice Chair Josh Skipper.

“This is not political. This is about a position that the district no longer needs to fund. And I think it would be irresponsible for the board to continue funding a position that is just flat out isn’t needed.”

The board’s vote was unanimous, 4-0, with one school board member absent.

District administrators originally proposed in March to cut Haun’s and two other employees’ positions as it was preparing to budget for the 2023-24 school year.

The district is in a severe financial crunch because of a mix of rising costs to serve students, plateauing enrollment, gaps in funding due to previous levy failures, diminishing federal COVID relief funds and a potential decrease in Washington state funding.

“It really was the perfect storm,” Superintendent Pete Peterson told the Tri-City Herald.

The Ki-Be School District serves about 1,400 students and employs about 285, with an annual budget of about $22 million.

As a rule of thumb, it’s suggested school districts keep their reserves at about 5%, but Ki-Be’s was projected to slump below 2%.

In order to keep the district’s reserves healthy, Peterson and administrators proposed cutting the three positions and not filling future staff openings when people leave. Together, those moves would save the district about $800,000.

The district also proposed further limits on travel, teaching supplies and consolidating some non-contracted services. Peterson previously said the district was intent on making cuts to programs that didn’t directly affect student learning or programs.

But on March 13, the school board delayed the decision to cut the three positions after parents and teachers packed the meeting, pleading with the board to look at other options.

Those two other workers — Chris Howell and Agustin Tovar, both student support specialists — ultimately kept their jobs. But the administration kept weighing the need for Haun’s position.

After several months of discussion, Peterson gave Haun notice again in an Aug. 18 letter that they planned to cut his position and that his last day of work would be Aug. 31.

The school board was supposed to approve Haun’s firing at a regular meeting on Monday, Aug. 28, but were met with more questions from attendees.

The school board quickly called for a special meeting to be held two days later on Wednesday for the sole purpose of answering public questions and firing Haun — which is what they did during the 15-minute meeting.

Skipper said the board exhausted all options before coming to the decision to cut Haun. He and other board members also acknowledge how beloved of a community member he is.

“Earlier this year, we were not in a healthy, comfortable position. But we’re in a much better position now,” Skipper said. “We’re still not where we want to be... Every year, we’re always going to look at areas where we can reduce expenses and spend the money to the best ability of this district to make sure that we’re servicing out students in the best manner we can.”

Haun’s salary of $101,000 will be used to cover existing expenses that the school district has.

His job to search out state and federal grant money for the school district will fall to other district administrators and department heads.

In a Wednesday email sent to all Ki-Be teachers and staff, Haun thanked everyone for the support he’s received and for being so dedicated to student learning and enrichment.

“Ki-Be is a great place and the only thing I ever wanted was to make it the best place for kids to learn and for staff to work,” he wrote. “You all deserve the very best place to work because of what you do each and every day to help educate our students.”

Haun previously served on the Ki-Be School Board before he was hired to lead the small school district. He has never worked as a teacher or principal, but had worked for 20 years in the banking industry before shifting to education.

“It’ll be tight for a year or two, but we’ll get back on track and hopefully be able to bring some people back and some positions back,” Peterson said. “We aim to be at our 5% budget reserves by the end of the 23-24 school year, if not higher.”