The Stillwater Area School Board got an earful Thursday evening from deeply divided constituents about Superintendent Denise Pontrelli.
Speakers and spectators packed the public forum before the board’s meeting at city hall to voice their support for or opposition to its efforts to oust the superintendent.
The board had voted 5-2 earlier this month to negotiate a separation agreement with Pontrelli, who has said she isn’t interested in leaving her job and would prefer to enter into mediation with the board over its differences with her.
The vote laid bare a rift within the district over Pontrelli’s Building Opportunities to Learn and Discover initiative, or BOLD, which in 2016 closed three elementary schools with declining enrollment.
A majority of the speakers at Thursday’s meeting expressed support of Pontrelli and her request for mediation, many sporting t-shirts that read “Ponies 4 Pontrelli,” a reference to the Stillwater mascot. Some criticized board members as petty for seeking to remove the superintendent.
“I would assert that the board majority has created many of their own problems,” said Peggy Franklin, a Lake Elmo resident. “You’re willing to publicly scapegoat Ms. Pontrelli to satisfy your personal vengeance.”
Pontrelli was hired to head the 8,300-student district in March 2015, and she released her BOLD plan later that year. The BOLD plan recommended closing Withrow, Marine on St. Croix and Oak Park elementary schools, and moving their students elsewhere in the district.
Pontrelli estimated the closures would save the district an annual $1.2 million, which would be reinvested in updated programming. Despite vocal opposition from parents and local elected officials, the school board approved the BOLD plan in 2016.
Over the next two election cycles, school board candidates running in opposition to Pontrelli and her program have won a majority of seats. Only two members who hired Pontrelli remain on the board.
The new school board voted at its July 11 meeting to seek a separation agreement with Pontrelli. Some supporters of this decision on Thursday pointed to recent the elections as a mandate from voters to change course.
“The old board and their vision for the district was roundly rejected and defeated,” said Bill Gilles, whose daughter is a first-grader in the district. “This new board is saddled with the top executive who designed and administered the vision of the old rejected board.”
Several district employees spoke up for Pontrelli, including fifth-grade teacher Ben Halley, who said the superintendent has broad-based support among educators. He also decried what he characterized as high turnover in the district’s top job.
“In my 12 years in this district, I’ve seen three full-time superintendents and twice had an interim superintendent,” Halley said. “No school district can build and sustain a productive and child-centered culture with such constant turnover of leadership.”
Pontrelli has almost two years left on her contract. She is due $388,758 in salary over those two years, plus up to $20,000 in health and retirement payments.
The cost of paying out this sum in a separation agreement with Pontrelli was a common concern among opponents of her ouster at Thursday’s meeting.
“A buyout of Pontrelli’s contract is a terrible waste of funds,” said Abby Banks, a resident of Woodbury. “The hundreds of thousands of dollars needed to terminate her contract … has no place being used for anything other than the educational betterment of our district.”
The contract contains no provisions for cancelling Pontrelli contract against her will, unless for cause. Board members have said they don’t intend to do that.