Vallejo schools superintendent to retire in June

VALLEJO – Vallejo City Unified School District Superintendent William Spalding will retire effective June 30, 2024, after nearly four years, the district announced Friday.

Spalding posted his own statement on Monday on LinkedIn. “Some of the greatest people I know are the leaders, teachers, staff, and students in the schools and districts where I have worked,” he said. “I look forward now to a more peaceful existence and more time with family and friends. It's been quite a ride.”

Board of Education President Christy Gardner said that she believes Spalding’s work at the district will have a lasting effect. “Superintendent Spalding’s departure will be deeply felt,” she said. “But we appreciate how his legacy positions the district exceptionally well to advance and expand upon his achievements with new leadership.”

Spalding began his 37-year career in education as a teacher in the Winters Joint Unified School district. He later served as vice principal of Vallejo’s Jesse Bethel High school but he then left the district to pursue other opportunities which ultimately brought him back to lead the Vallejo district.

Spalding was hired by the district in October 2020 after a national search. His work with the district began while students were learning remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic and he managed the return to in-person education in the spring of 2021. 

One of the challenges Spalding has faced as superintendent has been the significant reductions in the district’s funding, which is tied to enrollment and daily student attendance. When Spalding took over, student enrollment numbers had already been declining for decades but the pandemic exacerbated the district’s problems with chronic absenteeism.  

Despite the funding constraints, Spalding has kept the district on track to repay a $60 million state loan to rescue the district from insolvency in 2004. That crisis arose from a combination of financial mismanagement and flaws in the state funding model for schools with higher proportions of low income students. 

The district emphasized Spalding’s role in selling unused district properties in order to manage a shrinking budget and accommodate the loan payments. The agreement between the state and the district includes a state appointed special trustee to monitor the district's financial decisions for the duration of the loan. 

In the spring of 2022, Spalding and the district board moved to revoke the charter for Griffin Technology Academies to address a toxic mold infestation and dilapidation of the charter’s facilities as well as irregularities in the charter’s finances. A year later, the district found that the charter had completed the required repairs and sufficiently addressed the financial concerns. 

Although Spalding has often received praise from district board members, Trustee John Fox raised questions about Spalding’s prior working relationship with the district’s attorney. He said that he was concerned about possible ethics violations and the potential for that relationship to impact the board’s decision making regarding Spalding’s contract. 

Fox stated that he appreciated Spalding’s performance but felt that some of the terms of the contract were unnecessary, such as automatic yearly pay increases and a contingency that required four out of five board members to vote to fire Spalding rather than three. 

The rest of the board repudiated Fox’s concerns and fully supported the contract, which increased Spalding’s salary from $248,000 to $274,881 in July 2022.

According to Gardner, the district plans to include input from the community in developing a list of desired traits for a new district leader but they have not yet announced when they will begin the search for a new superintendent. 

The neighboring Fairfield-Suisun District Superintendent Kris Corey recently announced her retirement as well, so the two districts will likely compete for qualified applicants. The Fairfield-Suisun district serves 20,400 students which is slightly more than twice the number of students enrolled in Vallejo.