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With Portland Public Schools facing a $40 million budget deficit heading into the 2025-26 school year, Superintendent Dr. Kimberlee Armstrong wrote a memo to the School Board proposing the creation two new senior leadership positions.
On Tuesday night, the School Board voted 4-2 to delay the motion after Armstrong said she wanted more time to show her math around cost reductions. Board members Herman Greene and Gary Hollands voted against the delay; Patte Sullivan was not present at the meeting.
“I want to have an opportunity to prepare a more detailed report that shows separate information on how we’re reducing costs to create a structure that I feel will increase efficiency at the central office,” Armstrong said.
But Armstrong’s proposal already faces pushback from School Board member Julia Brim-Edwards, who released a statement Monday night against adding senior management. “This reverses action earlier this year to eliminate two deputy superintendent positions to take a layer of administration out and to save money,” she wrote on her Facebook page.
Armstrong’s proposal is to create two new senior chief positions—one for academics and one for operations—each with a salary ranging between $224,000 and $239,000. In a memo accompanying the resolution the School Board will review tonight, Armstrong says she would promote Kristina Howard, currently the district’s chief academic officer, and Jon Franco, currently the chief of schools, into the roles.
In 2023, Franco made $195,380, meaning his salary would increase by at least 14.6%. Howard was not in her position yet, but her counterpart in the position made $213,646. That would mean her pay would increase by at least 4.8%.
A chart attached to the memo indicates academics, schools and student services would report to Howard. Operations, technology and athletics would report to Franco.
“One of my goals in my first year as superintendent is creating a leadership structure that best supports our schools, staff and students,” Armstrong wrote in the memo. “Although a new layer of leadership is being introduced, the overall restructuring will result in cost savings as we work through our deficit.”
Armstrong added that the reorganization would “streamline workflows, consolidate efforts and strengthen our leadership.”
When Sandy Husk was interim superintendent last year, she eliminated Cheryl Proctor, the deputy superintendent of instruction, and Myong Leigh, then the interim deputy superintendent of business and operations. Leigh’s salary is not immediately clear, but as The Oregonian reported in February 2024, Proctor was the second-highest paid employee at the district, receiving $224,665 in 2023.
Brim-Edwards says the district has other priorities amid its budget deficit. Patching it could cut up to 230 jobs in schools and the central office, the district said in January. At the top of her mind is the potential elimination of funding commitments to schools in Southeast, career coordinators in high schools, and full-time reductions at Title I schools (which serve larger low-income populations).
“It’s not about the individuals in the positions at all,” Brim-Edwards says. “We need to keep our focus on schools at times like this.”
Ahead of the board meeting, Portland Association of Teachers president Angela Bonilla told WW that she understands the need for managers to help streamline processes in the district. But she says she doesn’t understand why the district isn’t trying to find ways to save right now—especially from some of its highest-paid workers.
“When we look at what our students have to experience day to day, those are the folks furthest from our students,” Bonilla says. “When we’re looking at cuts and we’re looking at how we sustain a quality education program, hiring and promoting new senior chiefs, it does not seem aligned to that work.”
She adds: “I hope that [Armstrong] hears us loud and clear that we need a different solution, and is able to find one.”
At Tuesday night’s meeting, board member Hollands said it was a mistake to allow Husk to let top senior staff go. He said it impedes Armstrong from doing her job and helping kids succeed.
“You get a superintendent who’s coming in who is not able to build the team that she needs to be successful for our kids. These are our kids we want her to be successful for,” he said. “We need to make sure superintendent needs to be successful, because the end of the day, the kids is the one that suffers from people not having support.”