Amid public furor over pending school closures and ongoing budget challenges, the Seattle School Board approved a new contract for Superintendent Brent Jones, with a nearly $25,000 boost in his compensation package.
Jones’ annual salary will jump to $348,395 — $13,395 more than last year’s — as part of a salary and benefits package that’s $24,790 higher than his previous contract. That agreement was set to expire on June 30, but it included language that allowed Jones an automatic extension if the School Board did not renew it by Nov. 15 of last year.
Jones’ total compensation now comes close to $390,940. The deal backdates to July 1. The two-year agreement, approved in a special meeting this week, expires in June 2026.
Critics say giving Jones such a hefty pay raise now appears “out of touch,” especially as the district faces an estimated $94 million budget deficit next year. Jones said that Seattle Public Schools may ask some employees to forgo cost-of-living adjustments, not fill vacant positions and possibly cut more staff at the central administrative office.
But School Board President Liza Rankin, who negotiated the new agreement, said the compensation increase was in line with the cost-of-living adjustment that other district employees received and that the board was able to get favorable terms in the deal, including a consistent way to evaluate and monitor the superintendent’s progress on the board’s goals.
“It’s not a bonus,” Rankin said. “It’s not related to performance.
“This is a better contract than we had before, and it still allows termination without cause.”
In addition to the salary increase, some parents were also upset that the contract approval was scheduled for a special meeting without public comment.
“That is grossly out of touch with the reality on the ground,” Ben Gitenstein, a district parent and former School Board candidate, said before the vote. The president of the United States’ salary is $400,000 a year, he said.
“That does not seem in keeping with reason or the state of our district,” Gitenstein said.
Nancy Case, a parent of two children in the school system, also questioned the raise and the timing of the meeting.
“I know that $25,000 is not going to close the budget gap,” Case said. “But it’s just the fact that that was a priority.”
Jones has since said that he’ll take five unpaid days next year “in solidarity” with employees who may be furloughed. He said he will still be available to the district on those days.
In an interview before the School Board approved the contract, Jones defended his compensation. Urban superintendents, he said, are faced with complex and difficult situations.
“I’ve taken us through many, many challenging times in the almost four years I’ve been here, and we still have work to do,” Jones said. “It [the School Board] wouldn’t need me if we had smooth sailing all the time. I’m helping to bring stability. I’m helping to bring that sustainability, and I believe our board understands that.”
In a competitive market for superintendents, the pay increase is merited, he said.
“In fact, I’m not even the highest paid [superintendent] in the state, and I have the biggest district,” he said. “We think this is an appropriate negotiation that we had.”
Last school year, Seattle had about 49,000 students.
By comparison, Lake Washington Superintendent Jon Holmen, for example, received $474,125 in salary, benefits and compensation in the 2022-23 school year, the most recent year for which data is available, state data shows. The district enrolled about 31,000 last school year.
Renton Superintendent Damien Pattenaude’s salary, not including benefits, is $327,998 this school year, according to a district spokesperson. That district’s enrollment is about 15,000.
Seattle School Board Director Joe Mizrahi said he understood the optics of a pay increase for Jones while the district faces budget challenges.
“I can understand the cognitive dissonance that people feel around that decision,” Mizrahi said. “Speaking for myself, I feel broadly that Dr. Jones is doing a good job. I think that he’s managing a complicated district and a complicated situation.”
Mizrahi said while there may be ill feelings about specific district decisions, staffing or school closures, “people aren’t rightfully laying the blame of that solely on the superintendent.”
A new superintendent search would cause more instability, Mizrahi said.
“The last thing that I think we need right now is a vacancy in that leadership role,” he said.
Rankin said her primary motivation for negotiating the new agreement was to remove the automatic rollover into a new contract if the board did not act affirmatively in November before the contract expired. The board now has to extend the contract in a public vote in January before the agreement expires.
In addition, there are new accountability measures and reporting requirements for the superintendent on the district’s goals, including quarterly check-ins with the superintendent on his progress and performance.
This story has been updated to include salaries for other Washington school district superintendents and to clarify that Seattle Superintendent Brent Jones’ contract term was set to expire on June 30, but was automatically extended because the School Board took no action on the agreement by Nov. 15 of last year.
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