To fill the seat left vacant by Eden Mack’s resignation last week, the Seattle School Board is now conducting a search for an interim board member — the second such search in the past two years.
The Board is taking applications through Jan. 29, and plans to appoint someone to Mack’s seat by the end of March. Applicants must be registered voters in the “District IV” region — a section of the city that includes neighborhoods such as Ballard, Magnolia and Queen Anne.
Whomever the School Board appoints will serve until the conclusion of the board’s next scheduled election in November, unless the person decides to run for the seat and wins it.
School boards are known for high turnover rates here and around the country. Members often receive little to no pay, and have only a handful of dedicated staff members who advance their work.
The Board currently has one other interim member, Brandon Hersey, who was sworn in during the fall of 2019 after his predecessor, Betty Patu, left in the middle of her term. The term for his seat, which represents South Seattle, is also set to expire this fall. All other board members except for Leslie Harris are serving their first terms.
In her resignation announcement on Facebook, Mack advocated for school board members to receive full-time salaries and more employees.
“Our volunteer school board, though well-meaning with shared values, we are simply not equipped to oversee an underfunded $1 billion budget and hire/manage a Superintendent to do this impossible job,” she wrote in her post.
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