Superintendent Carl Gartley responds Oct. 19, 2022, to a question during a Regional School Unit 18 board of directors meeting in Oakland. Morning Sentinel file

OAKLAND — Weeks after Regional School Unit 18 Superintendent Carl Gartley announced his plan to retire at the end of the current school year, he signed a contract for a new advisory role with the district at half his superintendent’s salary, making some district educators unhappy with the move.

Gartley, whose current annual salary is about $150,000, has been the RSU 18 superintendent for about eight years. The district has eight schools in Oakland, Belgrade, China, Rome and Sidney.

Health concerns prompted Gartley to begin considering retirement, he said, before the RSU 18 board of directors offered him a temporary position to oversee his successor’s transition. Gartley has been named interim assistant superintendent administrator, a new position with a salary of about $75,000, half of what he currently makes.

“I’ve been thinking about this and had a few health concerns over the last couple years,” Gartley said. “They’re going to keep me on for a year to do some consulting.”

Some RSU 18 educators  question the need to spend district funds on a new advisory role, especially after the district and its teachers union completed “strained” contract negotiations last summer.

“In negotiations, they said they didn’t have any money for support staff wages,” Ninette Fenlason, a Messalonskee High School art teacher and RSU 18 Education Association president, said. “Now, to see a new position created that could have served our support staff members, it’s hard to digest.”

Under the contract, Gartley is to work 20 hours and attend two meetings each week, either remotely or in person, although the expectations could vary from week to week.

In his new position, which is scheduled to begin July 1 and run through June 30, 2026, Gartley is expected to help his successor take the reins.

“The superintendent will assign me duties to help in the training. It’s just a transition position,” Gartley said. “I don’t know what it’s going to look like yet.”

The contract stipulates that Gartley can find employment in addition to his advisory role at RSU 18.

Regional School Unit 18 has recently spent about $3 million on upgrades and improvements to district schools, including Messalonskee High School in Oakland. Rich Abrahamson/Morning Sentinel

The new position’s responsibilities include supporting the incoming superintendent, participating in board meetings and advising on the district’s budget and disciplinary matters involving students and staff members.

The contract comes with health and dental insurance, up to $1,000 in stipends for cellphone and technology expenses and $30,000 in retirement benefits.

Gartley announced his retirement plans in late October, according to Laura Tracy, the chair of the RSU 18 board of directors. The interim assistant superintendent administrator position was created shortly afterward.

Laura Tracy, the chair of the Regional School Unit 18 board of directors

“We were having conversations with Carl about his plans, and we wanted to be able to, if we had the opportunity, to secure him for a period of time, knowing that there’s going to be a big transition,” Tracy said.

The RSU 18 board approved Gartley’s new contract Nov. 20, Tracy said.

RSU 18 now employs one administrative superintendent assistant, who Tracy said is expected to work alongside Gartley during the transition to a new superintendent.

“We’ve always had an assistant superintendent job in our district, but we can hire multiples,” Tracy said. “We moved quickly to secure the expertise of Carl, before he went and found another position in another district.”

Fenlason and other district staff members questioned the need to create the new role and hire Gartley to fill it.

The money RSU 18 is set to spend on Gartley’s new contract and benefits could have been used to hire several full-time educators, many of whom make less money in RSU 18 than they would at other local districts, according to Fenlason.

Fenalson said the average teacher’s salary is about $50,000.

Salaries were among the chief issues during contract negotiations last summer, which stalled for months when both sides retained outside counsel.

Tracy said Gartley’s new contract has no bearing on teachers’ pay or the district’s budget.

“It is true that negotiations were challenging on both sides,” Tracy said, “but I will say that the board wants nothing more to support our staff and pay them well.”

Last month, RSU 18 custodian Jeremy McArthur obtained Gartley’s new contract through a Freedom of Access Act request and posted it to an Oakland community Facebook group.

McArthur, who said he makes about $35,000 a year, wrote in the post that Gartley “dragged out negotiations for school staff and barely gave anything when all was said and done.”

In subsequent interviews, McArthur noted the juxtaposition between the tense labor negotiations over the summer and Gartley’s new position.

“In negotiations, the (RSU 18) school board and the superintendent did not want to give what we were asking for — or anywhere close,” McArthur said. “Specifically, they used the excuse of budget constraints to deny us a comparable wage to the other school districts in this area.”

McArthur said he is leaving RSU 18 to become a custodian — with greater pay — at the Waterville Public Schools. He said RSU 18 should put more money into its support staff and educators, not its administrators.

“My wage will go from $18.50 to $23 an hour for the exact same work,” he said. “There’s no reason they couldn’t offer us more money, while they go and make this new position.”

A similar situation unfolded in Waterville in 2017, when Eric Haley, the superintendent of what was then called Alternative Organizational Structure 92, resigned before being rehired a month later so he could begin drawing his retirement benefits sooner.

Gartley, 56, said he is not old enough to start taking retirement benefits.

He said the assistant superintendent administrator position was created to ensure a smooth transition for RSU 18’s next superintendent, and Gartley plans to hold it for only a year.

Tracy said RSU 18 officials do not plan to extend Gartley’s contract beyond its initial term.

“This district is dear and near to my heart,” Gartley said, “and I’m going to do whatever I can to make sure the next person is successful.”

RSU 18 is expected to name a new superintendent this summer, Tracy said. The district has been accepting applications for several months, although she declined to share how many have been received.

Gartley was hired in 2017 after being RSU 18’s assistant superintendent for two years and the principal at China Middle School for eight years.

He touts what he has accomplished as the district’s top administrator, including completion of a nearly $4 million athletic complex at Messalonskee High School and millions of dollars of upgrades at the district’s schools.

“Our district is the top-performing academic school in central Maine,” Gartley said. “We have some of the lowest per-student costs. Our students are doing amazing. The facilities looks great. The infrastructure is set up. Our debt is lowered.”

Gartley said the focus should be on RSU 18’s accomplishments, not on “a small group that’s attacking the school board on Facebook.”