COMMENTARY
Donn Esmonde: The high cost of doing nothing
You could see this one coming from a mile away. To the surprise of only those who still put a lost tooth under their pillow, McKinley High School Principal Crystal Barton will not be suspended or fired for various misdeeds.
Buffalo School Superintendent James Williams, and School Board members partial to him, considered going after Barton and then looked the other way. They cited the legal costs — likely upwards of $100,000 — involved in suspending or firing the maverick principal, given union-friendly state law.
Unless state ed officials step in, the months-long McKinley saga involving various transgressions by the iron-fisted principal ends not with the bang of consequences but with the whimper of bureaucrats. The bullying principal will, in the end, likely get the equivalent of a week’s detention.
There are some tough kids at McKinley, and Barton is tough enough to keep them in line. But she crossed the line between disciplinarian and dictator, as confirmed by the recent investigation into the firing of McKinley’s volunteer girls basketball coach and the “excessive” suspension of the player who defended her.
Williams & Co. laid the groundwork for the getaway at last month’s board meeting. Reporters were given estimates of the cost involved in trying to fire or suspend a principal. Williams moaned about the time and money it would take. In another tip-off to the coming non-action, the board then hired an attorney to deal with the issue of disciplining the principal. It allowed board members to duck and cover from the responsibility of deciding Barton’s fate.
All of the hand-wringing over the cost of removing a rogue principal, in a district with a $675 million annual budget, is to my mind merely a cover for a lack of will. The district routinely spends multiple times what it would cost to go after Barton on various consultants, legal fees and grievance disputes. If Williams & Co. really wanted to, they would proceed against the principal. But it is easier to file it and forget it, especially given that Barton — the president of the principals’ union — would not go quietly.
Williams found that out three years ago. Barton charged the superintendent with making racially and sexually offensive comments, some of them during a meeting in her office. Aside from anything else, her eight-page complaint about “bullying and intimidation” sent Williams a don’t-mess-with-me message.
Granted, going after a principal costs time and money. But failing to hold Barton accountable, when her actions crossed lines and victimized kids, carries a price for the district in public frustration and lost credibility that is larger than any legal bill.
The district’s recent marginal gains in student test scores are overshadowed by the ongoing controversies over how Williams runs the show. It is another way that the cost of keeping a vindictive principal outweighs the price of jettisoning her.
The district already has paid heavily. There has been months of negative publicity. An attorney was hired to take the Barton heat off of the board. The McKinley investigation cost the district $25,000.
Investigator Dave Edmunds’ report confirmed media accounts that — among other missteps — Barton influenced the excessive punishment of student Jayvonna Kincannon; pressured officials to have her kicked out of school; hurt kids by firing (on flimsy pretense) the volunteer coach and mentor whom Kincannon stood up for; and vindictively ended a basketball teaching clinic for young kids run out of the McKinley gym.
All of it is a call for action. Williams and the board say that the bill is too high. But doing nothing carries a heavier price.
