The Newport Board of Education voted to eliminate seven non-teaching staff positions at a special meeting Wednesday night.
The vote came just a week after the district sent out non-renewal letters for 30 teaching jobs and one central office position in the face of ongoing financial troubles.
The district’s alternative school, the Newport School of Innovation, was also up for elimination, but the board in the end voted to keep it open. Still, the meeting ultimately concluded with the elimination of the aforementioned administrative and operational positions as well as a few district-wide programs and budget items. Other items were tabled for discussion at a future date. You can read a full list of the programs up for elimination by consulting the meeting’s agenda here.
“These are the positions we feel that we can eliminate and not have the impact on the district as far as the daily activities,” said Board Chair Ramona Malone.
The board voted to eliminate the following positions: the director of district-wide services, two technology coordinators, a lead maintenance position, a public relations position and administrative assistants for both the special education and curriculum departments.
The board also voted to cap four administrative salaries at $120,000 for the next two years, reduce the number of portable Wi-Fi hot spots in the district, eliminate the district’s recruitment budget, cancel a transport contract with TANK, reduce programs for professional development and attendance tracking, bar funding for any unmandated out-of-state travel and reduce stipends for the athletic director and high school principal. Funding for the site-based decision making boards (which function like mini boards of education for specific schools) was also reworked to be based on average daily attendance, rather than membership.
On the other hand, the board voted against eliminating the chief academic officer and an energy management position, in addition to the School of Innovation. They also removed votes from the agenda for a school psychologist position, which was protected by tenure, and transportation for after-school programs, for which the board was able to find funding elsewhere in its budget.
A contract with Christ Hospital to provide a nurse practitioner for the district (over and above the school nurses already in place) was tabled due to remaining questions among the board members about how the position was paid for. Finally, the board voted to require the district to bring approvals for curriculum and testing contracts before them for approval prior to their annual renewals. Some of the training and professional development program infrastructure will be reworked into the district’s existing operations.
Conflict over the district’s future has characterized the board’s meetings since Jan. 22, when former Newport Independent Schools Finance Director Jennifer Hoover said the school district was facing a $3.9 million budget deficit for the 2026 school year.
Kim Snapp, the district’s interim finance director, told LINK nky at Wednesday’s meeting that changes the district has instituted since January will give the district a positive balance at the beginning of the next school year, although it’s unclear if that will continue throughout the year.
The Newport Teachers Association, the district’s teachers union, called for a “no confidence” vote in Newport Superintendent Tony Watts at the meeting on Feb. 26, which failed to garner support among the board members. Teachers (and even some students) packed the meeting to express their opposition to the cuts.
Regarding the call for a vote of no confidence by the Newport Teachers Association, Watts said at the time, “I’m doing the best I can. I support the teachers. Everything we do, we try to show them that.”
The board tentatively committed to cutting 21 positions across the three Newport schools in February, and crowds of critical teachers continued to show out to subsequent meetings to speak against the cuts and what they characterized as a disconnect between the teaching staff and the central office administration.
Findings of the Newport Education Task Force, first formed in 2019, didn’t help. The task force’s 2024 report, released in March, revealed that the district ranks among the lowest-performing in the region, with low kindergarten readiness, poor test scores and declining post-secondary preparedness. This is all while spending has increased significantly, particularly on administrative costs.
On May 2, according to information from the superintendent’s office, the district sent out its non-renewal letters to teachers. Given the district’s ongoing financial troubles, it’s perhaps no surprise that other jobs and programs were up next for removal or, at the very least, restructuring in such a way they would incur less expense to the district.
Public comments weren’t allowed at the special meeting Wednesday, but people still came out to see how things went, including people occupying the positions that were up for elimination.
One particular point of contention among the board was the potential for eliminating positions in the curriculum department, such as the chief academic officer, a position currently occupied by Darla Payne, who attended the meeting. Board Member Bobbie Stubbeman thought the role could be redistributed among the duties of the district’s principals, but Watts and Payne didn’t think this was realistic.
“There are things that are required by the state,” Watts said. “Training, things that you have to do, and the principals can’t do all that.”
Many of the meetings required training out of town, directly with the Kentucky Department of Education, Payne said.
“That’s four times a month, plus some,” Payne said, meaning the principals would be away from their buildings for greater chunks of time.
Malone stated that she was unable to find another district of similar size to Newport that didn’t have an academic officer.
There was some similar back and forth at the end of the meeting about the School of Innovation, an exchange that concluded with only one board member, Stubbeman, voting in favor of closing it.
Joshua Snapp, the school’s teacher coordinator, stated the school currently has 77 students and that it actually brings in money for the district.
“The purpose of the program was to remove roadblocks for students who had a struggle or struggled in the traditional setting, so we could remove those roadblocks and graduate,” Joshua Snapp said.
Some examples of obstacles that students might encounter include pregnancy, having medically incapacitated parents, or experiencing other life circumstances that would prevent them from attending a conventional high school. Many of these students, Joshua Snapp said, still manage to graduate on time.
The district will continue evaluating its options in the coming months.
“This discussion for us is not easy,” Malone said, “but it is necessary for us as we confront our financial challenges.”
Haley Parnell contributed reporting to this story.