$82,300 in Lennox : School Chief Goes to Top of Pay Class

The Lennox school board, in a 3-2 vote, has approved a four-year contract that will give Kenneth L. Moffett one of the highest salaries for school superintendents in the South Bay when he returns to the district next month.

Moffett will earn $82,300 a year when he comes back to the Lennox district after 20 months as chief administrator of the ABC Unified School District based in Cerritos.

Moffett, 52, served 10 years in the Lennox elementary system before moving in August, 1986, to the ABC district.

Board members were unanimous in praising Moffett’s previous leadership of the Lennox district, which serves a large population of immigrants. But trustees Hector Carrio and Carmen Martinez, who voted against the contract, said Moffett’s salary was set too high.

His new Lennox salary is a 10% increase over the current $75,000 level received by retiring Supt. Charles (Chuck) Shields. Moffett made $83,000 at the ABC district, but Carrio and Martinez noted that its 26,000 enrollment is much higher than Lennox’s 5,100.

Moffett is “undoubtedly very qualified, and there’s no question that he did a lot to improve the district in the past,” Martinez said. “But I just felt the salary is too high . . . and we should have discussed it more.”

Carrio, while saying he has “the highest respect” for Moffett, also contended that the board majority was too quick to accept the contract on what he said were Moffett’s terms.

Trustee Mary Davis, who voted with the majority, said the predominantly Latino district “is getting a good bargain, whatever we pay Ken. He knows this community very well and he has already proven that he can handle the kinds of problems that we have here.”

Those problems, she said, include educating a high percentage of foreign-born students and “keeping drugs, violence and graffiti away from our schools.”

In November, Moffett contacted several Lennox trustees about returning after he decided to resign his ABC post. He said then that his plans for educational reforms in the ABC district had become bogged down in community controversies. His bid to return to Lennox ended a search for a new superintendent that had turned up 80 candidates.

Higher Salaries

Shields said the Lennox district pays higher-than-average salaries “because we need really dedicated people who are willing to work hard in an unusual teaching environment.” Teacher salaries, he said, range from $23,800 to $45,500.

Despite higher salary outlays, the finances of Lennox schools are “in great shape,” he said. The district’s $16-million budget includes extra state and federal funds granted to schools serving poor communities with high minority enrollments.

Judging by other South Bay districts, salaries for superintendents--which range from about $63,000 to $83,000--bear little correlation to enrollment.

For example, the 665-student Hermosa Beach district pays Supt. Don Ryckman $64,200, whereas Supt. Roger Bly receives $65,250 from the Hawthorne Elementary School District, which has an enrollment of 5,500.

McKinley Nash, chief administrator of the 5,600-student Centinela Valley Union High School District, receives $83,200, placing him at the top of the South Bay school salary scale with Moffett. Supt. Walter Hale of the South Bay Union High School District, which has 3,600 students in its regular and continuation high schools, is paid $78,600.