Schools Chief Fires His Election Opponent : Education: Principal accuses Charles Weis of political pay-back and says he will sue for damages or job reinstatement.

Ventura County schools Supt. Charles Weis has decided not to renew the contract of Principal Dan Flynn, essentially firing his rival in this month’s election and prompting Flynn to accuse him of executing a political pay-back.

Weis confirmed Wednesday that he has decided not to offer Flynn another $62,000 annual contract because of poor job performance. The current one expires June 30.

“This has nothing to do with his decision to exercise his constitutional right and run for elective office,” Weis said. “I think if you get a chance to look at his personnel file, you’ll understand.”

But Flynn, 42, said he had been fired improperly and will file a lawsuit for damages or to get his job back.

“I believe it’s political retribution 100% and has nothing at all to do with my performance,” he said. “I can’t imagine that this could happen without a face-to-face meeting (with Weis) where I could present my side of the story.”

Flynn said he had received satisfactory or superior ratings his entire 18-year educational career until this week’s evaluation by Phillip Gore, director of the county’s five schools for juvenile delinquents and other troubled students.

Flynn has worked for Ventura County since 1991, running the three Juvenile Court schools. He said he received satisfactory ratings in all categories in five previous evaluations. His ratings this week were unsatisfactory in every category, he said.

“I just wanted to get involved in the political process,” Flynn said. “I didn’t realize this was a repercussion of it. . . . During the election, I had to tell it like it is. I was free from any recrimination, or so I thought.”

Flynn noted that Assistant County Supt. Stephen Kingsford only last week wrote him a letter of recommendation. The letter credits Flynn with implementing a year-round schedule, updating juvenile school policies and bringing the latest technology into classrooms.

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“Dan Flynn is dedicated to providing high-quality leadership to our staff and high-quality education programs to our children and I can recommend Dan without reservation,” the letter concludes.

Weis and Gore said they could not discuss shortcomings noted in Flynn’s evaluation because personnel matters are confidential unless an employee distributes the document himself. Flynn said he would release current and past evaluations, but after meeting with attorneys, he provided only the cover sheets for reviews covering the past two years.

Three of the semiannual reviews showed that his performance was consistently satisfactory. That changed with the one he received this week.

Weis narrowly defeated Flynn in the June 7 election, as both spent heavily to win a superintendent of schools post that had not been contested for more than 100 years.

The county teachers union refused to endorse in the race. Teachers reached Wednesday said they generally support Flynn.

“I believe it was a pay-back, yeah,” said Bill Bateman, an English teacher at one of the schools Flynn runs. “I’ve lost a lot of respect for upper management because of the recent election.”

Bateman said Flynn has been an aggressive advocate for McBride Juvenile Court School, beefing up computer and library programs and fighting to keep state funding.

“There have been a lot of funds moved out of court schools into other programs,” he said. “We’re the cash cow. Until Dan got here, we produced it but the money went somewhere else.”

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Bateman said he thinks that Flynn is well liked by most teachers, although some may harbor grudges because of numerous transfers Flynn carried out last year.

Larry Keegan, president of the county teachers union, said Flynn has a solid reputation with teachers.

“As far as I know, there were few complaints from the employees about Dan,” Keegan said. “In my contact with the court school teachers, they were satisfied with their relations with him.”

Gore said he was surprised by Keegan’s comment, but would not comment further.

According to Flynn, his problems with administrators were not evident in his January evaluation, but began to build with Gore after Flynn said he would challenge Weis in the election.

“You could feel the tension between he and I since I declared my candidacy in the second week of March,” Flynn said.

Flynn said Gore was not happy when he used leave time he had accumulated to run his campaign full-time. The county’s guide for candidates recommends that county employees seeking public office take such a leave, Flynn said.

During the race, Flynn criticized a variety of county programs, including some of those directed by Gore.

But never, until the Monday evening meeting with his supervisor, had Gore notified him of any problems with his performance as a principal who oversees a staff of 20, Flynn said.

“I’m still kind of in shock and sitting here wondering what I’m going to be doing next Friday,” he said, “and how I’m going to take care of my family.”

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But Flynn said he began sending out resumes two weeks ago after a post-election meeting with Weis left him with a feeling that “my time was up.”

“I went into that meeting with high expectations of working together and offering my assistance, and left saddened and dismayed, looking for employment,” Flynn said. “I gathered from that conversation that it was time for me to find employment elsewhere.”

Weis said he never told Flynn anything that would lead him to conclude that his days were numbered.

“He talked about how he felt about himself,” Weis said. “He felt very badly about how he had behaved during the campaign and about the misinformation he had spread to the public. I asked him if he knew that the things he had said were not true. And he said he did. . . . I mostly listened.”

Gore conceded that it may appear that Flynn’s dismissal is related to politics.

“Obviously, because of the timing, one might draw that conclusion,” he said. “But there is no connection at all.”

Weis said Flynn is being dismissed now because his contract expires next week. And he said the district would not be severing its relationship with Flynn if his problems had not been serious.

“I’m hoping that most people realize that we don’t take a non-renewal lightly,” Weis said. “If he wants to talk about his (personnel) file, we’ll be happy to talk about it if he’ll release it.”