Chief of Schools Not Doing Job, Board Says

When the Laguna Beach Unified School District fired Supt. Reed Montgomery on Tuesday, after he requested a paid medical leave two months ago for undisclosed reasons and never returned to work, his absence wasn’t the only reason for dismissal.

School board members said Wednesday that Montgomery, 51, had failed to complete his duties as head of the 2,500-student system or provide leadership at a crucial time.

“There were things we asked him to resolve in a timely manner and it was either never done, or the first attempt at it was completed and that’s it--he would never redo it,” said Trustee Steven Rabago.

Added school board President Kathryn A. Turner: “He just didn’t perform to what the contract requirements were for.”

But board members declined to give specifics because Montgomery, who was Laguna’s superintendent for just seven months, said he would file a lawsuit against the board as early as next week.

He wants to collect salary and benefits for the remainder of his three-year contract, which he estimates at $300,000.

He also said Wednesday that he was never told his performance was not up to par.

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“It just came out of the blue on me,” he said in a telephone interview from his home in Lake Arrowhead. “There was never any talk about any of this.

“I think they got ticked off at me because I took sick leave,” said Montgomery, who earned $95,000 a year and was offered incentives for bonuses worth $20,000.

Responded Rabago: “That is absolutely not the case. It was clear that there were some performance issues or we wouldn’t have met with him seven times.”

Asking for a medical leave and providing insufficient information to back up the request “was the last in a series of events,” Rabago said.

“It has nothing to do with his medical condition and has all to do with his responsibilities and the obligations of the contract.”

Those seven closed-door meetings were held from July 29 to Dec. 4, according to school board minutes, and what was discussed has not been made public.

Montgomery, who has served as a superintendent in San Bernardino and Los Angeles counties, said those meetings were held to devise a format for his performance evaluation, which was never completed.

He also stated Wednesday that internal bleeding was the cause of his sudden exit from work on Dec. 5 and is why he asked for a paid medical leave for the month of December.

Montgomery said he suffered from internal bleeding intermittently from late August to early December. He said his doctors are not sure why it happened and he declined to reveal anything else about his medical care.

“It could be stress-related,” he said.

Board members, meanwhile, are looking ahead to Montgomery’s replacement and have instituted a tight timetable to find a new school chief by the end of March.

The board expects to hire an executive search firm that specializes in top school administrators, and will search public and private school districts throughout California.

Marge and Bob Earl, a husband-and-wife team of executive recruiters who live in Laguna Beach, volunteered to run the superintendent search that ultimately selected Montgomery. School officials have praised their efforts, despite Montgomery’s termination.

“The Earls did a wonderful job,” Turner said. “It’s hard to say where it went awry.”

Ron Harris, who with his wife, Ellen, are parents and frequent critics of school board decisions, said the firing was the right move, even though it comes as the board debates whether to enroll as many as 342 more students because of development along Newport Coast.

“The timing couldn’t be worse with the Newport Coast decision coming up,” Harris said.

“But, due to the principals and the teachers, the district still provides a solid, first-class effort for the children.”

School officials must decide by March 1 if they will accept a $6.6-million agreement with the Irvine Co., which is developing houses along Newport Coast. The plan has drawn controversy from many parents, who oppose the agreement and want the board to change the district boundaries so the new students would attend schools in the Newport-Mesa Unified School District.

Analyzing the complex issue has fallen to elected school board members, instead of a professional school administrator.

“There was clearly a need to have some leadership,” Rabago said, “to take the initiative to understand what the problem was.”