At last week’s Essex County Board of Supervisors meeting, Central District Supervisor John Magruder read into the record a letter from a citizen who has been issued a “stay off” notice by the county’s superintendent of schools.
Hazel W. Hickman did not attend the April 9 session after being served the notice the previous day. The order requires Hickman to stay off Essex School Division properties — including the School Board complex where the supervisors conduct meetings — or be charged with trespassing.
The order was signed by Essex Superintendent of Schools Dr. Harry Thomas III.
In the letter read by Magruder, Hickman expressed opposition to the county school division’s request for additional local funding for the 2024-25 academic year.
“I believe the administrative salaries at the District Office are top heavy for a district with three schools and a student enrollment of less than 1,600,” Hickman wrote.
Hickman went on to write that central office administrative salaries should be scrutinized with other regional school divisions.
“The top six administrators in the Central Office salaries for three schools is over one million dollars,” Hickman wrote. “The superintendent has a financial package of salary and benefits that probably exceeds $200,000. Other administrators’ base salaries are well over $100,000. Have you considered asking what is each administrator’s job description?
“I recommend that you, the Board of Supervisors take a firm look at these administrative salaries as well as the qualifications,” Hickman’s letter continued. “Even if some salaries are grant funded, this is a very questionable appropriation of taxpayers’ dollars when student results are analyzed.”
After Magruder read the letter, Board chairman Rob Akers noted that the stay-off order prevented Hickman from attending the meeting and announced he had asked the county’s attorney to review the matter.
“We may want to send a letter to the school board asking that they modify that order somehow that would allow Mrs. Hickman the opportunity to speak before us,” Akers said.
County attorney Adam Winston described Akers’ suggestion as “an advisable course of action. Public bodies, in general, do have the right to police attendance at their meetings if people are unruly… given the fact the events in question did not occur in front of this body I feel it is responsible to send a letter asking if this accommodation can be met. At the end of the day, the school board is the custodian of this facility, so it’s a little bit out of the board’s hands.”
Akers, meanwhile, asked Magruder to contact Hickman “to offer our apologies for her not feeling comfortable coming in person and we will be addressing it in that letter to the school board.”
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