Michele Greenwood Bettinger

08/30/2026

Vela’s contract expires June 30, 2027. The board hasn’t taken action to offer him another contract so this year requires a competent board to recruit, interview and hire a new superintendent.

From a “Best Practices” standpoint, there are many steps to take but here are the first steps that should happen in the next month:

1. Rewrite the over 20 year old job description;
2. Hire a search firm that can also place a competent interim superintendent until a new one is chosen;
3. Discuss and set a salary scale for the job.

It would not be best practice to hire someone internal.

Anyone who has been working in the upper levels at Central Office has already BEEN part of -and most likely created- many of the current problems in KSD (and would be likely to perpetuate them. )

When Vela was chosen; the Board President made many crucial mistakes (driven mostly by vanity imho) and, frankly hijacked that process.

Further, Vela’s own staff was deeply embedded into that recruitment process, much to its detriment.

Students, school staff and taxpayers have borne the brunt of the disastrous results of that entire flawed process.

(Face it, Tim Clark wouldn’t even vote to hire a recruitment team because he was happy with Vela and even stated that from the dais.)

I will repeat: a competent board president would lead a rigorous and transparent recruitment process.

What are your thoughts?

08/15/2026

05/18/2026

New Substack Post https://open.substack.com/pub/michelegreenwoodbettinger/p/your-school-district-is-at-the-mercy?r=16nf7r&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

05/16/2026

If you wouldn’t take advice from someone who is hateful/ugly-spirited then you can discard their criticism, too.

05/14/2026

Started a substack. I used to blog about the Kent School District. I'm back at it. No paid subscription required.

05/14/2026

I'm cleaning up some files on my computer and came across these questions I'd prepared in anticipation of an OPMA, Public Records Act (PRA) and Ethics meeting we were going to be having with legal. This would've been sometime in 2021 or 2022 after Dr. Watts left and before Mr. Vela was chosen.

Here are those questions I typed up and prepared for the meeting:

OPMA QUESTIONS:
Can we clarify what constitutes a serial meeting?
Does it violate OPMA to solicit votes in any manner: Email? Phone? One-on-one conversations?

PRA Questions
• Being honest, citizens have shared public records with the board and I’m often shocked at what the board is NOT told. How does a board director get access to public records?

Conflict of Interest Questions
• We have a Conflict of Interest policy 1610 that requires us to maintain a log of any contracts subject to this policy and annually, or when a new director assumes office. This has never happened in my time on the board. How can we make sure that we are logging any potential conflicts?
• When should a director recuse themselves? Over the course of time, board directors have sat on other boards with organizations that have contracts with the district; how does this not constitute a conflict if the director votes?
• When Dr. Watts contract was up for renewal in 2020, several leaders of organizations with which we have contracts reached out to support his renewal, does this constitute a conflict of interest?
• Right before the vote for the Bezos Academy, the board was notified that the district had engaged in Amazon Business Prime for the entire district, does this constitute a conflict of interest?

ETHICAL DUTIES QUESTIONS
• Board Policy 1002 is out of compliance with our policies; further, RCW 28A.150.230 was updated in 2010, 5 years after this policy was last approved. Has it gone through legal review?
• What about employees of the district sitting on boards that might have impact on district operations? Example: Dr. Watts was a governor with the WA Nonprofit Building Better Futures. Also involved with that nonprofit were Employees of the King County Housing Authority. At the time of the 2019 filing for board directors, Leah Bowen was employed by the King County Housing Authority. I heard her say that her boss stopped by her house one day and encouraged her to run for the School Board.
• I’ve said this before and, in light of Auburn School District recently implementing such a thing, can this board consider a third-party tip line to advise of any potential conflicts of interest, violations of law or policy?

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