About a week after the WCCUSD teachers union publicly revealed its vote of “no confidence” in Associate Superintendent of Business Services and Chief Business Officer Kim Moses, the district announced her retirement.
In an email sent to the community at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, the district said Moses, after nearly two decades of service, plans to retire in June.
“We are working on identifying a replacement for her position for the remainder of the school year,” said the email signed by Superintendent Cheryl Cotton.
Moses has served as a WCCUSD principal and was interim superintendent before Cotton assumed the post last summer.
“We will miss Dr. Moses’s (sic) wisdom and leadership, but we are also grateful for the legacy she leaves behind. Please join us in extending our gratitude to Dr. Moses for her years of service and in wishing her a joyful and fulfilling retirement,” Cotton wrote.
At the Dec. 10 school board meeting, Moses was accused of “fear-based” budgeting by the teachers union, whose board in November voted “no confidence” in her by a 114-1 vote and said she has mishandled the district’s budget.
She did not attend the meeting and did not respond to Richmondside’s request for comment.
Union accuses Moses of “fear-based budgeting”
In the district’s first interim budget report, presented at the Dec. 10 board meeting, the numbers show that district expenditures are expected to exceed revenues over the next three years by about $13.6 million this year, $19.2 million next year and $25.7 million the following year. The district is exhausting its Fund 17 reserve over the next two years to help offset the deficit. As a result, the report shows this year, the district is expected to have a balanced budget, however will face a $3.9 million deficit in 2026-27 and a $29.3 million deficit in 2027-28.
These numbers do not account for the pending raises in the contracts recently negotiated by UTR and the Teamsters. Moses previously told Richmondside each 1% salary increase adds about $2 million to district costs, so it’s anticipated that the expenditures will increase by millions.
At the same time, projected revenue continues to decrease because enrollment continues to trend downward.
However, the union claims the district, under Moses’ leadership, is misrepresenting its financial picture.
“The projected income is false, it’s underreported by about $38 million,” UTR Executive Director Mark Mitchell said at the recent school board meeting. “We provided that information in the (state mediation) fact-finding hearing. It’s been widely documented and communicated to the district officials, including Dr. Moses.”
He also said the district could quickly resolve the deficit if it exhausted its Fund 71 dollars — about $62 million in unrestricted funds.
“That’s squirreled away from students and the public and could just be re-determined to be part of general revenues, and there would be no deficit in the outer years,” Mitchell continued.
He also added that the district has mismanaged its money by spending more on outside contractors, rather than hiring new permanent employees or nurturing talent in its ranks.
“Last year, under Dr. Moses (as interim superintendent), there was a $30 million overrun in contractors beyond board approved expenditures,” Mitchell said. “This year already, under Superintendent Cotton, they’ve spent $15.7 million in unapproved expenditures on contractors. The addiction to contracting is the issue.”
Education reporter Jana Kadah contributed to this report.
Why did you put a (sic) after the correct grammar usage in the quote by Cotton? It’s just above the second photo.
Superintendent Cheryl Cotton’s quote reads, “We will miss Dr. Moses’s wisdom ….” And you edited in a (sic) as if “Moses’s” is an incorrect way to indicate a possessive when a singular word ends with an “s” sound. Your writer/editor is wrong.
Cotton’s “Moses’s” is exactly the correct way to write it and say it. You must add that “apostrophe s”. Only if the word is plural do you add just an apostrophe, and skip the extra s.
A name is singular. So whether it’s “Dr. Moses” or “Dr. Seuss”, the correct possessive is “Dr. Moses’s” or “Dr. Seuss’s.” If your story were about Grinches, which is Grinch plural, then the correct possessive would be Grinches’ .
Overall, however, your grammar is more correct more often than that of East Bay Times’ reporters/editors.
Hi Jaqi, We always appreciate reader feedback like this. We follow Associated Press style which calls for just a single apostrophe after proper names ending in “s.”