Soap Lake School Board asks for superintendent’s resignation

SOAP LAKE — First-year Soap Lake School District superintendent Aaron Chavez will not be returning for the 2024-25 school year, following action by the Soap Lake School Board on Monday.

“My status is, I’ve been asked by the board to resign,” Chavez said Tuesday.

Chavez has been asked to stay through the end of the 2023-24 school year. 

Board chair Curt Dotson and board members Signe Knudson, Donald Clark and Nicole Frazier did not return phone calls asking for more information on the decision.

“They feel we’re not a good fit,” Chavez said. 

Chavez is the fourth Soap Lake superintendent since March 2022, when then-superintendent Sunshine Pray resigned. Dotson was named interim superintendent and held the job until the board selected Kim Casey for the 2022-23 school year. She resigned in summer 2023 to take a job as interim superintendent in the Prosser School District, being named as the permanent superintendent in November 2023. Chavez was hired as superintendent in July 2023.

Board members also approved a resolution declaring a financial emergency.

“The financial resources of the district will not be adequate to permit the district to maintain its educational programs and services at substantially the same level for the 2024-25 school year,” the resolution said.

The board resolution cited a number of factors, including declining enrollment, increased expenses for the district’s special education program, increases in wages and benefits, inflation and increases in the cost of insurance. 

“In order to maintain the level of school district expenditures within the level of reasonably anticipated revenues, it may be necessary to make certain reductions in the district’s staffing levels,” the resolution said. 

It did not specify what the staffing reductions would be. District administrators will be directed to prepare what was called a modified educational program.

Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at cschweizer@columbiabasinherald.com.

    Soap Lake School Board chair Curt Dotson during a 2023 meeting. The board asked for the resignation of Superintendent Aaron Chavez Monday.