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Benicia Unified board hires Leadership Associates to run superintendent search
Summary
The Benicia Unified School District board voted unanimously June 17 to hire Leadership Associates to conduct its superintendent search, citing the firm’s prior work with the district, a competitive price and an aggressive timeline.
The Benicia Unified School District Governing Board on June 17 voted unanimously to approve a contract with Leadership Associates to conduct the district’s superintendent search.
Board President Grubbs said the board considered three firms — Leadership Associates, Hazard, Young & Atia (HYA), and the California School Boards Association Executive Search Services — and selected Leadership Associates because of its timeline, familiarity with the district and lower cost. “Their timeline … is aggressive but realistic,” Grubbs said. She added that Leadership Associates worked with the district three years ago and that “those documents belong to us.”
The firm’s scope includes a community and staff input phase; board members noted Leadership Associates will reuse recent survey data rather than re-survey the community. Trustee Manasseh encouraged fellow trustees to participate in the community and staff input process, suggesting one or two board members join stakeholder conversations to hear feedback directly. Georgina Martinez was singled out by multiple speakers for providing support in the process; board members described her role as central to working with the search firm.
No dollar amount for the contract was stated in the discussion on the record. After discussion, a motion to approve the contract passed with an oral vote: “Aye” and no opposition.
The board’s action is procedural: it approves the search firm and the firm’s phased approach. The board did not adopt a candidate or make any personnel decision at this meeting; next steps will be the outreach and candidate recruitment phases identified in the firm’s timeline.
Quotes used in this article are taken verbatim from the board meeting record.
The board’s motion and vote concluded the item: the contract with Leadership Associates was approved unanimously and the board directed staff to proceed with the search process as outlined in the firm’s proposal.
