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Board approves assistant principal appointment; separate vote held for custodial coordinator amid abstention
Summary
Trustees approved the appointment of Fred Masters as assistant principal at Billy Mitchell Elementary and voted separately on a custodial services coordinator position after a trustee disclosed a personal conflict and abstained from that vote.
The Lawndale Elementary School District board on May 15 approved several consent and superintendent action items that included the appointment of Fred Masters as assistant principal at Billy Mitchell Elementary and a separately considered custodial services coordinator position.
Trustee Phillips moved and Trustee Burris seconded a motion to approve consent items 7.03 through 7.14 (with consent item 7.1 pulled for separate handling). The motion carried 5–0. Superintendent Castro then introduced Fred Masters, whom she named as the district’s new assistant principal for the 2025–26 school year at Billy Mitchell Elementary. Castro described Masters’s prior teaching and leadership experience and his master’s degree in educational administration; Masters addressed the board and said he was “ready to get down to business.”
Earlier in the meeting the board had pulled consent item 7.1 (classified employment, new employment, change of status and resignations) for a separate vote. On the motion to approve all of item 7.1 except one custodial services coordinator name, trustees voted in favor and the motion carried with one abstention recorded for the single removed name. Trustee Coronado explained she had a conflict because she knows the person and asked to be recused from that candidate’s appointment.
The board then conducted a separate motion to approve the custodial services coordinator appointment. That motion passed 4–0–1 (four yes, zero no, one abstain); the abstention was recorded for Trustee Coronado. Meeting minutes show the board has changed the published agenda several times during the preceding days, and the motions were taken consistent with that revised agenda.
Why it matters: Hiring for school leadership and district operations affects school-site leadership capacity and day-to-day facility management. The separate vote and abstention show the board followed standard conflict-of-interest practice when a trustee disclosed a personal connection to an appointee.
What’s next: Fred Masters will join Billy Mitchell Elementary for the 2025–26 school year; the district will complete any onboarding steps through Human Resources.
