10A • January 8, 2016 • Seaside Signal • seasidesignal.com
SEASIDE SCHOOL DISTRICT 10
Year ʖɚ
Review
Superintendent to retire
after 35 years in district
After 35 years, with 19 as superintendent,
Doug Dougherty announced his intention to
retire at the end of the school year.
Dougherty began his career with the Seaside
School District as a teacher at Seaside Heights
Elementary School in 1982. He also worked as
a teacher at Broadway Middle School and the
principal of Cannon Beach Elementary School
before being hired to replace former superinten-
dent Harold Riggan in 1998.
Dougherty’s primary role, however, will be
working on a new school relocation bond to be
placed on the November 2016 ballot.
Three of the district’s existing four schools are
located in the tsunami inundation zone; they have
“long surpassed their useful lives and have a high
likelihood of catastrophic collapse in an earth-
quake,” Dougherty said. For 25 years, Dougherty
and other administrators have worked toward the
goal of relocating those schools. A measure to ob-
tain $128.8 million to do so was on the ballot in a
November 2013 election, but failed.
The board accepted his retirement and voted to
create a temporary committee to set a process for
seeking Dougherty’s replacement, who will start
in July 2016. The committee — Chairman Steve
3hillips and board members 3atrick No¿eld and
Hugh Stelson — will consider contracting with
an agency to assist and creating a committee to
help with the interview process, Phillips said.
Dougherty accepted a request from the board
to serve part time as superintendent emeritus
upon his retirement to help transition the new
superintendent during the 2016-17 school year.
Cannon Beach Academy
to open doors
The new Cannon Beach Academy, on track
to open next year, will get at least $250,000 of
the Seaside School District’s budget. Funds will
come from the district’s existing four schools
in order to serve the charter school students,
but where cuts will be made has yet to be de-
termined.
The academy won conditional approval
to open from the district’s board of directors
during a special meeting last week.
Whitney Westerholm
kicked up a storm as
homecoming queen
and place kicker.
The district’s overall budget is slightly more
than $21 million.
To start, the board will craft a three-year con-
tract with the academy administration that allows
the school to begin classes with kindergarten and
¿rst grade and then add a new grade level each sub-
sequent school year. The academy plans to offer
education for kindergarten to ¿fth-grade students.
While many parents anticipate sending their
children to the new school, administrators are
concerned about the impacts.
The district is requiring the academy to have a
minimum enrollment of 44 students for the 2016-
17 school year, which amounts to an approxi-
mately $256,000 contribution from district funds
in the academy’s ¿rst year of operation. When the
enrollment increases to a capacity of 85 students
— the academy’s goal — the district will have to
divert about $494,000, Dougherty said.
Ballot measure
On Nov. 3, nearly 70 percent of voters in
Seaside School District 10 passed a ballot mea-
sure to renew a local option tax to help fund
operations in the district for ¿ve years, starting
2016. The local option tax, in place since 2000,
helps fund the district’s operations by generat-
ing approximately $1.2 million per school year.
Each year the tax will provide funds for the
district, from $1.22 million in 2016-17, up to
$1.4 million in 2020-21.
Overall, more than $6.5 million will be raised
through the local option tax. This estimate is
based on current data available from the Clatsop
County assessor. Seaside’s total school budget for
2015-16 was just over $21 million.
The funds will support the district, which includes
Seaside High School, Broadway Middle School,
Seaside Heights Elementary School and Gearhart
Elementary School. The district also will include the
Cannon Beach Academy when it opens in 2016.
This is the ¿fth time voters had the option to
renew the levy. The last local option tax vote took
place November 2010, with 55 percent of the vot-
ers approving the measure to continue to fund a
reduction in classroom sizes and provide a wider
range of programs for Seaside students.
With passing of the local levy, the district set
the stage for a future bond to build a new school
outside of the city’s tsunami inundation zone.
Such a plan failed in 2013.
JEFF TER HAR PHOTO/FOR SEASIDE SIGNAL
The board accepted his retirement and voted to
create a temporary committee to set a process for
seeking Dougherty’s replacement, who will start
in July 2016. The committee — Chairman Steve
Phillips and board members Patrick No¿eld and
Hugh Stelson — will consider contracting with
an agency to assist and creating a committee to
help with the interview process, Phillips said.
Dougherty accepted a request from the board
to serve part time as superintendent-emeritus
upon his retirement to help transition the new su-
perintendent during the 2016-17 school year.
Seaside School
District 10 board
members discuss
a motion to in-
clude the Cannon
Beach Acade-
my as a public
charter school
within the dis-
trict on numer-
ous conditions.
Looking ahead
Dougherty has indicated he plans to seek an-
other bond measure in the next year or so to build
a new school site outside of the tsunami zone,
which puts students at three of the district’s four
schools at risk. A bond measure to do so was pro-
posed in 2013 and failed.
KATHERINE LACAZE PHOTO/SEASIDE SIGNAL
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