MARLBORO COUNTY — A recent meeting of the Marlboro County School Board, in which a new superintendent, Dr. Carla Mathis, was named as the replacement for the state appointed Interim Superintendent Dr. Michael Thorsland, turned controversial when board members delved deeper into monetary issues facing the district as it works to approve a working fiscal budget for the 2026-2027 school year.
According to information shared with the Board from the financial report, the district has received 73% of its budgeted revenue as of March 31. He also said the report shows salaries and benefits were below the expected spending level, while operations remain over the ideal spending level.
Special Education needs
A key concern continues to be special education contract services, according to Thorsland, who said contract educators contribute to a sizeable share of the district’s operational costs. A financial hole Thorsland says he believes can be filled by hiring certified special education instructors rather than relying on contracted teachers.
“If we were able to hire our own special ed teacher, they would be salary and fringe, but instead we’re paying a contract company,” Thorsland said, adding that he feels the contracts should be classified as salary and fringe.
“That’s the money where we didn’t budget enough this year and we’re going to more closely approximate that expense next year in our budget,” Thorsland said.
Financial Report and Salary Scale discussion
Turning to the district’s salary scale, Thorsland explained the finance report was included in the state’s update to the board because of its relevance to the budget— making up a whopping 85 to 90% slice of the district’s financial pie!
“Once we get to a place where we’re comfortable with salary schedules, that’s what’s going to drive the majority of our budget. So, it’s an important piece and I wanted you to see it. If you tell us to change this, change that, those are things we can work with. But I wanted you to see them before we present a budget to you two weeks from tonight,” Thorsland said.
When asked by board member Angela Galloway, Thorsland said administrator pay bands were not made based on a candidate’s number of degrees but rather determined by the candidate’s expertise and experience level.
He explained, “To be an administrator, you have to have a master’s degree or higher. And this [salary schedule] does not reflect pay for additional degrees. It reflects getting paid for doing the job.”
Seeking to answer Galloway more thoroughly, Thorsland broke down the salary bands for the board.
“I was thinking that first band would be like the first three or four years as an administrator. The next band would be, you know, years five through eight and then over eight years’ experience as an administrator, would be that third band,” Thorsland said, adding, “I will say this, we are trying to implement this without taxing the budget too much, it was an intentional change that Ms. Grant, Ms. Watson and Mr. Mosby and I discussed.”
Thorsland said the district wants to reward its educators financially, but while it remains at a deficit, it cannot afford significant raises this school year.
“We can’t afford for a lot of our existing employees to go up $10,000 or $12,000. So, we’re not necessarily immediately going to be able to correspond steps to years’ experience. We don’t want people to go backwards because of the rows there, but we may not be able to keep steps exactly where they are or keep years’ experience. So, we changed it to step, which gives us a little more flexibility to put people on a scale,” he explained.
Despite Thorsland reminding council of how constricted the budget is, Vice Chair Michael Toms communicated a desire for the state team to take another look at the budget as it relates to staff compensation and raises.
He said, “I think you all need to go back and work those administrative salary scales. In other words, it’s nothing fair about, you know, someone having to sit there two or three years before they get a raise. In other words, now some of them, and you might have to go back in the archives, but those older scales had an increment for everybody, every year, and they laid out the requirements educationally for all of them every year. So, this shortcut that you all putting in, it’s not going to wash. I’m sorry, but like I said, you know, you all still got the budget, yet you [are] coming in here belly aching to us about this and telling us that we are going to have to approve this in two weeks. No, no. You all have the budget. Whatever you all do, you’re doing whatever you want to do.”
He continued, “In other words, you’re firing people. You’re laying people off. You’re offering district personnel teacher contracts. I mean, you are all doing exactly what you want to do and then trying to use this board—to justify what you’re doing. And like I said, it’s not gonna wash. In other words, every scale—you all use should be broken down to the point that each year that person can look forward to what they’re going to get the next year and what they’re working towards.”
Answering the vice chair, Thorsland explained the scale looks like it does at present because the district currently has assistant principals making a salary that falls in the $60,000 range.
“That’s not acceptable in today’s day and age. So, what we did was collapse those beginning salaries so that if someone becomes an assistant principal in our district, there’s no way they can be making in the $60,000 range. That shouldn’t happen. And that’s happening right now,” Thorsland said.
According to the state team, employees classified as being in an administrative role will now receive more competitive pay than they otherwise would on the scale. He added that no staff members would be hit with a decrease in pay under the state’s proposed salary schedule for the 2026-2027 fiscal budget.
“So, this is helping our employees. It’s a step in the right direction—it’s not where we want to be,” he said.
Pushing back at Thorsland’s explanation, Dr. Rippin McLeod, Jr. said, “You’ve got two administrators, executive directors that are making more than any of your principles or the rest of your directors. But yet, you haven’t addressed, you know, looking at their salaries and reducing theirs like you have everyone else’s.”
When Thorsland said the district has not cut anyone’s salary this year, McLeod erupted, saying, “Oh yes, you have. Yes, you have. You’ve been going in cutting, cutting, cutting those salaries for those people that got those raises that really shouldn’t have been gotten. Yes, you have.”
Thorsland was quick to point out only next year’s salaries have been cut.
Clashing over control and administrator pay
Debate over salary scale quickly devolved into finger pointing between Councilman McLeod and Interim Superintendent Thorsland over the need for the state to step in and assist the board with managing its finances.
Thorsland agreed the State Department did need to come in and make decisions on laying people off but was quick to highlight the steps were only required because the board had failed to do so themselves.
McLeod answered, “And like I say, you’re the State Department, so you’re the one that’s responsible.”
His words prompted Thorsland to respond, “I appreciate you trying to shed your responsibility, but the responsibility hasn’t been taken in the past. And if the State Department hadn’t come in, this school district would have been bankrupt.”
Again, McLeod insisted the board was moving along fine financially, nothing was missing from the budget, and the district was not facing bankruptcy over the summer when the State Department assumed majority control.
When Thorsland questioned McLeod on why the board allowed staff members to receive unjustified salary increases in the first place, he did not answer, however Board Chair Michael Coachman explained it was because the board was not informed of the salary increases.
“Well, so somebody had to come in and address that because it wasn’t being addressed and the budget, the school district, was heading towards bankruptcy. That is a fact,” Thorsland countered.
McLeod said Thorsland could not know the outcome until the final audit of the budget comes out in January, to which Thorsland reiterated his confidence that the return will show a continuing decrease in financial capital for the district’s fund balance.
Attempting to redirect the conversation, Coachman said he wanted the board to focus on looking ahead to starting its budget on May 19—concentrating on reviewing all administrators and salaries across the board to compare where the district was last year with where it’s going.
Jumping in, Board member Danny Driggers asked his fellow board member McLeod, “Did Dr. Thorsland give them the job or did another superintendent give them a job with that money?”
McLeod answered the superintendent gave them the job; however, he said he felt Thorsland is responsible for correcting the situation now.
He said, “He’s gone out and like I said, he’s fired, gotten rid of our most dedicated employees and whatever. So, I’m calling him on it.”
Driggers said he agreed McLeod had a right to call anyone out he saw fit; he just wanted to point out Thorsland didn’t make the decision to increase executive director salaries.
“He’s trying to cut that executive director and other people back a little bit to help us move forward,” Driggers added.
His words spurred Leevander McRae Jr. to remind board members the plan going in was for them to make salary cuts.
He said, “We all unanimously agreed that we were going to have to cut regardless of who sat there—It’s a lot of individuals that wanted to cut more within the schools.”
When McLeod continued to insist that Thorsland needs to focus on balancing the budget, the interim superintendent next asked McLeod for specific ideas on how he would better balance the budget, he answered that he no longer worries about the budget.
“I rest good at night because I don’t even worry about the budget. You’ve got it,” McLeod said. He added that he wanted to see the district’s budget balanced with equitable cuts and salary increases made across the board on a case-by-case basis.
Returning to the question of administrator pay, Angela Galloway asked if any avenues for correction are currently being looked at by the state to bump up the pay of administrative positions that Thorsland said he felt were underpaid. When he answered in the negative, Galloway asked if there were any discussions underway to provide back pay.
Thorsland answered that while he believes the positions are underpaid, they are not considered underpaid from a comparative standpoint as far as the State Department is concerned. He pointed out there are other staff members who he believes are making less than deserved but says the discrepancy in pay for administrators is causing them to make less than they would instructing a classroom.
“We do not have plans in place to add pay to this school year. We can’t. I mean, we’re already facing probably our fund balance, looking at the $2 million mark, $2.5 million mark. We can’t spend more money this fiscal year to make that even be worse,” Thorsland said, adding he would like to see the change made in next year’s budget.
Federal Funds and Title I Discussion
Vice Chair Toms asked, “When we cut people that’s being paid through federal dollars—I mean, if they’re paying our federal dollars, does that impact our general budget?”
Thorsland answered that federal funds can be used only to supplement, not supplant, the general fund.
“We don’t have general fund money to add teachers right now. So, what we may have to do is it would be legal in Title I if we’re adding teachers to a building, they could be added in Title I. We may have to add teachers and instructional personnel to Title I and that could mean that somebody that’s in the existing Title I plan, we don’t have funding for—that could be one of those positions where we have to have a conversation and say we’re not going to be able to afford this position next year. The additional teacher would come from federal dollars,” Thorsland clarified. He added that the fund an employee receives their paycheck from should not affect their salary.
Thorsland continued, “If we had a teacher paid from the federal funds and another teacher paid from general funds, they’re going to be paid based on the scale that’s set by the state.”
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