MADERA - Last Friday Madera Unified School District Superintendent Ed Gonzales was given the word that at the February 15th meeting the board of trustee's would vote to terminate his contract WITHOUT cause. This afternoon the superintendent met with the district staff in the board room and made the announcement that he was about to be fired. 

We have no confirmed information as to why this is happening at this time. However we have heard a very credible rumor of a riff between MUSD Visual and Performing Arts Director Marcheta Williams and MUSD Assistant Superintendent Victor Villar.

We sent text messages to the entire board of trustees for comment. Only two returned our text's and that was MUSD Trustee's Ray Seibert and Brent Fernandes who both asked us to contact Board President Al Galvez as he was the only board member authorized to speak on behalf of the board. Seibert did add that he was not aware of any such riff at the district office.

In a text message from the board president Mr. Galvez had this to say, "It is a personnel issue and the Board has no comment. The Board had not taken any reportable action [In closed session] and this is a personnel matter. No further information is available at this time."

There is 18 months left on the superintendent's contract and since he is being released, the district will be responsible for that payment. According to TransparentCalifornia.com the superintendent receives with his benefits package $233,195.88. The district buy out on Gonzales contract could be as high as $350,000.

The board will meet on February 15th at 6:30pm for their public session . They will open the meeting earlier for closed session and prior to going into their conference room, the public will have an opportunity to address this issue with the board. If you have an opinion of what is happening with our school district, you are invited to attend.

One question Big Valley News will be asking is, "How did the board come to the decision to fire the superintendent in the time since the last board meeting since their was NO REPORTABLE action on their last closed session meeting? Did they discuss this outside of closed session, outside of the public eye and violate the Ralph M. Brown Public Meeting Law? A violation that does come with fines and jail time.