LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – The process of searching for a new Clark County School District superintendent restarts next week, as the nation’s fifth-largest school system has been without a permanent leader for nearly a year.
Newly elected school board president Irene Bustamante Adams did a five-minute sit-down interview with 8 News Now where she discussed her vision, hiring a new superintendent, and protecting undocumented students.
“My vision is to restore the trust that the students, the parents, the stakeholders have given us to put students first and make that our main focus,” Bustamante Adams said.
CCSD is a nearly $4 billion enterprise with close to 300,000 students.
Bustamante Adams said the public will have its say in hiring the next superintendent.
“Education affects workforce development and economic development. So without the three in alignment, we’re not setting ourselves up for success,” she said.
Feb. 5 is the application deadline and that is the same day when the school board will have a public presentation on a hiring timeline.
Bustamante Adams said the legislature and governor’s office will be included in the process.
“I know that we’re probably going to disagree on some things, but they are the funding. They are the investment of what they expect of the school board trustee,” Bustamante Adams said.
The school district stopped its superintendent search last year after former trustee Katie Williams resigned. 8 News Now had reported she wasn’t living in Nevada, and that sparked an investigation from the Clark County District Attorney’s office.
Around that same time, CCSD was dealing with a budget shortfall. The search firm CCSD hired told trustees that this distraction could impact the candidate pool.
Bustamante Adams said the district’s budget is strong.
“The department of taxation, the local government commission did not find any issues with our budget. There are good processes, are we perfect? Not yet. Do we need improvement? Absolutely,” Bustamante Adams said.
The board president also touched on the impacts next year’s budget can have on teachers.
“Have we been dependent on the ESSER funds to fill some gaps where the central district buys a lot and it doesn’t affect a principal’s budget? Yes. That money obviously went away. We’re going to have to sharpen our pencils,” Bustamante Adams said.
ESSER funds are also known as Covid relief funds. The deadline to use that money was last fall.
Bustamante Adams said the district has received a great pool of internal and regional applicants for the superintendent job.
Watch the full interview for her comments on undocumented students and CCSD’s immigration policy in the video player above.
