OROVILLE – The Oroville School Board accepted the resignation of Rich Solberg as one of their member school directors at their Monday, Aug. 29 meeting.

Solberg has resigned from several positions, including the Oroville Chamber of Commerce board, as his personal plans have changed.

“I may be the leaving the area to pursue work,” said Solberg in an interview after the meeting. “Real estate isn’t cutting it right now, you’ve got to go where the money is.”

Also approved as part of a consent agenda were the resignations of Jane Lynch and Marsha Bell as school bus drivers. Lynch has driven a school bus route for many years. Jeff Gee was hired as a part time K-3 music teacher for the 2011-12 school year pending approval of conditional teacher certificate from the OSPI. Rich Hutchins was hired as assistant high school football coach and Tony Flores was hired as assistant girls soccer coach for the 2011 season.

One thing that was removed from the consent agenda was the motion to approve the new Collective Bargaining Agreement contract for Oroville Education Association for the Aug. 1 through June 30, 2013 school year. The motion was stricken from the agenda because the teacher’s association had not met in August to discuss ratifying the contract, explained Steve Quick in his superintendent’s report.

“We concluded negotiations in June and we had this item was on our agenda last month too,” said Quick. “Apparently the union hasn’t met with its members to bring it to a vote.”

Quick said the OEA may be considering what to do about state mandated cuts to teacher’s pay that have taken place across the state.

“The only thing that might be hanging out there is the state did cut teacher’s pay by 1.9 percent,” said Quick, who explained that the difference cannot just be made up by the district.

“That would be gifting funds,” he said. “We’ve put a couple proposals out there. Some districts have added a day or two to their calendars to try and make up for the cut, some have had early release days and some districts have done nothing.”

The superintendent said it has been frustrating to superintendents across the state because the state has pushed the cuts down to the local level.

“Finding ways to make up the difference is easier in cash rich districts, however we’re already operating on reserves,” said the superintendent.

Quick also reported ten students and two adults from Turkey would be arriving that night. The Turkish exchange students will be at Oroville for one and a half weeks. The district will pick up the Dominican Republic exchange students the day after the Turkish students are dropped off for their return home.

The principal reports from Junior-Senior High School Principal Kristin Sarmiento and from Elementary School Principal Joan Hoehn will begin at next month’s meeting, according to Quick.

Julie Sylvester reported that the summer custodial and maintenance staff spent the summer painting the outside of the elementary building and the bus garage. In addition, classrooms, locker rooms, both gyms, hallways, entryways, railings, trim and doorways were painted. Worn carpet was also removed and from the elementary and most of the high school.

The next meeting of the Oroville School Board will be at 5 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 26 at the District Office located at 816 Juniper Street.