Kent School District ‘misleading’ stipend list causes inquiries

A public records document released by the Kent School District that showed stipends of $26,000 to $41,00 paid last year to central office administrators raised a lot of inquiries, especially after its distribution by the Kent Education Association (KEA, teachers union) at a Jan. 12 district community budget meeting.

District communications team staff, however, in a Jan. 16 email to the Kent Reporter in response to questions about the large stipends, said the public record document had a “misleading” stipend column and that nobody received the large amounts of extra pay listed under that category.

The response included an attachment explaining that the extra pay was two months pay of an employee’s annual salary and not pay in addition to the base salary.

“The two months of salary reflected are not additional compensation but rather payroll for July and August that was set aside from the previous fiscal year due to the misalignment between the contractual year and the fiscal year,” according to the district email.

When asked follow-up questions by the Kent Reporter about how an inaccurate public record was released, district staff replied that they had already “created a new document to clarify the information in response to your questions.”

District staff also responded with the following statement:

“The report that was released provided a responsive record without additional commentary,” according to the email. “Any interpretation of the column/contents was made by the requestor, not the district.”

The public record document had five columns that listed the name of the central office administrator, base pay, total stipend amount, pay start date and pay end date.

As an example, Superintendent Israel Vela was listed with base pay of $355,000, a stipend of $95,287, a pay start date of July 1, 2024 and a pay end date of June 30, 2025.

A stipend is a fixed sum of money paid periodically for services or to defray expenses, according to Merriam-Webster dictionary.

A couple of district residents had requested additional details from the district about the stipends months ago, but told the Kent Reporter they didn’t receive any explanation about the stipends through phone calls or public records requests.

KEA President Tim Martin said the union didn’t get any answers about the stipends from district staff, so it distributed the public record document, which the Kent Reporter received a copy of Jan. 14, at the community budget meeting. According to the document, the amount of stipends paid to about 31 central office administrators in July 2025 totaled just more than $1 million.

Martin, during an interview prior to the district’s response that the document was misleading and that stipends were not paid, said he distributed the list with names, salaries and stipends at the community budget meeting in part to let people know about the payments in light of district leaders message that Kent battled a budget shortfall this year and faces a $35 million budget shortfall for the 2026-2027 school year.

“They gave over a million-dollar stipend to district administrators,” Martin said after reading the document, which clearly stated stipend amounts.

Martin was told by the Kent Reporter about the district’s statement that “Any interpretation of the column/contents was made by the requestor, not the district.”

Martin replied that the public record document came from the district.

“A community member made the request and this was information the district provided,” Martin said in a Jan. 22 phone interview. “It was not made up by the KEA or the community member.”

Joe Riley, a Kent School District resident and parent, filed the public record request in July that led to the salary and stipend document released by the district. Riley told the Kent Reporter he filed a request for the salaries and stipends of central office administrators in part because the district said it lacked funding for fifth-grade camp.

“My first reaction was something must be wrong because that’s a lot of money,” Riley said, in a Jan. 20 phone interview, when he saw stipends of $20,000 to $40,000 in addition to annual salaries ranging from $153,000 to $243,000.

Riley said he sent emails in an attempt to find out about the stipends to Damon Hunter, the district human resources director, and to Raul Parungao, the district finance director, but didn’t hear back. Riley then submitted another public records request in July to see what the stipends covered.

Riley received a response in November that he said didn’t explain the $1 million in stipends in the original document but referred to stipends being paid for doctorate degrees, vacation leave, sick leave and cash out values. When Riley asked for further clarification, he was told to talk to administration.

The district’s explanation sent to the Kent Reporter about the two months pay broken out from the salary sort of convinced Riley the large stipends were not paid.

“But it’s not a misleading column, it’s a plain wrong, incomplete record,” Riley said.

Riley said if the district had explained in July about the two months pay and that it was not a stipend, he probably wouldn’t had posted to social media about it.

“It’s frustrating there’s so much silence,” Riley said. “Administration is not answering, public records says it can’t explain it to you. The silence of not talking to the community is frustrating.”

Kent School Board member Donald Cook brought up the public records document listing the high stipend pay during the Aug. 13, 2025 board meeting, according to a YouTube video of the meeting. Cook asked Vela about the payments.

“I want to ask about stipends,” Cook said. “People are discussing online the dollar amounts paid that are higher than what we’ve seen in the past. Who approved these stipends, that may not be what is normal. What is the typical amount and typical reason for stipends?”

Vela replied that stipends are part of the negotiated contracts between the district and the non-represented administrators.

“It seemed like quite a bit of money and I’m told it’s a bit off what is normal,” Cook said in response. “It’s a little disconcerting to see such a high amount. You’re saying it’s bargained, is there documentation to review, to see what came up and how stipends were brought about?”

Vela said “it’s part of negotiations and bargaining.”

Cook asked if stipends were paid outside of what’s in a contract.

“I’ll leave my comment for the record as I stated,” Vela said.

“That doesn’t seem like a very strong argument to me,” Cook said.

No other board members asked a question about the stipends.

Martin, the KEA president, said it’s interesting how the district didn’t answer questions about the stipends until after the public record document was distributed at a community budget meeting.

“It’s from the district and it’s misinformation from what they shared with us,” Martin said.

Paid stipends

After receiving a copy of the stipends public records document paid to central office administrators, the Kent Reporter requested from the Kent School District the stipends paid to the four administrators with the highest stipends in 2024-2025 on the list. Several stipends were paid to the following employees:

• Israel Vela, superintendent, paid an annual salary of $355,000 in 2024-2025, received a stipend of $5,000 in 2025 for travel, part of his contract, according to a public record received by the Kent Reporter. In addition to the stipend, Vela received, as part of his contract, $23,075 (6.5% of his salary) paid into his choice of a tax sheltered annuity; a $4,200 match to his annuity; and a $3,845 retroactive payment to his annuity.

• Wade Barringer, deputy superintendent, paid an annual salary of $243,446, received a doctorate stipend of $3,000. In addition, he received a $4,200 match to his tax sheltered annuity.

• Christine Avery, executive director of school and leadership success elementary level, paid an annual salary of $207,174, received a doctorate stipend of $3,000. In addition, she received a $4,200 match to her tax sheltered annuity.

• Darice Johnson, executive director of school and leadership success secondary level, paid an annual salary of $202,122, received a stipend of $5,000 as an administrator trainer/consultant as a state framework specialist. In addition, she received a $3,000 match to her tax sheltered annuity.