The Park City School Board voted on a new two-year agreement with Superintendent Jill Gildea during its meeting Tuesday night, despite community members and even some council members pushing for months to hold off on making the decision until newly elected officials take their seats next year.

The agreement was approved by a vote of 3-2, with all board members whose terms expire after this year – Andrew Caplan, Wendy Crossland and Anne Peters – voting in favor.

In June, Caplan announced on KPCW’s “Local News Hour” that the board intended to renew Gildea’s contract. His comments caught the community’s attention and the contract became a hot topic.

Board member Meredith Reed has since stated that he made the statement without consulting her or, as far as she knows, other board members.

Ten days after Caplan’s comments were published, community members started a petition on Change.org asking the board to delay the decision until next year. By August 20, the day the district voted on the issue despite the petition, the online movement had collected 520 signatures.

If they had left the decision to next year’s board, the new members would have had a month to decide whether they wanted to extend or end the district’s relationship with Gildea.

The newest members, Reed and Nick Hill, rejected the request for an extension, saying they would rather wait.

“I would prefer that this decision be made by the new board,” Hill said.

“I can only agree with that,” Reed agreed.

Kathleen Britton – a candidate for Crossland’s position – and Eileen Gallagher – who is currently running unopposed in Caplan’s district – declined to comment on the decision.

Previously, Britton was the only candidate who had not publicly asked the board to delay the vote.

Her opponent, David Glasser, did not hesitate to share his view of the situation.

“I am disappointed that the board has collectively decided to leave this important decision to the next board,” he said.

He stated that he saw no urgent need to approve the contract and considered the measure unjustified.

Susan Goldberg, who is running unopposed as Peters’ successor, has not yet responded to a request for comment.

“Having been here for seven years, I would really pay close attention to changes and their implementation,” Peters said before the vote on the decision. “I would prefer to give the three new board members the opportunity to familiarize themselves and assess the situation for themselves in order to then make a better decision.”

Crossland agreed that the new board should take time to evaluate the district from the perspective of elected officials before deciding whether or not to continue Gildea’s oversight.

Although the new agreement has a term of two years, it contains a clause allowing the board to terminate the contract early if necessary.

The new document has not yet been made public, but Gildea’s current contract specifies that if the board decides to terminate the contract before the end of the term, she must receive a full year’s compensation and benefits. She is the highest-paid superintendent in the state.

Crossland also emphasized that the process of finding a competent superintendent takes one to two years, and she chose to maintain the stability of the district.

“It’s a decision we and I make based on a variety of factors,” she said. “I’ve heard both sides.”

Since her hiring in 2018, Gildea has faced criticism from the community as the district faced several problems during her time as superintendent, including illegal storage of toxic waste, starting construction projects without proper permits, 180 cases of student-to-student harassment – some of which the district failed to resolve according to legal standards – and a state audit that showed the district had failed to help groups of students who were eligible for state assistance.

At the same time, the district has achieved academically rigorous results, ranking fifth best in Utah by U.S. News & World Report, and has earned a spot on the College Board Honor Roll for promoting access to Advanced Placement courses for traditionally underrepresented and low-income students.

During the discussion, Caplan criticized the critics, saying that personal attacks should be avoided, no matter how bad someone’s mistake was.

“I would ask the public for a little more decency and class,” he said. “And if someone says things on the radio that are only partially correct or true, and people then demand that that is the right thing to do, without sitting here in this position, without working thousands of hours of volunteer work and without considering other interest groups, then that is a little foolhardy.”

Despite all the disagreements, he stressed that he still thinks Park City is a great place to live.

“We all came here for the people and a good community, and we can’t change that,” he said. “We can’t let this become our issue just because it gets clicks on KPCW or The Park Record. We can’t let the press influence how we behave toward others.”