Logan County school board members bought out the contract of the county's superintendent this week, six months after she signed it.
School board members unanimously voted Wednesday night to pay former superintendent Phyllis Doty until Sept. 30. Doty had a 60-day out clause in her contract, should she choose to retire.
Doty told the board at its July 14 meeting that she was going to retire, according to Paul Hardesty, the school board's president. Board members voted July 28 to accept Doty's retirement, Hardesty said, and she left July 31.
Also Wednesday, Hardesty said the West Virginia Legislature's Commission on Special Investigations is probing the Logan school system. He said he doesn't have explicit details about the investigation, including whether it involves Doty's contract or not.
He said the investigation started before the current board was seated last month, and long before this year's election or election filing period.
Hardesty said he was divulging the investigation as an "act of transparency."
"I do not know what this investigation holds," Hardesty said in the transcript of a statement he made at Wednesday's board meeting. "I can tell you, from what we are learning on a daily basis, it is not good."
Board members will solicit a forensic audit of the school system as well, he said.
"This is a pretty strong statement, but we as a board feel this is important," Hardesty said in the statement.
Darlene Adkins was serving as acting schools superintendent on Thursday. Adkins is in charge of the county's pre-kindergarten and Title I programs, according to the county schools website.
Board members plan to pick an interim superintendent to serve until the end of June 2017. They could pick that person as soon as Monday, Hardesty said, when the board meets at 5 p.m. at the board office.
The search for a full-time superintendent might start around January, Hardesty said.
Doty could not be reached for comment Wednesday or Thursday.
In February, the previous Logan school board approved a four-year extension to Doty's contract on a 3-2 vote. In its final version, the contract included $2,500 in yearly raises to Doty's $115,000 salary.
Following the February vote, board President Jim Frye died of brain cancer. Frye was a proponent of Doty's extension, alongside board members Chad Preston and Pat Joe White. Frye was replaced by Don Elkins, who did not seek election for a full term.
Elkins, Preston and another board member, Phyllis Adkins, were replaced July 1, when the new board convened. In May, the Gazette-Mail reported that four of the board's five members, as of July 1, would have opposed Doty's contract extension.
Doty would not agree to lower her contract extension to one year, as some members publicly requested. At the time, Doty said that, if a majority did not want her to serve as superintendent for the duration, they would have to pay her for the entirety of the four-year contract.
Reach Jared Casto at jared.casto@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-4832 or follow @JaredCasto on Twitter.