2 Organizations Call For Decatur Superintendent's Suspension

DECATUR, GA — Two organizations for Black parents with the City Schools of Decatur are calling for CSD Superintendent David Dude's suspension amid an investigation into his use of vacation days and other ongoing lawsuits involving the district.

The groups — Beacon Hill Black Alliance for Human Rights and CSD Black Parents Alliance — announced Wednesday they would hold a press conference this Friday to publicly call for Dude's suspension.

Community members are invited to attend the conference, which will take place at 1 p.m. at Elizabeth Wilson School Support Center, 125 Electric Avenue, Decatur.

“Employees from the City Schools of Decatur have come to us and expressed their concerns about the capability for a truly independent investigation to take place while Dr. Dude is still at the helm. They have shared their concerns to school board members, and no action has been taken," said Carmen Sulton from the Black Parents Alliance. "It appears that the school board is allowing a double standard by not suspending the superintendent the same way other employees have been suspended while under investigation.”

The district faces five lawsuits, including two separate lawsuits filed earlier this year by two former employees who are suing it and Dude, alleging misuse of vacation days, retaliation and unpaid overtime wages.

The most recent lawsuit, filed in January, claims Dude violated the district's severance and non-disparagement agreement with David Adams, the district's former human resources officer, when Dude told Decaturish.com that district employees complained about Adams' job performance.

The lawsuit alleges that Dude's comments were made in retaliation for Adams reporting Dude's "financially unethical conduct" to the district attorney. It says that Susan Hurst, the district's former chief financial officer, told Adams in 2017 that the Decatur board was providing "an improper salary increase" to Dude by reimbursing him for expenses without receipts. It said the superintendent was also frequently not reporting his time off when he was not working.

• Related: Decatur Schools To Overhaul Superintendent Contract Amid Lawsuits

A second former employee, Cheryl Nahmias, alleges Dude demoted her in retaliation over a video of her son — a white City Schools of Decatur student — using racial slurs and wielding a toy gun, mentioning shooting Black people.

Nahmias was initially placed on leave after she defended her son, and later put on "special assignment" in the district's central office — a demotion from her administrative role as Decatur High School's international baccalaureate coordinator and instructional coach, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

Decaturish used the Georgia Open Records Act to request further information and investigate the allegations against CSD. The publication reported in February that based on open records requests, Dude did not document the payment from his unused vacation days since 2016 in the district's payroll system until Jan. 27, 2021 — in response to the open records request from Decaturish.

New records from early March also showed Dude was out-of-office on days he didn't record as vacation days, particularly in the summer of 2019, Decaturish's Dan Whisenhunt reported March 9.

School Board Chair Tasha White issued a statement March 12 it would be rescinding Dude's contract and issuing a new one to clarify vacation day usage, and it would hire an independent investigator to look into the allegations. Nothing else has been said publicly about the investigation or the superintendent's contract so far.

The district said there has been "some confusion" over the interpretation of language in Dude's contract in regard to time off, which "may have played a role in the belief that he has taken more leave than he is entitled to take," according to the statement issued in mid March.

Read more of Decaturish's coverage here.

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