Jefferson County Schools then-superintendent finalist Dan McMinimee sat impassively at school board meetings last spring as audience members inveighed against him, shouting out that he was unqualified to lead the state’s second-largest school district.
Critics decried his proposed annual pay as excessive, compared his professional bona fides unfavorably to his predecessor’s and said his 12 years with the Douglas County School District didn’t bode well for Jefferson County’s 85,000 students.
Even board member Lesley Dahlkemper stated that McMinimee’s proposed base salary of $280,000 — later reduced to $220,000 with $60,000 worth of annual performance pay and retirement benefits added on — “is not commensurate with experience.”
He was hired in May on a 3-2 board vote in one of the most contentious superintendent selection processes in recent memory.
But McMinimee, who completes his second week on the job Tuesday, said he never thought