SCARSDALE, NY (April 6, 2022) — As predicted last weekend on these pages, Dr. Thomas Hagerman has unexpectedly resigned as Scarsdale Schools Superintendent.
The announcement was part of a Friday night news dump by the Scarsdale Board of Education.
There was a statement from Dr. Hagerman:
Scarsdale Board of Education and School Community:
From the onset of this school year, the District has prioritized a return to normalcy for both our students and staff. While many gains have been made towards this end, the IRS issue has become a major distraction to that work.
Although I have already resigned my position as superintendent of schools, effective June 30, I now feel it is best to do so more immediately in order for the District to keep its focus on students and a successful ending to the school year.
It has been a privilege to work on behalf of Scarsdale’s children and youth and alongside so many outstanding administrators, faculty, and staff.
A brief Board statement was read:
The Board of Education has accepted the resignation of Dr. Thomas Hagerman as
Superintendent of Schools of the Scarsdale Public School District. In connection with his resignation, the parties have entered into a separation agreement, which will be posted in Board Docs.
The Board of Education believes that this Agreement is in the best interests of the District and community at this time.
The Stipulation Agreement is here.
A Special Meeting was scheduled for 4:00 pm on Friday, April 29, but abruptly cancelled just hours before, then moved to Monday, May 2 at 5:00 pm. The Board met in Executive Session at Room 170 at Scarsdale High School for two and half hours then illegally left the room without gaveling the meeting back into session before walking out of the meeting without explanation or posting a notice and removing to another part of the building for an hour, before returning after an hour, gaveling the Special Meeting to order, adopting two motions, including one illegally denying a Freedom of Information Request Appeal filed by this reporter regarding what the Board calls the IRS Matter, then adjourning.
Andrew Patrick, scheduled to become Interim Superintendent on July 1, was made Interim Superintendent effective immediately.
The Board has been stonewalling our Freedom of Information requests and is, as of today, in violation of state law for failing to produce records by a May 5 deadline.
Today, the Board held a previously unscheduled Special Meeting, posted online at 1:30 pm, at 4 pm during which a Stipulation Agreement signed by Dr. Hagerman was accepted unanimously by the Board. The resignation is effective immediately.
Dr. Hagerman was scheduled to end his tenure as Superintendent on June 30.
The story began last summer when the IRS notified the Scarsdale School District they were in a heap of trouble for failing to remit payroll taxes withheld from employees.
Unaware of a major scandal brewing behind the scenes, the Scarsdale Board of Education accepted Dr. Hagerman’s resignation as Superintendent at its meeting on January 24. He was scheduled to leave his current position at the end of the 2021-22 school year to become Headmaster at the prestigious Latin School of Chicago. That plan has unraveled.
In a story first reported on Talk of the Sound, the Scarsdale Board of Education has been in turmoil since March 25 when Dr. Hagerman first informed the board that the Internal Revenue Service assessed the Scarsdale School District $843,558 in penalties and interest for errors in payments of payroll taxes in 2020 as well as a tax shortfall for the fourth quarter of 2020 of $448,316, a total of $1,291,904.
A statement issued at the time sought to minimize the issue, saying the District made “a few errors…in the semi-monthly depositing of payroll taxes in FY2020” and as a result, “the Internal Revenue Service has penalized the District.”
The statement said the District has been “engaging in exhaustive efforts over the past several months to resolve these issues.”
The full statement is here.
Joanne Wallenstein who has covered the Scarsdale schools for years and runs Scarsdale10583.com, the go-to media outlet for all things in “the Dale” broke an important story: Dr. Hagerman wrote a letter to the Latin School in which he significantly altered a quote from Scarsdale BOE President Karen Ceske to invert its meaning to falsely convey that the Board was in communication with the IRS to negotiate a resolution in the months before Dr. Hagerman informed the Board of the IRS Matter. Wallenstein was first to report on Dr. Hagerman’s surprise “first resignation” in January 2022 and wrote about his “second resignation” tonight.
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