Left, Superintendent Attila Weninger at a city of Stevens Point meeting in early 2014. (City-Times photo)

By Donnelly Clare and Brandi Makuski

The Stevens Point School Board Monday night voted to not renew Superintendent Attila Weninger’s contract. 

The Board voted in open session shortly after midnight Tuesday, after emerging from closed session discussing Weninger’s contract renewal.

The move to not renew was made by Board Member Lisa Totten and seconded by Kim Shirek. Board Member Chris Scott told City-Times staff Tuesday morning she left the meeting during closed session, refusing to participate because she “wasn’t comfortable” with the direction of the meeting. Scott declined to comment further.

“I just didn’t feel right about sitting there listening to what was happening,” Scott said.

The vote doesn’t mean Weninger’s leaving the district yet. His contract doesn’t expire until 2015.

It’s the latest in a long line of problems for Weninger, who last year was given a vote of no confidence by the Stevens Point teacher’s union just before his 2013 contract was renewed by the Board in a 5-4 split. In 2012, Weninger was twice accused of threatening parents of students who had registered complaints against teachers but no action was taken against the superintendent.

Since Weninger was hired by the district in 2010, he said he’s faced mounting difficulty balancing the fallout of Act 10 with current district spending, with officials from the local teacher’s union crying foul after he refused to meet with the group and leaving no wage increase for teachers since before Act 10. Weninger eventually agreed to meet with the group but by all accounts little progress was made.

In April the teacher’s union filed a formal complaint against Weninger and the district, saying Weninger failed to bargain in good faith with Stevens Point Area Education Association, instead entering into closed session negotiation meetings with a predetermined wage increase of zero, which is against the law.

City-Times will update this story.