Controller:Not a dime for Vallas

Outgoing schools Chief Executive Officer Paul Vallas is not entitled to a financial payout from the city school district, city Controller Alan Butkovitz said yesterday - adding that negotiations over a severance deal should be stopped immediately.

Last week the Daily News first reported that Vallas and the School Reform Commission were negotiating a compensation deal for Vallas.

In a letter to SRC Chairman James Nevels, Butkovitz blamed Vallas for the district's massive budget deficit.

"The measures of common sense and the norms from the world of corporate governance clearly indicate that Mr. Vallas failed in his fiscal responsibility as chief executive officer, and as a result is not due any additional compensation for having left the school district with a budget deficit estimated to be as high as $200 million," Butkovitz wrote.

"Furthermore, if he resigned, there is no contractual basis for additional compensation . . . If he was fired, it appears to be for cause."

Vallas, 54 - who officially leaves the district Saturday to become head of the New Orleans Recovery School District - could not be reached for comment.

Butkovitz's comments follow similar remarks made last week by Democratic mayoral nominee Michael Nutter.

"How a district that has a hundred-plus million-dollar deficit could give anybody any extra money is beyond me," Nutter told the Daily News then. "This is not some corporate situation where you walk away with stock options. This is a school district."

Nevels would have no comment, his spokeswoman, Carey Dearnley, said yesterday. "It's still a matter of discussion by the SRC's and Paul Vallas' legal teams," she said.

"I appreciate the interest that these leaders are showing for the well being of our children," reform commission member Sandra Dungee Glenn said of Butkovitz and Nutter. "I am listening to their comments and will take them under advisement, but it is inappropriate to comment about a personnel matter."

Reform commission member Martin Bednarek said Vallas is entitled to whatever his contract calls for - and nothing more.

"Nobody asked him to leave. He went out and sought a job when he was under contract to us. I don't know how you can ethically get a gold parachute if you leave on [your] own," he said. "We have other things facing us. I wouldn't give him ice water in the winter time."

What Vallas may be entitled to was not clear yesterday. His contract calls for him to receive a $100,000 retention bonus at the end of each year. Fernando Gallard, a district spokesman, could not say whether or not Vallas had pocketed those bonuses.

Vallas' contract calls for him to earn $275,000 a year. But because of the deficit, he did not take his last pay raise and had been earning $250,000. It was not clear if Vallas was seeking the outstanding payment, Gallard said.

Vallas was hired in July 2002. *