CHARLESTON, W.Va. –The West Virginia Board of Education will seize full control over Boone County Schools and place Randolph County Schools under a state of emergency.

Board members voted Wednesday during their regular monthly meeting after the Office of Accountability director Alexandra Criner gave review reports regarding the situation at both schools.

During the recommended motion for Boone, State Superintendent Michelle Blatt told superintendent Matt Riggs and assistant Superintendent Tony Alienate to vacate their positions at the end of business on Wednesday. Blatt has appointed former Wyoming County Schools Superintendent Deirdre Cline as Boone County interim superintendent.

Blatt said that the board will be limited in what they can do regarding students’ education and that they must come up with a plan.

“A set of standards and or strategic plan that must be implemented in order for the Boone County board of education to regain control of the school system and that the WVBE directs the current and future Boone County superintendents to provide progress reports to the WVBE as requested,” Blatt said during her motion.

Before the motion was approved, Criner told the board that they conducted a special circumstance review from May 19 to May 21 after the recent federal case against Michael Barker, the former maintenance director who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud for running a scheme that ultimately took $3.4 million dollars from the school system between November 2019 and December 2023.

She said they found a multitude of issues within the system.

“Including potential conflict of interest, outdated policies, potentially using board of education resources to maintain property, and interference with the day-to-day operation of the school system,” Criner said.

She said during their review they also found a laundry list of issues pertaining to the noncompliance of West Virginia Department of Education policies 8200 and 8100.

These issues include the board not being able to provide invoices for purchases, could not provide state board of education approval for purchases over $100,000, where they had invoices dated before the purchase order, had multiple examples of improper coding of supplemental and stipend pay and had documentation that did not receive proper advisor approval and incomplete contract documentation.

She also said that they also lacked some essential polices including a teacher traveling policy and a non-adequate policy for purchasing and procurement.

However, Criner said they are currently working on getting these policies.

“Boone county schools is working with an outside vendor to update their policies and so there’s sort of a transition period there in which those newer policies have not been board approved and there still operating under the older policies,” she said.

She said they also found issues regarding nepotism and lack of communication.

On the other hand, Randolph County Schools was put under a state of emergency Wednesday during the boards meeting.

“During this time Randolph County board of education members and the superintendent with targeted assistance from the WVDE will create a comprehensive plan to correct identified deficiencies including a viable proposal for a balanced budget,” Blatt said during her motion.

Criner and her office performed a general review at the request of the superintendent Shawn Dilly.

She said that the review was mainly to interview county board members in order to find out about recent decisions they made. Some of their most recent decision was voting down Dilly’s plan to consolidate Harmon School, a K-12 school with 103 students enrolled, in January 2025. Which promoted Dilly to rescind his plan to consolidate Picken School, also a K-12 school with 29 students enrolled.

Criner also said they found issues regarding their plan to deal with declining enrollment, failure to approve of a consolidation plan, they are staffed beyond the school aid formula for professional, support and service personnel, and the Chief School Business Officer said that the board has a projected budget shortage of $2.8 million dollars for FY 25.

During the interviews of the school board members, they recounted that the reason they voted no to consolidate the school was because of the issue of transportation for those students.

She also said that while the board members didn’t express a plan in order to tackle their operational challenges.

“And although members expressed concern of the future of Randolph County Schools, no member of the local board articulated a clear path forward in the wake of the current challenges,” Criner said.

Criner said that members also expressed the lack of communication between them and superintendent Dilly did not help with all of the issues they are currently facing.

The board will hear an update on Randolph County Schools at their meeting in December 2025.

In recent months, the state board has also seized control over Mingo, Logan, Nicholas and Tyler.