Editorial: NHA refuses to share salaries after 10 years of doing so

Don’t look for the Keystone charter academy employee salaries this year. For the first time in our 10 years of publishing Keystone’s salaries, National Heritage Academies has refused our FOIA request.
Each year we have explained we know that NHA is not a public body and is the legal employer of the staff, but Keystone is operating on tax money and taxpayers have the right to know how their money is being spent.
Keystone’s representative sent us an email telling us we can appeal or sue if we don’t like it. We appealed to the president of the Keystone Board of Directors Steve Harsant, which is the next legal step, and he replied: “The Board has decided to maintain the denial of the Jan. 20, 2025 FOIA request for Keystone staff compensation information. The Academy will comply with all legal requirements, including the public posting of average salaries for new teachers, veteran teachers, and support staff, by Nov. 1st of each year.”
We are disappointed in this sudden lack of transparency by NHA/Keystone and assume it has to do with all the federal funds dispersed as bonuses to Keystone teachers over the year which would have made their reported salaries much higher than their basic salaries.
The Keystone board has discussed in public whether its teachers will leave for higher-paying jobs once the federal funds have stopped – which they now have.