Without having ever attended a meeting as a school board member, newly elected North Thurston Public School Board District 2 Director Tim Bullus is resigning from his position.
Bullus is currently attending the state Police Academy in Burien in preparation for joining the Chehalis Police Department.
Bullus skipped his oath of office ceremony on Dec. 9 and submitted his letter of resignation to the board ahead of its Jan. 13 meeting.
“While I am honored and was hoping to make it work, the time required and the responsibilities of my new career in law enforcement, including the police Academy and my training schedule during my first year post Academy would make it almost impossible for me to consistently make meetings,” Bullus stated in his resignation letter. “I feel the role of director two is too important to not be able to commit the appropriate level of time to and it would not be fair to the board, the superintendent nor the students.”
Bullus was accepted to the Chehalis police academy in the fall prior to the November election, but his acceptance came too late for him to remove his name from the ballot.
The North Thurston Education Association, the union that represents teachers in the district, announced Bullus’ acceptance into the police academy in a social media post on Oct. 9.
At the time, the Thurston Education Association indicated that Bullus asked the union to put all endorsements behind his opponent, Jeremy Ryan.
Nevertheless, Bullus beat Ryan at the ballot box 59.6% to 29.6%, according to the certified election results.
Bulllus and Ryan vied for the Position 2 seat after incumbent Tiffany Sevruk chose not to run for re-election.
North Thurston Public Schools is expected to accept Bullus’ resignation letter during its Jan. 13 meeting and start accepting applications and nominations for an appointee soon after.
Information about the Jan. 13 board meeting can be found online at https://www.ntps.org/about/school-board/board-materials.
