The Washoe County School District’s Board of Trustees on Tuesday elected to reopen its national search for superintendent candidates after several of its first four finalists withdrew their names for consideration.

The search to fill the district’s top position, an urgent priority for the trustees, was high on the agenda of the board, which regrouped at its regular meeting to hear its options as how to proceed from consultant Jim Huge.

“I know it’s disheartening when you lose candidates in this search,” Huge said. “However, as I’ve reminded everyone, (football players) Joe Montana and Tom Brady were not first-round draft picks. ... There are still plenty in the pool.”

Initially, the board narrowed its first choices down to six, but two withdrew even before interviews began. Recently, Kimberly Olsen, Hector Montenegro, Ed Heatley and Lawrence Fryer completed their formal interviews and toured the district. The first three withdrew for various reasons, although Huge alluded that some already had a “bird in hand” and accepted positions in other districts that offered more competitive pay, an issue that Huge advised the board should examine. However, he added that he has a more refined concept of what the school board is seeking.

“The first thing I learned is that I got a more specific idea of what you want in a superintendent, even though I thought I knew fairly well,” he said.

Huge presented four options to trustees on Tuesday: to open the search for another 30 to 60 days, to immediately identify several of the strongest remaining candidates from the initial pool of applications, to assign an interim superintendent and draw out the process to find more qualified candidates or to place someone currently within the district who is volunteering to act as an interim for a year on a try-out basis and who could potentially be hired permanently later.

Trustee Estela Gutierrez, a counselor at Truckee Meadows Community College, was concerned that 30 days would be too short to make a decision and that the salary and benefits package should be known ahead of time.

“I’ve experienced this type of screening at the CEO level,” Gutierrez said. “I think 30 days is short. For the consultant, I would like more aggressive research done on candidates before they come on board to this district. ... One thing we as trustees need to take a look at is if we’re going to market ourselves as a competitive district compared to other districts, we need to know what’s the contract and what’s the salary. We’re working backwards.”

Ken Grein, a trustee, also questioned limiting the advertising of a search to a month.

“We all want things yesterday,” he said. “We all want instant gratification. “We’re a little bit on the late side, so that concerns me.”

Gutierrez said she would like more “FBI screening” of candidates.

Trustee Scott Kelley expressed confidence in the search process to this point.

“If we wait too much longer, we’re going to start to lose some of these candidates,” he said. “Other districts are going to snatch them up.”

During public comment as the board deliberated on their options, Michael Millerick, a former WCSD human resources employee who now resides in Sonoma, Calif., suggested that the board find alternative consultant groups to lead the search.

“I believe it is advisable to reopen the search for the following reasons from my own experiences: If the pool generated depletes significantly, it’s not normal,” Millerick said. “It speaks to a problem ... and I say this with all due respect to the consultant, but it may be wise to employ someone else. In a review of the selection process you have with the current consultant, there are steps that missing that, if they were in place, they wouldn’t have lost four of six candidates.”

Huge said many districts of Washoe County’s size are offering their superintendents packages of $250,000 with an extra $50,000 in benefits.

One parent of a child who graduated from the district and another child currently enrolled said maybe now is not the time for the board to become competitive within its market. She said the candidate volunteering to serve as an interim might be viable.

“If you want to compete, you’re taking $300,000 from my child,” the woman said. “I’m in the process of considering moving my child from Washoe County and I don’t want to do that. ... This person is willing to come in for a year and ‘try me on for size’ like you did with (Paul) Dugan. You’re telling me that there’s not one person in education here in the superintendent and deputy superintendent to do this. You’re telling me they’re not good enough to step up.”

Huge encouraged the board that the candidates who withdrew did not do so on account of the quality of the district.

“They were very impressed with this district and the board,” Huge said. “They said this district is poised to move to the next level but it’s going to take a lot of work.”

The decision to reopen advertising for another 30 days was made in a 6-1 vote, with Gutierrez opposing.

Current superintendent Paul Dugan retires Aug. 1.