AUBURN - After six years leading the Auburn Enlarged City School District, schools superintendent John Plume will step down.

Plume's short announcement came during a budget presentation at Tuesday night's regular school board meeting, and took board members momentarily aback.

He merely said this would likely be his last budget, leaving some members glancing at one another wide-eyed.

Even before he'd indicated his intent to the board, Plume had declared his plans to give notice on the public access

television program, “Inside

Government with Guy Cosentino.”

The announcement came after Cosentino asked Plume about his designs on retiring BOCES superintendent Gary Gilchrist's position. Gilchrist announced last month that he will retire after eight years leading the Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES.

Plume said he had not applied for the position, but planned to deliver his last budget as superintendent this year. He refrained, however, from calling his departure a “retirement.”

“It's my last budget,” he told the host.

The show aired Tuesday night at 7 p.m., just as the Auburn school board meeting was beginning.

“I think we've had a good run,” Plume said after the meeting had adjourned. He cited rectifying a “huge” $600,000 budgetary gap since his tenure began in the spring of 2001 as one of his most important accomplishments.

“I think there's a good direction and a solid plan,” he said, suggesting he's begun to become weary of 60-plus hour work-weeks over 50 weeks a year.

“It gets to be a little enervating,” he said. “I'm at a point where I'm thinking I'm not sure I can do this particular pace for another year.”

Meanwhile, the superintendent is required to notify the district formally of his departure a few months ahead of time, a matter Plume said he has yet to address.

Plume will finish out the 2007-08 school year at Thornton Avenue, but isn't yet certain whether he will take another position in the Auburn school district, become a superintendent elsewhere or retire altogether.

Indicating his respect for Plume's leadership of the school district over the last six years, board president Michael Stearns said, “Since John Plume came on board, the district has taken a different tone. He always had logic and reasoning behind every proposition and resolution he's made.”

Staff Writer Olivia Goldberg can be reached at 253-5311, ext. 235, or at olivia.goldberg@lee.net