The Baltimore County schools superintendent failed to move to the county by the deadline in her contract, according to Maryland’s inspector general for education, and it’s unclear where she lives now.

A report published Tuesday by the inspector general found that Superintendent Myriam Rogers told the school board she lives in an apartment in Baltimore County. But the inspector general found that she isn’t listed on the lease, and that other public records indicate she maintains a residence in Prince George’s County.

Rogers’ contract “requires that the Superintendent live in Baltimore County, Maryland” and that “she shall maintain continuous residency” there no later than a year into her job.

The inspector general’s investigation found that the school board paid her expenses for a September move, months after her contract required her to become a county resident.

The investigation began in response to a December complaint that Rogers was working remotely, at least once a week, without the school board knowing. Investigators were also told she’d be picked up or meet someone in a shopping center in College Park on several occasions during school hours on weekdays.

The Inspector General couldn’t substantiate the remote work claims but found other potential problems and recommended the school board take action to correct them.

Rogers became Baltimore County’s schools superintendent in July 2023, earning a salary of $310,000. She’s now paid $331,700 after the board approved a raise in November based on her performance during the 2023-24 school year.

She joined the school system’s central office team in 2020, quickly rising through the ranks to deputy superintendent under her predecessor, Darryl Williams. Rogers beat out 24 candidates from 15 states for the superintendent job. Board chair Jane Lichter said at the time that Rogers was chosen for her a clear vision for the system and understanding of the challenges it faces.

Under Rogers’ leadership, the school system has seen gains in academic achievement, this year earning the most 5-star schools in the state. It also faced controversy and national headlines when Dazhon Darien, the former Pikesville High School athletic director, was arrested accused of framing his principal with AI.

Rogers’ contract gives her a year to relocate, a deadline that passed on July 1. It allows her to ask the school board for an extension to move, and for the board to pay for her moving expenses.

Maryland voter registration records show that Rogers changed her address to a Towson apartment on Jan. 13. The Inspector General found that two people are listed as occupants on the lease, neither of them Rogers, and that someone else is paying the utility bills.

Property records indicate Rogers owns a home in the Prince George’s County town of Mitchellville, which tax records list as her principal residence. The inspector general found her driver’s license is registered to the home she owns.

The school system coordinated Rogers’ move, according to the inspector general’s report, using a personal Gmail address instead of a school system email address. That could violate school system records policies designed to comply with Maryland open records laws.

Before the inspector general’s office released its report, The Banner had been investigating Rogers’ residence. Baltimore County Public Schools declined to make Rogers available to for an interview at the time.

Spokesperson Gboyinde Onijala said via email last month that Rogers is maintaining continuous residency in Baltimore County but noted that “the contract does not state that a superintendent is prohibited from owning property in another county or state.”

Onijala did not answer questions about when Rogers moved to Baltimore County, if Rogers asked the board for an extension to her moving deadline and if the board paid for Rogers’ moving expenses. She also did not answer questions about whether Rogers uses the Prince George’s County home.

In a Tuesday statement, the school system said Rogers’ driver’s license, voter registration and other personal documents reflect the Baltimore County address.

The report’s reference to meetings happening in College Park were also false, according to Onijala.

Documents given to the inspector general’s office indicate that Rogers completed her move to the county in September 2024, “and the Board of Education leadership was made aware of the timeline of her move. Her focus remains on serving the 110,000 students of Team BCPS and moving the school system forward,” the statement read.

When it comes to the Baltimore County apartment, Onijala told The Banner that the surname listed on the lease matches Rogers’ surname. Onijala said family lives there with Rogers. The superintendent’s name was left off for safety reasons, the spokesperson said.

Rogers told WYPR Tuesday evening that claims she lives outside Baltimore County are “baseless.”

“I can’t speak to the motivations of people who made these false statements,” she told the station. “I can tell you that every day, my commute is less than six minutes. I can tell you that in the cold months, there wasn’t even an opportunity for my car to warm up when I drove myself over here.”

Jane Lichter, chair of the school board, declined an interview request last month, but said via text message that the “Superintendent has met her residency obligations as outlined in the contract.”

Lichter did not answer questions about why Rogers’ contract requires her to move to the county or whether the board has seen any evidence she’s done so.

Lichter did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday afternoon.

While Rogers is not required to provide proof of residency to the school board, families of Baltimore County Public Schools students are. Proof of home ownership, a lease or rental agreement, are some of the requested documents for families, as well as documents with a parent’s address and photo IDs, according to the inspector eneral.

Baltimore County’s county charter does not require the superintendent to live in the district, the inspector general’s report states. It recommends the board better define the residency requirement in the contract and review other local superintendent contracts to determine if it’s relevant to the job. Not every Maryland school district requires residency.

The Baltimore County school board’s lawyer, Darren Burns of Carney, Kelehan, Bresler, Bennett and Scherr LLP, said he could not define what “maintain continuous residency” means because he’s “unable to provide legal advice to non-clients.”

Norm Ridder, owner of McPherson and Jacobson LLC, a search firm Baltimore County used for its superintendent search, said it’s common for superintendent contracts to have a requirement to live in the same district as the school system they oversee.

Contracts without that clause are often in places where there isn’t a lot of affordable housing, like California and Colorado, he said.

“A lot of times, they require residency because they want the superintendent and his family or her family to be engaged in the community,” said Ridder.

It’s best practice for superintendents to live where they work, he said.

James Hanks, a retired attorney who represented school districts in Iowa, said some of the larger Iowa cities, as well as districts around the country, require employees to be residents in the school districts where they work. That’s not the case in Baltimore County.

Hanks said he would interpret the language in Rogers’ contract — “maintain continuous residency in Baltimore County” — to mean that Baltimore County is where the superintendent should be spending majority of her time, and that she has a presence in that location. That’s how it’s interpreted in immigration law, he said.

Board member Maggie Domanowski, who said she is speaking for herself and not the school board, said she had assumed Rogers was following her contract but hasn’t seen any proof. It also hasn’t come up in board meetings, she said.

She interpreted “continuous residency” to mean where Rogers is spending most of her time — like how the IRS determines a taxpayer’s primary residence. But, she said, that’s her own opinion.

Where Rogers is physically isn’t a big concern for Domanowski.

“I’d rather it be more about telling the truth,” she said. “We need to be as transparent and honest with the public as possible. I’d have an issue if she was being dishonest with us.”

About the Education Hub

This reporting is part of The Banner’s Education Hub, community-funded journalism that provides parents with resources they need to make decisions about how their children learn. Read more.