WESTBROOK – Cindy Button, the Westbrook School Department transportation coordinator hired in June, resigned from her position last week, but details behind the circumstances of the resignation remain unclear.

Superintendent of Schools Marc Gousse confirmed Monday that Button had turned in a letter of resignation last week, effective Dec. 31. However, Button is spending her last two weeks working from the school department’s central office.

Dean Flanigan, the school department’s director of operations, said Monday that the position of transportation coordinator was posted last week following Button’s resignation.

Button was hired for the job amid public objections from school bus drivers, who supported keeping the two administrative assistants who ran the department’s daily tasks.

The transportation job has been in flux since Penny Esposito retired in early 2010. Esposito was replaced by Jan Breton, the former assistant superintendent whose job had been eliminated. Breton was only in the post for six months.

According to Gousse, after Breton left, the school department named Jeremy Ray as director of operations, overseeing the transportation, maintenance and technology departments. Ray subsequently left to become superintendent of schools in Biddeford. After Flanigan was named director of operations, coordinator jobs were created in June for transportation, maintenance and technology.

When hired, Button, who was one of only three certified transportation directors in Maine, had been the transportation director at School Administrative District 60 in North Berwick, where she still lives. Flanigan added that the long commute might have played into Button’s decision.

Flanigan said Wednesday that Button has been working on budgetary items for the school department from the central office leading up to the school’s budget discussions this spring.

“I wanted her to have the documentation right at her fingertips,” he said.

He said that Button has been looking ahead at figures for the transportation department for fiscal year 2014-15.

Flanigan added that “there wasn’t anything in her letter stating reasons” for the resignation.

Both Flanigan and Gousse said they were surprised by Button’s resignation.

Multiple calls to Button were not returned by the American Journal’s deadline Wednesday.

In an interview with the American Journal in July, just as she began the job, Button said she was “looking forward to putting together a bus safety committee and implementing a safety program for all students in Westbrook. Transporting students the safest possible way is by far the most important part of my job.”

On June 19, the Westbrook School Committee unanimously agreed to hire Button as the new coordinator for $45,000 per year, and to eliminate one of two administrative assistant positions in the transportation department. Prior to Button’s hiring, Joan Harmon and Peggy Bowden were longtime assistants who ran the department’s daily tasks.

Bowden’s position was eliminated to provide funding for Button’s job. Bowden subsequently took a job as a department bus driver.

Prior to the School Committee’s vote in June, Mark Crawford, a Westbrook school bus driver, read a letter in support of the two assistant positions, which was supported by the transportation staff.

“These two women have worked at Westbrook schools for many years, and have run the daily operations at the Transportation Department with different administrators for the past three years,” he said. “There are two people currently working in our office that have demonstrated that they can, and have, run the transportation department.”

Harmon has been working with the district since 1992, while Bowden began as a bus driver in 1984.

Harmon said Tuesday that as the current administrative assistant, she is overseeing the department’s day-to-day operations until Button’s replacement is hired, but declined to comment on whether she will seek the position.

There are some 25 employees in the department.

Superintendent of Schools Marc Gousse confirmed Monday that Cindy Button had turned in a letter of resignation last week, effective Dec. 31.