A member of Northern Lehigh School District’s leadership team will retire before the end of the year.

The school board on Monday accepted the retirement resignation of Greg Derr, director of support services, effective at the end of the day on Dec. 21.

Superintendent Dr. Matthew J. Link acknowledged Derr’s retirement.

“This is kind of a cliché that you can replace, fill the position, but you can’t replace the person,” Link said. “That sentiment rings so true this evening.”

Link said that Derr has been with the district for about 17 years.

“And I can tell you in the time that I’ve had to work with him, he’s been nothing short of remarkable with his leadership over buildings and grounds and transportation,” he said. “What he’s done in simply leading us and making sure that our buildings have been safe during the pandemic was nothing short of a miracle.”

“Greg, I’m going to deeply miss working with you, Mr. Derr. Thank you for everything that you have done for this school district, for the students and really for the community at large.

“I wish you nothing but not having to make 1,000 decisions a day moving forward, and just joy, and happiness, and time to relax.”

“I just wanted to say that I enjoyed coming to work every day; I’m a morning person,” Derr said. “I never minded coming in to work honestly at all, I never felt like I was working.”

Derr added he formed a lot of friendships along the way.

“I enjoyed all the people that I worked with; a lot of people I’m close with here through 17 years, we did things outside of work.

“Thank you for everything, and all the opportunities I had while I worked here,” he said. “You trusted me to make some decisions, lots of decisions, but I appreciate your support through the years.”