The superintendent of a Southern California school system emerged Thursday as the leading candidate to head the Prince George's County Public Schools.

The county Board of Education said John Deasy was its top pick to be the new chief executive officer. Deasy rose to the top after the board spent this week meeting with him and two other finalists.

Deasy, 45, has run the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District for five years. That district has 17 schools, about 12,000 students and a current budget of about $100 million.

Prince George's - in the Washington, D.C., suburbs - has 202 schools with about 134,000 students enrolled. For fiscal 2006 the school system has a budget of $1.37 billion.

The top schools job in Prince George's has been vacant since Andre Hornsby resigned last year amid an ethics controversy. PG school officials said they would travel to the Santa Monica area before officially offering Deasy the job.

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