A consultant/auditor hired by the Santa Ana Unified School District (SAUSD) revealed at the board meeting tonight that the district is going to lose $2 million due to their bungling of class size reduction (CSR). I will file a complete report tomorrow, but I did not want to wait to get the basic facts out.
Trustee Audrey Noji tried to intimate that the district did nothing wrong as they did not file an incorrect CSR report with the state. However, Trustee John Palacio reminded us that the district would have filed a fraudulent report were it not for the brave teachers who stepped forward.
I was astounded at how unapologetic SAUSD Superintendent Jane Russo appeared to be. I have yet to hear “I’m sorry” come out of her mouth. Nor does it appear that any of her lame administrators are going to pay for their multi-million dollar screw up. Amazing.
In fact the meeting opened with all the usual awards and such. I guess Russo did not know what was coming. It will be a miracle if she hangs on to her job.
Trustees Rob Richardson and Jose Hernandez asked that the auditor not mince words on her final report. But neither of them appeared to be ready to truly hold anyone accountable. Trustee Rosie Avila even thanked the district for their prompt report. That too was astounding. They just bungled $2 million and she thanked them?!?
Again, I will file a full report, with pictures tomorrow. I have to go audit an environmental abatement job tonight. I took over 10 pages of notes tonight, and will transcribe the scary details in my next post.
UPDATE:
The Times O.C. and the O.C. Register both weighed in on this story in today’s papers. Here are some highlights from both articles:
From the Times: If one substitute spent her day split in two oversized classrooms, both classes would have been eligible for the “Option 2” funding.
But this method failed in every single classroom where it was implemented, according to auditor Christy White of public accounting firm Nigro, Nigro & White, because of poor instructions from district administrators, a failure to hire enough substitutes and a lack of classroom space. Additionally, the alteration of rosters was improper and has been corrected, she said.
“Ultimately, it shouldn’t have been done, in our opinion,” White said.
Also from the Times, SAUSD Board President Rob Richardson finally wakes up, “There are two ways to do things
WHO organized that scheme?
Make sure you don’t misuse computers during work hours on this blog. Someone authorized spying on “problem” employees and looking to bust people for any kind of trepasses. Best bet is to view at home
Correct me if I’m wrong, but did the district forgo over 2 million in class size reduction state money, hire several new overpaid admin types and agree to sell 36 million in certificates of participation all while paying overtime to the IT dept to spy on people?Can someone post the state super of eds contact info on this blog so we can ask the state to take over this mess?
I believe that if the class size reduction was inplemented correctly for all grades originally planned to be turned in to the State it would of brought in to the district 16 million dollars.The 2 million loss is for an incomplete audit and partial grade submission for funding consideration to the state , as I understand it.
New LATimes article today:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/orange/la-me-classsize25apr25,1,2891951.story?track=rss
Class size snafu costs district
Santa Ana Unified will lose $2 million in state funding because of improperly applied programs to reduce elementary rosters.
_____________________
So let me get this straight. Russo has no clue that her direct underlings have hatched a scheme to defraud the state out of millions of dollars and she calls union members
It’s going to take a lot of car washes and candy bar sales to make up that $2,000,000!!!!!! But it won’t have an impact on the school board members or the over paid administraitors so it’s ok! Have a happy day everyone!
Every day that this blog exists, is one more day that corrupt district officials cannot hide from their lies and misdeeds. That is why there is intense focus on trying to suppress the teachers and trying to monitor and intimidate posters who visit this site. Good job, Art. Freedom of speech is still free. Even in Santa Ana.
No Big Deal! The Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce just asks it’s members for some more cash and they give it to the District on Chavez Day at some park, take a lot of Happy Photos with smiley kids and Gringo’s in suits, and everybody is happy! Si Se Puede!!!!
$2,000,000 short? All they need to do is fire a handful of those overpaid no good Department heads! And where are the Anti-Nativo folks? I don’t hear talk of a Recall this time. I wonder why??
http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/homepage/abox/article_1669055.php
OCRegister article. Apparently a vague memo was sent out. No one yet claiming responsibility for the memo. Jane Russo will bring in a state agency, the Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team to help her do her job.
What I don’t understand is why is the SAUSD going to build a new school in January of 2008, when they are going to close Grant Elementary, if they claim next year the population is going to be down?! Taxpayers and childrens money going down the drain again….
Who is going to be held accountable for this? 2 Billion of losses is nothing to laugh about. This is serious and should have serious legal consequences. I know in my place of employment I would not be given another chance. Someone needs to step down from that Board. I hope the students and teachers dont take any more cuts to their salaries, arts, sports, EDUCATION.
So – Apr. 25, 2007 08:55 AM
Things have changed since the Enron debacle. Sitting Boards can now be held personally responsible for fraud and crimes committed by their organizations. The luxury of being a “hands off” board of education is over. The board is in peril already. Their choice of an unseasoned hothead may come back to bite them.
How much money will they have to spend propping her up with special audits and emergency crisis teams? This is in addition to the salary she receives for services she has yet to deliver.
“The state agency works with districts statewide that are struggling with finances. In extreme cases, the agency restructures districts that go bankrupt.”
That says it all. Bankrupt.
Sacramento Bee article:
http://www.fresnobee.com/384/story/43857.html
Mrs. White with the auditing company made it pretty clear last night that there was a memo sent to the schools about implementing the CSR programs. She stated that the memo was “vague” about how the implementation of CSR option 2 was to work, yet every single administrator interpreted it and implemented the program the same way. How vague could it possibly have been then?
No one said who the author of said memo was, but if the memo they reviewed was so vague, there must have been someone at the district who distributed further information to every administrator with specific instructions on how to implement this program. All these school sites didn’t accidently come to the same conclusion based on a vague memo.
The district needs to provide the auditors with the real implementation memos, or the person responsible for distributing this implementation method to the administrators.
At this point in the audit, it does appear, based on the presentation last night, that it was a senior administrator and not the school board that was responsible for this whole snafu.
I thought someone here said a few days ago that the District’s audit cannot be trusted, as it is a self-audit? Seems like once it is published everyone here is trusting it as the gosphel. Hmmm
Poster 16,
Please. The audit did not include a close investigation of every claim of CSR fraud. And yet it revealed a $2 million loss. Imagine what a true investigation would have come up with?
When is Russo going to resign?
to #17 you should of asked Ms. Russo that yesterday at the SAUSD meeting? Where were u?
Poster 18,
Are you serious? I was there until 8:30 p.m. Then I had to go to work and didn’t come home until 5 this morning. My co-blogger Thomas Gordon was there too. Where were you?
One of the first casualities of war is… *truth.*
Russo has displayed too many times that truth does not matter. She’s seriously into the *blame game.* Her first target was the LA Times and now we learn she is harassing and intimidating teachers.
As SAUSD shareholders, is this the kind of CEO you want running our school district. And are you really pleased with how the BOE has handled this matter?
Jane Russo is completely disconnected. She doesn
How is trying to take away freedom of speech EVER a good idea? If Russo is trying to come across as a lawless tyrant, well she
Really, Jane, is that the best you can do? Write complaint letters for teachers to shut up about the fraud you
It must suck to be Jane Russo and have to find out the truth about shoddy district practices from a BLOG, rather from the people she is supposed to count on for guidance and communication.
#57 An abusive organization can only be dealt with by using legal remedies. As more and more employees get completely disgusted by being targets of bully behavior or witnessing other colleagues go thru unnecessary harassment by incompetent managers, there will be more and more lawsuits in SAUSD. The Board of Education
Dr. Noji –
Thanks for recruiting Jane Russo and bringing her back to SAUSD as Supt. Fine job. Her four month tenure has been disasterous. Must we endure an entire year?
Many teachers who plan to get pink slips in March 2008 over this “ERROR” are already contacting lawyers. These errors are NOT little when they amount to many teachers’ livlihoods. Plan on lawsuits if pink slips are given over this error. Sure they are already blaming DECREASING enrollment to cover up their mistakes and to JUSTIFY for the pink slips they will give the poor teachers in March 2008. I hate this district. Thanks Art for all you do.
The silence from the district administration and school board is deafening. They should all be ashamed of themselves. If heads don’t roll over this, then what?
I would like to see that “vague” memo to schools that was supposed to outline the policy.
won’t lawsuits eventually hurt the children too?
just wondering, unless they have insurance or another fund, settlements all come out of the SAUSD budget right?
This bears repeating from an earlier thread about contacting President Rob Richardson:
Blue Coyote Says:
4/22/2007 9:53 PM
#9
Russo is NOT an outsider. Russo enjoyed employment with SAUSD for over two decades, serving in several capacities, until her contract was NOT RENEWED. At that time she slinked to a very small district where she was ass’t supt. for a few years. When Audrey Noji went supt. shopping, she plucked Russo to return to SAUSD as Deputy Supt. for one year. When Russo’s one year internship with Mijares concluded, Mijares resigned and Russo was named interim supt.
It’s no secret that the months long supt. search was merely window dressing to appease the community. Russo was not the best qualified candidate for the position. Russo’s resume does not list any experience as a supt. nor does it include an Ed.D. or Ph.D. degree in education. The BOE’s decision to appoint such a person with no prior experience and reward Russo with an annual salary in excess of $250,000 has left many questioning the BOE’s rationale for gambling with an individual who has no proven record.
While this sordid mess has not been completely revealed or resolved there is one certainty surrounding this fiasco — at no time has Supt. Russo held herself or her cabinet *accountable* for this black eye. Supt. Russo has blamed the LA Times for daring to publish the district’s dirty laundry and she has launched an all-out attack on the teachers who have spoken to the press and SAEA. Her campaign to intimidate and silence is underway with the blessing of Rob Richardson and Audrey Noji.
In the past the district has relied on a variety of intimidation tactics to silence certificated and classified employees. And it has been successful. Russo’s lack of political astuteness has hindered Russo from adequately assessing current conditions. Couple this with Audrey Noji’s zeal to control and retaliate and the perfect storm for a sea change at SAUSD is churning.
No, Supt. Russo is not an outsider. She is very much an insider who is embroiled in a scandal that rests squarely on her door step.
The road to reform was promised by the recall activists and they served up Rob Richardson as its savior of reform. It’s been over four years and the road to reform never materialized. So called community activists harnessed their money, political cache and energy to rid their neighborhood of an elementary school. They gave permission to an outsider, Ron Unz, to prance into town and dictate his English only philosophy because of his unlimited funds. None of the so called recall activists have ever spent time in a classroom teaching and none of them hold any educational degrees or credentials. Their meddling was self-serving – no school in my backyard. Their hypocrisy is boundless. And when their community needs them most, they remain silent on the sidelines out of loyalty to their social pals.
It’s the teachers that must move the corruption and fraud front and center. Teachers, who do not live in your community, are alone in this fight for the children of Santa Ana.
Richardson and his recall acolytes called for transparency, but in the end the prescription was too antiseptic
An administrator once told me that it takes only about $40,000-$50,000 to get rid of an employee. If the district could drag the determined employee
From the district’s website:
http://www.sausd.k12.ca.us/events/detail.asp?id=479
Teacher Recruitment Fair
Saturday, April 28, 2007
Recruitment Fair for High School Math/Earth Science and K-12 Special Education. 9:00a.m. – 12:00p.m. For more info please call 714-558-5731.
Why would this district have a teacher recruitment fair when they are planning on laying off scores of teachers who already work for the district? How much is this little Saturday event costing? Why isn
#10
Here’s a chant for the next meeting:
Hey, Hey, Ho, Ho! Richardson and Russo…They must Go!!
or..for a sign
The three R’s are hurting our Kids!
Russo, Richardson, and Rossie!
And what’s the deal with the wimpy lawyer guy they just appointed to the board to replace Tinajero???.He’s worthless! All he does is keep reminding us he is a lawyer (which is not a positive thing in the minds of most people). This clown MUST not be re-elected.
Here’s some good news.
http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/news/local/santaana/article_1670325.php
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
29 Santa Ana students headed to prestigious preps
National program will pay more than $5 million in scholarships for students to attend boarding schools.
By FERMIN LEAL
The Orange County Register
Twenty-nine middle school students from Santa Ana Unified have been chosen to participate in a program that places them in prestigious preparatory academies across the country.
SANTA ANA Twenty-nine middle school students from Santa Ana Unified have been chosen to participate in a program that places them in prestigious preparatory academies across the country.
The A Better Chance program will send the students next fall to top boarding schools in states including Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Connecticut. The program places students with scholarships that pay the full four-year tuition, room and boarding costs for every student, equaling about $5 million.
The New York-based nonprofit group helps send about 400 students nationally to schools every year. The goal of the program is to place more inner-city students in these highly respected schools.
Santa Ana Unified sends about 20 to 25 students to the program each year. Students qualify by excelling academically or in other areas, and by demonstrating financial need.
Maria Colmenares, a counselor at Villa Fundamental Intermediate, has been working with the program for several years recruiting students to apply.
Each year, her school typically has as many students accepted to the program as all of Los Angeles Unified, she said.
For more information about the program visit http://www.abetterchance.org.
Contact the writer: 714-445-6687 or fleal@ocregister.com
Good news? Give me a break! This is classic SAUSD spin! “We would like to point out we have a handful of students going to decent colleges and able to read and write but please don’t ask us about the 57,000 students who are not qualified to get a job at McDonalds! Just go visit any campus any day of the week..talk to the kids and judge for yourself. It’s pathetic.
to #36, would it be because Villa Fundamental is next to the SAUSD Headquarters?! Hmmmmm Everyone at Villa Fundamental is involved, wished all of the SAUSD Principals, staff and the members of the SAUSD Education Board were as involved and proactive as Villa Fundamental staff! ;(
So let
#30 To Carlos
Poster #33 Asked regarding the need for a recruitment of Math/Science teachers…
Whether or not the school district is laying off teachers, the need for math/science teachers is heavily in demand. Teachers being layed off currently in SAUSD are elementary school teachers who really do not have the capacity to teach higher level math. It is rare to see a math teacher let go, and more importantly, stay unemployed. A credential math/science teacher is a rare commodity in this day and age. I encourage the district to have the fair and try to find math teachers. Currently at Santa Ana High School there are several classes being taught by long term subs, who have no credential, and perhaps a limited knowledge of mathematics.
Luis,
Why would any good teacher that had lots and lots of prospects come to SAUSD? What would be the draw?
Anon,
I understand your valid point, but the issue was not whether someone wanted to come to SAUSD or not, it was why they need to have a fair for math and science teachers. All school districts are doing the same to acquire that talent.
As far as those teachers wanting to come to SAUSD that is a seperate issue, and I believe many have already answered the pros and cons of the district.
This posting should be considered as an addition to #897 posting dated 4/22/07 on the “corruption” thread.
Further investigation has revealed that Gomeztrejo, the new Valley High School principal and CEO of High School Inc., was not released from Centinela Union High School District in June 2005. Gometrejo was transferred to Hawthorne High School after his wife barged into the Lawndale High front office demanding to have it out with a Lawndale assistant principal. Gomeztrejo was having an affair with the AP and his wife was hell bent to bring the tryst to an end. Embarrassed Centinela district officials transferred Gomeztrejo to Hawthorne High at the end of the 2005 school year in an effort to reverse plunging teacher morale at Lawndale High. Once at Hawthorne High School Gomeztrejo launched an anti-teacher campaign that, predictably, deep-sixed teacher morale there. Sources in the Centinela District said Gomeztrejo’s erratic behavior at Hawthorne High School force the District to let Gomeztrejo go without a demotion offer at the end of the 2006 school year.
None of the administrative postions held by Gomeztrejo listed in this posting or in the posting of 4/22/07 was included in Gomeztrejo’s application and resume to SAUSD in the summer of 2006 when he applied for the AP position at Saddleback High and in the winter of 2007 when Gomeztrejo applied for the Valley Principalship. SAUSD Officials Juan Lopez and Louis Bratcher have made public statements stating that no irregularities were uncovered by SAUSD when the District did a background check on Gomeztrejo.
#37. Your point about the general ability for the SAUSD to service it’s students and faculty is well taken.However the placing of this number of students into the schools mentioned is significant if was from Mater Dei.The fact that these students are from a school district with the problems being addressed here is even more significant.In the past all blame for poor performance of the students in the district was placed on the students and parents,now we know the large factor is due to questionable district management. There are many examples of schools with similar demographics that are successful nationwide and even within this city.The differance appears to be with management.
#37 and #45
You’ve hit on a topic that is deserving of community dialogue.
Why does SAUSD have a two-tiered
system? And is this two-tiered system offering equal opportunity/access to a quality *public education* for all?
Sending a 14-year old child, 3,000 miles away, to a prepatory high school has its advantages and disadvantages. I’m not certain I would want to remove my 14-year child from our day-to-day family life. Those are lost days that can never be replaced.
It’s unfortunate our comprehensive high schools are academically substandard and in some cases forcing our parents to search elsewhere for a solid, academic high school experience for their children.
I’d like to know how many of our students exit the district after they complete the 8th grade? Talented students leaving the district is problematic and I think we need to talk about this.
Who is responsible for this latest fiasco at the SAUSD? The cheesy administrators who end up at the district office after they create disasters at the schools they are assigned to. Notice administrators never get fired? They go to the District Office to keep making bad decisions like this one.
If you look at Santa Ana’s SACS Budget Report (it’s a public document that the district can’t refuse to provide to you…under California’s public access law, they can’t even ask your name when you ask for it) you’ll find that the 2006-07 budget adopted by the school board specifies that in the General Fund alone there will be a cash surplus of $76,500,624.31 when this fiscal year ends on June 30.
You’ll find that in Section F, Fund Balance, Reserves, Line 2, Column F, Ending Balance.
Column E shows that $35,622,467.96 of that $76,500,624.31 Ending Balance is Restricted Funds; that is, it’s tax money that must be used for specific accounts.
However, Column D shows that $40,878,156.35 of the $76,500,624.31 Ending Balance is entirely Unrestricted money; that is, it can be used for any purpose, such as keeping kids music programs, reinstating all the programs that have been cut, competitive salaries/benefits to recruit and retain the top teachers for the children, etc.
State Law AB 1200 specifies that school districts must retain a Reserve for Economic Uncertainties. The law sets a formula for SAUSD’s Reserve: 2% of Expenditures. If you look at SAUSD’s SACS Budget Report, Section B, Expenditures, Line 9, Total Expenditures for the year, Column F, you find that the Total Expenditures amount to $476,835,453.30. Two percent of that is $9,756,709.07.
However, if you return to Section F of the SACS Budget Report, Line 2b, Column F. reveals that SAUSD has set aside $32,805,806.35 in Reserves. It is overfunding the reserve by an enormous $23,049,097.28!
Furthermore, Column D shows that the entire Reserve, including the $23,049,097.28 overfunding is all Unrestricted cash!
That money should be spent on educating the community’s children, but if you try to demand that, you’ll encounter an avalanche of misinformation and disinformation especially formulated with gobbledygook that’s intended to intimidate citizens (and even board members). Trustees who rubber stamp what the entrenched district bureaucrats throw at them especially don’t want the public to know that they don’t understand the budget, so they don’t ask questions and just rubber stamp away. That’s why they ended up in the fake class size reduction mess. If you read the April 20 News Section, P. 16, of the Register, you saw a long report headlined “Bureaucracy stymies lawmakers” which reported on how the bureaucrats in Sacramento lead lawmakers around by the nose; so, this problem isn’t just limited to school boards.
By the way, that $76,500,624.31 year-end SAUSD cash surplus noted above is only the General Fund surplus; if you want to find the what the total surplus will be on June 30, you need to go through the SACS detail report for each fund category. The total is typically well over $100,000,000.
Remember back in 20002-03 and 2003-04 when SAUSD was rending its garments over the huge deficits if claimed to have? Well, if you look back in the audited SACS Budget Reports for those years, you” find that the district ended the years, respectively, with $46,370,00.76 and $22,955,239.80 surpluses in just the General Fund alone.
Most districts play the same game. What they do to start off the year is to underreport their income and overstate their expenditures in the first budget report, thereby creating a phony “deficit” in Section C of the SACS report. But the savvy citizen will look down the line to Section F, Line 2 Ending Balance. If there’s a surplus there (and there usually is), then the “deficit” in Section C is phony and designed for media consumption to panic taxpayers.
When the San Diego Union-Tribune caught the San Diego Unified School District bureaucrats in these financial lies, the district’s budget manager just shrugged and admitted that all districts play this “shell game” (direct quote).
That’s a sad and cynical shell game because its children who are being cheated, along with taxpayers.
SAUSD has double-trouble, too: Using the mechanism of at-large elections, the now-underground anti-public school Education Alliance has elected the majority of SAUSD trustees. The California Supreme Court recently upheld that the 2001 California Voting Rights Act is the law of the land. The Act was passed to enable ethnic voters to get out from under the thumb of “Old Guard” anglo political machines that control school board and city council elections from behind the scenes. It’s surprising that MALDEF or LULAC haven’t yet used the law to end at-large elections for the school board and city council in Santa Ana. It’s the only way that strong and truly representative officials can be elected and break the stranglehold that the Old Guard and their bureaucracies have on the city and the school district.
How the tax skim scam works:
That huge cash surplus in the SAUSD budget will largely be skimmed into one of several “investment accounts” managed by the OC Treasuer’s Department from which the Department skims tens of millions in “management fees.” Funneling the tax money skimmed from educating kids into county government earned a certain person a reputation as the “financial savior” of Orange County. So, don’t expect the Register to help you on this because the Register’s favorite county politician might be revealed to be less than perfect.
The Treasurer’s Department then places the money with politically favored brokerages. The brokers reap millions in fees from “churning” the money in “bottom feeder” and house accounts, which increases the brokers’ “take” even more.
A large chunk of what the brokers rake in is doled out as contributions to the campaign organizations of favored local and state politicians, who then look the other way in regards to the skimming from school district budgets.
The career bureaucrates in the district finance and superintendents offices who cook the books to make the skim possible then reap kickbacks in the form of insider deals on investments, real estate, cars, “seminars” to exotic locales, and similar “perks.”
As for the school boards, not even a majority of members needs to be in on the skim scam: All that’s needed is a couple of insider trustees to cajole and ridicule those trustees who try to really understand what the budget shell game. No one, not even the most highly principled trustee wants to look at public meetings like an incompetent fool who can’t grasp “simple” accounting.
Even the California Teachers Association is in on the skim scam: At the time that CTA was telling teachers they needed to take a salary cut because SUASD was nearing bankruptcy, CTA knew — as did anyone who looked at the district’s SACS Budget Report — that SAUSD would end that fiscal year with yet another surplus of tens of millions of dollars. But, CTA officials have their own political agenda, and they don’t want to upset the contributions apple cart that “their” politicians in Sacramento get from this statewide scam that school districts are engaged in.
Even this year, CTA was telling teachers at the start of the year that SAUSD was facing hard times and not to expect raises and full salary restoration. It was only when some classroom teachers went and got copies of the district’s SACS Budget Report showing the huge cash surplus for this year that CTA had to suddenly reverse itself. Local union leaders are teachers, not accountants; they rely on CTA to tell them a district’s financial status. That’s why local leaders went along with the salary cut a few years ago and why SAUSD’s local leaders were ready to accept another year of hardship for themselves and their colleagues.
District bureaucrats and their cronies get away with this because the State Department of Education fails to provide any meaningful oversight as to how your tax money is shuffled around. Remember a few years ago when angry voters tried to find out what the Anaheim Union High School District did with $142 million in bond money? When it became clear to them that the money had been misappropriated, they went to the State Attorney General, and the AG’s then-spokesman, Nathan Barankin said, so sorry, but “there is no direct supervisor over the administration of these bonds.” The United States Justice Foundation that monitors school districts (only “monitors”) said that citizens have little legal power to stop district bureaucrats from basically doing whatever they want. Strong, stringent oversight is much needed; but don’t expect politicians to create that because that would end their gravy train of campaign contributions coming from the skimmed money.
If you are brave enough to get your district’s SACS Budget Report and challenge the bureaucrats, they (including Orange County Department of Education Bureaucrats)will unload on you a barrage of financial gobbledygook laced with school accounting jargon designed to make you look and feel foolish. The best way to stand your ground is to know what the jargon really means. Here’s a vocabulary primer:
ADA: Average Daily Attendance. District begin the shell game by consistently understating their ADA because that makes it look like enrollment is declining. The formula for coming up with the ADA figure is deliberately complicated so that the average citizen or reporter ends up confused and believing whatever they are told by the “experts.”
Adopted Budget: Districts adopt a budget in June for the upcoming fiscal year that starts on July 1. This is a public relations budget in which income is greatly understated and expenditures greatly overstated to make headlines that the district is operating at a “deficit.” Skip the PR dysinformation, get your own copy of the SACS Budget Report and go right to the Bottom Line in the General Fund report; the Bottom Line is found in Section F, Fund Balance, Reservesm Line 2, Column F. If there’s a positive balance there, then there’s no deficit, no matter what’s written earlier in Section C. Also check Line 2b, Column F, in Section F: In no case, according to state law AB 1200 should the “Reserve” desgnated for economic incertainties exceed 3% of what’s listed in Section B, Expenditures, Line 9, Total Expentitures, Column F. For SAUSD, the AB 1200 specification is 2% of Total Expenditures.
Interim Budgets: After the PR budget to kick off the year, scare the public, and intimidate teachers from seeking salary increases, the district issues a series of “interim budgets.” Keep track of them. Typically, as the year goes on you’ll see the “deficit” shrink and the surplus grow.
COLA: Cost of Living Adjustment. Each year, the state automatically increases all districts’ budgets by a certain percentage to cover inflation. The COLA typically exceeds the actual inflation rate. This year (2006-07), SAUSD automatically got a COLA increase of 5.92%. That amounted to $14 million, which more than offset both inflation and the claimed enrollment decline. The same will be true for the coming year with a COLA coming in to SAUSD at $18 million for 2007-08 to cover inflation and any enrollment decline, according to the state budget office.
Required Reserve: This is an annual reserve specified by state law AB 1200. Based on a district’s ADA, the maximum reserve ranges from 3% down to 0.5%. SAUSD’s ADA dictates a reserve of 2% of Expenditures. Anything over that is pure padding, but padding that’s vehemently defended by the bureaucrats with more reasons that you can shake a stick at. Too bad there aren’t more informed citizens to shake sticks at the deceptions.
“Special Reserve”: Legally, there’s no such thing in school districts. The real name for “Special Reserver” is “Slush Fund.” It’s just another way of stashing cash that will later be skimmed into those county “investment accounts” that feed politicians and brokers.
Restricted Funds: Also called “Categorical Funds.” In fact, the bureaucrats like to use both terms in debates to keep citizens (and uninformed trustees) off-balance. These funds can only be spent for specific purposes, such as Special Education children.
Unrestricted Funds: These are funds that the district can spend for any educational purpose. One of the first moves in the shell game that the bureaucrats play on taxpayers is to move Unrestricted funds into Restricted accounts and claim the money now can’t be spent for meeting general needs; however, Unretricted funds are permanently Unrestricted, regardless of what accounts they are stashed in, and the Unrestricted funds can be moved out of the restricted accounts as soon as the public has been fooled. This part of the shell game goes on constantly.
Teacher: You’d think this would be obvious. But when the public hears the bureaucrats talking about “teachers,” the public thinks of people act
ually in the classroom teaching the community’s children. But that’s not how the shell game is played. Districts count anyone who has a teaching credential as a “teacher,” including all the people in the district office, including the superindentent and all the assistant supers. That way the district can make its ratio of teachers to students look great.
Trustee: The reason a school board member is a trustee is because school districts are not any form of local government: School districts are legally part of the state government and board members can only act in trust for the state to fulfill state law and requirements. Trustees who fail to do this can be removed for Breach of Fiduciary Duty to the state. Most trustees frequently breach this duty; most aren’t even aware that “their” district is part of the state government. The Department of Education, in addition to failing to provide financial oversight, also fails to enforce trustees’ fiduciary obligations.
Zero-Based Budget: School districts are supposed to operate on zero-based budgets; that is, at the end of each fiscal year on June 30, there’s not supposed to be any money left over because on July 1 the state automatically refills the district’s accounts from the state budget. The money given to the district by the state to educate the community’s children is all supposed to have been spent to do just that. Any amount “left over” is legally a breach of the trustees’ Fiduciary Duty to provide children with the best possible education. But, who cares? After all, their only kids and they don’t vote and their parents are too busy to figure out what’s going on with the money.
TRANS: If the state budget is delayed, districts are provided with a financial mechanism for carrying on business until the state budget fills the district’s account. This mechanism is “Tax Revenue Anticipatory Notes.” TRANS for short. So, school districts are never really without money, even if the state budget is delayed.
Until average citizens inform themselves about their district’s budget, take on the bureaucrats, and force the politicians to end this campaing contribution gravy train that’s running at the expense of children, children will continue to be cheated, our nation’s future will continue to be endangered, and taxpayers themselves will continue to have their taxes skimmed away by the shell game scam.
It looks like the real reason to get rid of Nativo – He’d be in direct competition with district thieves.
What can be done about this? It must not go on.