Bongo likes to visit other blogs. While surfing earlier today, I found a very interesting recap of last Thursday's Board of Education meeting, written by board secretary Kim Skaja. Mrs. Skaja has been on the board for more than 10 years. She evidently posts on the HN site and was asked for a rundown of how Thursday's meeting went. Bongo posted his synopsis on this blog, but Mrs. Skaja's summary was much more detailed. Sorry for copying your post, HN, but its good information so hopefully you won't mind sharing it with Bongo. I'm only copying the part of the meeting having to do with the closing of the forensic audit:
Mr. Green moved to approve the resolution to close the forensic audit. Two items were added to the resolution. On page two of three - at the end of the paragraph which refers to seeking reimbursement from a former administrator for an overpayment to TRS in the amount of $5,998.84; add the following: "and the Board reserves the right to seek reimbursement from a second former administrator for potential over payments for TRS" Add an addition at the very end, where it states " Now therefore, be it resolved by the Board of Education of Consolidated School District No. 158 as follows:
1. The recitals set forth above are found to be true and correct.
2. (This is the added portion.) The BOE reserves the right to review matters not outlined in this resolution that occurred during the time of the forensic audit.
3. The Board of Education declares the Forensic Audit and associated investigations complete and closed.
Ms. Seedorf wanted to removed the noxious weed agreement from the resolution. Mr. Snow was the only other member to support the idea.
Mr. Snow and Ms. Seedorf both wanted to keep the audit open and sited several changes they wanted to see in the resolution. Ms. Seedorf called it a facade, Mr. Snow said it was filled with half truths and smelled worse than last month's fish. The Board spent about two and half hours listening to and responding to the things Mr. Snow and Ms. Seedorf wanted changed in the resolution.
Concerns: Not enough time to review, not complete, not accurate.
Response: Gentry (CPA and Board member), Green (Board president) and Quagliano (CPA and Board member) worked to create the document and strove to be as complete, clear and accurate as possible. Some of the changes suggested to Mr. Quagliano from Mr. Snow were made prior to bringing the document to the meeting.
Concern: Mr. Snow accused board members of being unscrupulous and giving extra benefits to our "administrator friends." He also said we were lying and "shoveling a bunch of B.S."... He said the board had no policy for giving administrators retirement benefits or free health care or extra vacation time or cash in lieu and therefore those disbursements should not have been made. He also sited a lack of transparency and made accusations of cover ups.
Response: Mr. Gentry calmly explained both free health care and retirement benefits were not in a board policy but they were clearly defined in the administrators' contracts. The extra week of vacation was also in the contract. The contract language overrides policy language as stated in the policy manual. The Board has a September 2007 memo from legal counsel defending the Board's position not to pursue Cash in lieu (CIL) and CIL is already being phased out as it is no longer seen as beneficial to the district. The core conclusions of the audit were the Site and Construction finding were extremely clear - essentially no problems found and the payroll audit found no systemic wrong doing. In his opinion, all aspects were covered in the summary and there is no lack of transparency.
The meeting continued in that vein for the next two hours. Every concern Mr. Snow and Ms. Seedorf brought up was adequately and satisfactorily addressed and should have (in my opinion) eliminated all concerns. However, that was not the case for Mr. Snow and Ms. Seedorf who both voted against the resolution.
Dr. Burkey had great comments at the end of the discussion. His exact quote, "Thank God, it's over." He said he requested and supported the audit of payroll. After all the things he had heard, he is amazed there was nothing there. He is glad this is over and everything is on the table. The district could not go on with so many issues hanging over it. He reminded everyone that Huntley is not what it was fifteen years ago. District 158 is one of the most rapidly growing school districts in the country. In 1995, the district had under a thousand kids. The district was run like a mom and pop operation and in many ways it was a mom and pop organization. We must stop judging the actions of people at that time by the standards of today. That being said, many things were done very well. This year's tax rate is the lowest it's been in 12 years. All 8,000 plus of our students are housed in modern facilities and no school building is over eleven years old. We have sufficient land for growth and will never have to face a situation like District 204 recently did, when they were forced to spend 16.5 million dollars to buy enough land to build one high school. The previous boards and administrators showed great foresight by purchasing land while it was still affordable. It is time to put the forensic audit behind us and put all of our efforts into the future. We won't get better unless we put all of our efforts into the future.
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