Seattle Schools Community Forum

I was only able to hit two of the four Board committee meetings last week (and not the work session either but Charlie covered that one).  I went the the Audit portion of the Audit and Finance Committee meeting on Tuesday.  This was a good meeting and especially so because of the arrival of the A&F's two new volunteer public advisors (looking for one but got two and that's even better).

I attended an event on Thursday by a group called First Thursday which is a black community group that supports its community businesses and groups.  Their speaker was King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg.  I attended because it was advertised that he would speak about Pottergate.

When we last left the discussion of District Administration magazine, they had published an article by former Boston schools' superintendent, Tom Payzant, about how urban superintendents are not being given a long enough tenure to see real results.  Professor Payzant used our district as an example and wrote a revisionist history of Dr. Goodloe-Johnson's stay here in Seattle.  (And mind you, there are more than a few Board members who agreed that the article was off the mark.  They, too, do not want to see themselves painted as being bullied and weak.)  Charlie and I (and at least a few other readers) wrote to the editor to complain.  One of our main complaints was that Professor Payzant did not disclose in his article that (1) he knows Dr. Goodloe-Johnson, (2) was brought out to conduct her Board evaluation and (3) that he and Dr. Goodloe-Johnson are both professionally affiliated with the Broad Foundation.  That might have given some readers pause had ...

Students Need Stable District Leadership is an article at the website, District Administration, about Dr. Goodloe-Johnson.  It was written by Tom Payzant, a professor "of practice" at Harvard's Graduate School of Education and the former head of Boston Public Schools and he is apparently someone who likes to talk about things he isn't well-versed in or he just likes to leave things out.

The Times has a revealing article about Fred Stephens, former head of Facilities and Silas Potter's enabler/friend/supporter.  I was wondering when someone in the mainstream media might want to examine his record.  The Times does a fairly good job but does miss/leave out a few parts. For me, it jogs my memory back to several Board meetings.  (I keep most of the Board agenda's at meetings where I have spoken and so I can recall testimony from other speakers.)  The article starts off with African-American activists wanting more access/opportunities to bid on SPS construction contracts.

This morning I attended the joint press conference between City representatives and district representatives who announced that the district will now be using Seattle's Ethics and Elections Commission (SEEC) services for complaints of violations of SPS ethics policy as well as retaliation complaints for those who do speak out. Good lineup;  for the City, the Mayor, Tim Burgess, Wayne Barnett, Executive Director of SEEC, Robert Mahon, SEEC Chair.  For the district, Susan Enfield, Noel Treat and Steve Sundquist.   There were folks from all the tv stations as well as print/radio reporters.   The two state auditors assigned to SPS were also there. There were brief remarks from Enfield, the Mayor, Burgess and Sundquist.   Enfield stated that the City had "expert" services and their program is highly regarded.  She said it was not all they were doing to restore accountability but that it was a "keystone" step.   Sundquist said that th...

Part two of KUOW's series on the Pottergate backstory aired this morning.  Again, just riveting.   And again, you can read the transcript but the audio is better. More backstory in case you missed it is that one of the central early warnings was not just the Sutor Report but that the Daily Journal of Commerce, two years ago, was courted by the district itself to do a story on the Small Business Works.  In doing work for the story, the reporter had found out about the Sutor Report.  That, of course, changed the story. In the story, Lee Newgent, the Executive Secretary of the Seattle Building and Construction Trades Council, raised several issues among them: "Giving out work to construction firms that didn't have construction licenses, wage violations, not doing any criminal background checks [or] fingerprinting of their employees while working with children."   He also stated that somewhere down the line " there are going to be criminal indic...

Want to know the number one asked question about the financial scandal?  Why was this program created at SPS? KUOW had a superlative report by Phyllis Fletcher giving a great backstory complete with Board meeting audio plus historic background on Seattle minority businesses.   It fills in a lot of gaps in the story. There's a transcript at KUOW but honestly, it is much better to listen to and hear some familiar voices praising Silas. What is jaw-dropping to me is this at a Board meeting in 2008: Potter admitted to the board that he lobbied a state legislator to change a law that would let him expand his program. Potter: " I kinda sorta didn't let the school board know when I did it. So you guys have to forgive me for it." They did. But his lobbying was a violation of district policy. Potter didn't say that outright. His lobbying was successful. He got to give contracts to bigger companies as a result. Here was an SPS employee standing before the Board...

Apparently MGJ released a statement to the press and I've seen it on the local news. Here's the link to the statement at KIRO-tv. I won't print it all here but basically: thank you to the Board " I regret that my tenure in Seattle ended during the time of the questions and concerns that were legitimately raised about the Regional Small Business Development Program." Elsewhere she says, "In the case of the small business program, I am angry that any school district employee would abuse a program and taxpayer funds in this way. I had absolutely no involvement in this appalling abuse of the public’s trust. Neither the state auditor’s investigation nor the independent counsel investigation authorized by the school board found that I was in any way involved in these actions." She goes on to say that she is " ultimately responsible " for what happened in the district. Regardless, this situation happened on my watch as superintendent. For...

Here's the latest in the Pottergate saga from the Seattle PI. Thanks to connections in SPS I had a heads up on this but had not seen the details. (I know this information was also given to the Times but the PI seems to have beaten them to the first release of the story.) It doesn't look good for yet another couple of Board members, this time Steve Sundquist and Harium Martin-Morris. From the PI story: Two Seattle school board members were warned in late 2008 that a contractor hired by Silas Potter was unlicensed, paying below-market wages and not following safety rules on construction sites at two elementary schools, according to e-mails between the school board and union officials The contractor, Solar West Office Solutions, was investigated by the state Department of Labor and Industries, which ordered the company to pay $57,000 in back wages. However, the school district wound up footing the bill because Solar West's owner, Keith Battle, could not be locat...

High atop his tower (probably on Mount Doom) Gary Ikeda, former head counsel at SPS, is NOW going to speak to the Board's investigator. Somehow he remembered his law school training and realized he could speak if he got a client(the Board)/attorney privilege waiver. This story was in the Seattle Times. District lead counsel Noel Treat said this: Treat, in a reply e-mail, advised Ikeda to "please cooperate fully and answer any questions" of the investigator, Seattle attorney Patricia Eakes. On Friday, Treat told Ikeda that because Eakes is legal counsel working for the school district, no waiver of the attorney-client privilege is necessary for him to cooperate. "To the extent you believe otherwise, please consider this a waiver to the extent necessary for you to be interviewed," Treat wrote in his e-mail, telling Ikeda that Eakes would contact him next week. What Gary thought: "However, I do think clarification is necessary as to the issue of my n...

Being away from the action (and doing some amount of long distance driving), I've had time to ponder Maria Goodloe-Johnson and her actions (or inaction as the case may be) in the last week. The Story of the Lost Integrity (or Did I Ever Have It in the First Place)? Once upon a time you're hired for a leadership position. You're hired to come in and make big changes where everyone, from top to bottom, is accountable. You even have a phrase created and put it at the bottom of every single business sheet of paper. Something like "Every student achieving, everyone accountable." You come in and turn this way and that and create a great deal of churn that looks like action but when the foam dies down? Not so much. Years pass. Suddently, you are told that an investigation is occurring around a program under your leadership. Wait, make that two investigations. Must be serious, right? You talk to the investigators but for the life of you just don't remember m...

Yes, it's going to be Open Thread tonight. Be our eyes and ears at the School Board meeting for those who can't go or watch. They don't take shots of the audience so if you recognize any of the usual suspects, let us know. I want impressions, details and your thoughts. (If you go see Wendy Kopp, let us know how that goes as well.)

As other readers have shared, Mr. Potter has opened up. From what we have learned about his dealings and his personality, nothing is very surprising. In the Times' story , he says he believes he is being " thrown under the bus ." Silas, all of you are more like rats off a sinking ship. This is rapidly turning into "he said, he said, he said" with Dr. Goodloe-Johnson sitting in the corner speaking no evil, seeing no evil and hearing no evil. He's still in Tampa (has been since September) and: No law-enforcement officials have contacted him, and he said he would cooperate with them. Potter said he's ready for any fallout, even if he gets arrested. "If I have to serve time, OK," he said. From your lips to the King County prosecutor's ears, Silas. I'm hoping the King County prosecutor is giving the Times a ring today for his location. Also, he talks about himself in the third person. Shades of Bob Dole. About who is really at fa...

The stories are flying fast and furious. The Seattle Times has a story about the coming ouster of the Superintendent and COO. A couple of choice quotes: "It's a sad situation," DeBell said after the meeting. "Maria is a good person. Don Kennedy is a good person. "But when they have that much responsibility, they have to be held accountable." Asked if she let him down, as one of the School Board members who had hired her, DeBell said that "lax management and lax oversight let the city down." So wait, does that mean he believes the Board was lax? Again, this isn't about likability or if someone is good. It's about skills, ethics and vision. I believe MGJ has the skills to be a good superintendent but not the ethics or vision. She made bad choices in the name of her vision and was trying to marginalize the Board and consolidate power since the day she got here. Maybe for legal reasons DeBell couldn't say outright - "...

Interesting piece from Crosscut about what they would tell the Board. David Brewster has a 6-point plan. Some of it is fine, one point is a "no and hell no" and the last one just made me smile. Here would be my suggestions for a deeper surgery: 1. Continue Susan Enfield in her role as chief academic officer. She is doing a good job and is not implicated in the scandals, but she does not have the financial experience to be full superintendent, at least for now. Me: I'm not sure I agree in total but maybe it would have been better to get an outside person. If Dr. Enfield stays on permanently, she might not be as tough as an outsider interim. 2. Name as interim superintendent a highly respected figure in town, with strong management experience, to spend a year or so in rooting out incompetence, creating robust accountability and reporting structures, and finally getting to the root of all the financial flubs. This should be someone along the lines of Jim Sine...

Here's one other piece of this puzzle of a crisis - the tracking of the Sutor Group report. Back in early 2009, district communications, for whatever reason, had been talking up the Small Business Works program. The Daily Journal of Commerce decided to do a piece on it. But the reporter wasn't going to just do some fluff piece "look at this great program" based on what the district PR put out. He had done a public disclosure request and got the Sutor Group report. Apparently, he called the district with questions and word went out to upper administration from Communications; the Daily Journal of Commerce had the Sutor Group report and may call about findings. All calls were to be referred to Communications. Now MGJ put this in her daily Friday updates to the Board. Why no one on the Board thought, "What is this report and why does it have actions and responses that a reporter would call about?" The Board did not receive the Sutor Group report and w...

Ah, so the plot thickens. A reader alerted us to a story in the Seattle PI online about lobbying that Silas Potter did at the State Legislature for more leeway in running business development programs. In the Auditor's work documents, it notes a couple of times that Potter had been told not to go to the Legislature and lobby (but he apparently didn't stop). As well, a former legislator, Velma Veloria, was paid by his office to lobby as well (even though lobbying for the district is strictly limited and must go through Legal and neither person did). Apparently there was little opposition to the bill (which passed) but: Larry Stevens of the Mechanical Contractors of Western Washington and National Electrical Contractors Association, testified on March 15, 2007 that he was concerned about a lack of oversight. "There needs to be some parameters around it. This bill...is a little too wide open," he said. "It just throws it open....there are no public works pol...

I actually don't have time to get into this in depth but let me explain what I know about how this idea about outreach to small businesses that are minority/woman-owned. (I will try to flesh this out more later or, hopefully, some media-type will do it.) This started with an idea from former School Board member Mary Bass. It became a policy (but again, I don't have the policy number or date in front of me). What I understood it to be was merely a way to say to those smaller companies, "Here is a staff person you can call with questions. He/She can help guide you through the process." In addition, I think they were probably going to make a small brochure with tips and maybe have a couple of classes a year on doing business with SPS.This work would be part of one person's job in capital. That's it. No roster of classes, no roster of instructors, no personal service contracts so that prominent people in the community could do outreach. Just a way to bro...

This is late but if you want to be on speakers list for this week's School Board meeting, call the Board office tomorrow morning starting at 8 a.m. at 252-0040 or e-mail boardagenda@seattleschools.org. Calendar This Week Monday Curriculum and Instruction Policy Committee - 4:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m. Tuesday Executive Session from 4-6 p.m. (not for the public but I'd love to be a fly on the wall) and (oh no) Diversity Speaker Series: Dr. Barbara J. Love "Bending the Arc of the Universe; How Young People Change the World - 6-8 p.m. at the Stanford Center Wednesday Board Meeting from 6-9 p.m. I hope the room is full of watchful eyes and ears. I don't think going down there with pitchforks and burning torches will help. I think good signage can send a message. Thursday Another Executive Session - this one is labeled " complaint against public employee " and reading that I can only ask, "Only one"? As I mentioned there are no community meetings for Saturda...