Seattle Schools Community Forum

When a vendor for the District has overbilled the District they can be subject to debarment - the District will refuse to do business with them in future. As a result of the scandal around the Small Works roster program and the state auditor's office investigation into the potential loss of public funds, a number of cases for debarment arose. Here is a district memo summarizing the status of those debarred. You will note that the debarment of the Urban League has expired. It ran for 18 months from September 2011 to March 2013. I was troubled when Micheal Tolley contracted with the Urban League to provide mentoring to "at-risk" youth AFTER the Pottergate scandal broke. I was particularly troubled when the SAO reported that, once again, their invoices lacked sufficient detail. Yet the District is ready to do business with them again. Astonishing.

Here's are some notes from the press conference and follow-ups from it.

This Accountability Audit Report by the State Auditor was better than the one in February if you are only looking at money.  But yes, money was once again lost and while the amounts are smaller than in February, it still damning and painful.

Publicola did some digging and found that the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) had a contract with the Urban League (who also had contracts with SPS).    From the article : In response to a public disclosure request, WSDOT revealed that it has contracted out support for disadvantaged and minority businesses through the Regional Small Business Development Program (RSBDP), the Seattle Public Schools division headed up by program manager Silas Potter, the man in charge of the SPS program at the center of the $1.8 million scandal, as first reported by the Seattle Times. According to quarterly and annual reports on WSDOT’s Support Services for Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBEs), Potter’s RSBDP offered business competitiveness courses to companies with the goal of helping them bid more successfully for WSDOT contracts. The low level of DBE attendance and the lack of any growth in enrollment at RSBDP classes suggests a similar pattern to that d...

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 - "...