JeffCo school board decision draws questions re:transparency

The process to choose a new superintendent for Jeffco Public Schools is underway. Members of the Jefferson County Board of Education have hired Ray and Associates, Inc. to lead that work. Representatives of CESC are encouraged to participate in the process by attending a meeting with a representative from Ray and Associates, Inc. from 8:00 – 9:00 on Tuesday, March 18 in Conference Room 3A-3B at the Education Center. During the meeting, CESC members will be provided information about the search process and the timeline. There will also be dialogue to discuss qualities participants would like to see in the next superintendent.

Input can also be given by completing a confidential online survey or attending an open community meeting forum (see dates, times, and locations below.) The survey asks what qualities one thinks is most important in the selection of a superintendent. The survey link is: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/23VNLYW

Open Community Forums:

Tuesday, March 18
Education Center Board Room, 5th Floor – 9-10 a.m.
Alameda International High School auditorium - 7-8 p.m.
Conifer High School auditorium – 7-8 p.m.
Wednesday, March 19
Education Center Board Room, 5th Floor – 9-10 a.m.
Dakota Ridge High School auditorium – 7-8 p.m.
Arvada West High School auditorium – 7-8 p.m.

The JeffCo school board will be giving district staff budget directions in tonight's board study session, tonight at 6pm. We hope this includes funding equity for JeffCo charter students. Please attend this evening at the District HQ board room.

Witt, Newkirk, and Williams have now directly cost the District almost $1 million dollars it did not have budgeted for this year. They have done this in less than four months. Please see our blog page The Current Price of WNW+Miller for a detailed breakdown.

WNW are wanting to reduce the Reserve Fund by $7.5 million dollars, giving a lot of it charter schools. As was noted in the letter from Kelly Johnson (“Broken Promise?“), this would violate a promise made by the District Board in 2012 to the taxpayers of JeffCo on how the revenue from 3A/3B would be spent.

Last night, the Jeffco school board majority voted to:
• CUT over $4 million dollars from EMPLOYEE SALARY INCREASES
• Transfer $3.7 million of mill funding to charters next year, to be $7.4 the year after (even though charters did not support nor work for 3A/3B)
• REFUSED to spend a measly $600,000 for 13 additional free full day kindergarten classrooms that would have impacted the lives of almost 500 low-income children (reasoning that there is no data to support full day kindergarten for poor kids as being helpful… in spite of the fact that there is a plethora of national data stating so!)

JCEA MEMBERS & THE JEFFCO COMMUNITY MUST TAKE A STAND! Please attend this Monday night’s bargaining session at the Ed Center, 4 pm (GO IMMEDIATELY AFTER SCHOOL); BE THERE EARLY!!! REPOST this to your FB page; and check your home emails this weekend for further detailed information!!

**EdNote** The board room was standing room only, the overflow room at the Education Center was overflowing and people were standing in the lobby outside the boardroom hoping to get a seat. Probably more than 400 people. Perhaps, for the time being, while attendance is so high it would be wise for the board to hold all their meetings at a centrally located high school’s auditorium, like Lakewood High School. **EdNote**

Then began what should have been 45 minutes of public comment but Witt let it go on for more than 2 hours.

The 5:30 pm Study Session started on time but set the stage for a very long and wearisome night. Bill Newman of Ray and Associates presented information on the superintendent search community forums and survey results.

Study Session

1.02 Superintendent Search Update: Bill Newman of Ray & Associates – the firm heading up the district’s superintendent search – presented on the themes from the stakeholder forums that were held last month. You can see their report at here. Page 4 is interesting in that you can see what the different groups’ priorities are, including the BOE.

In this video, Ken Witt appears to apply different rules to public comment depending on the topic the public is commenting on.

In this video, despite clear direction from the community budget survey, Ken Witt opposes a slight expansion of free full-day kindergarten to schools with a free and reduced lunch population (a measure of poverty) of 35% or more. The cost to the district would be ~$600,000 annually, or about 0.09% of the proposed 14-15 budget. Also Julie Williams and John Newkirk are corrected about some mis-conceptions they have about kindergarten.

Take a look at the newest invoice from the attorney hired by the Board of Education to serve only the Board of Education without a public and transparent discussion by the entire Board.

This month, the taxpayers received a discount of $10,107.00, which also doesn’t match the contract terms.

Again, the information as to what this attorney is doing (services appear to be occurring nearly every day of the month again), has been redacted under the claim of “Confidential attorney-client privileged information.”

<snip> ...we have a hard time believing that confidential legal advice is given to this board in an invoice nearly every day within a one month period.

It really is past time for the public discussion of the hiring of this attorney and what specifically this attorney is doing for the board of education.

Support Jeffco Kids has shown you the redacted invoices received via CORA request for the Law Offices of Brad Miller.

Out of curiosity, we also have submitted a CORA and received the invoices of Caplan and Ernest (we’ll go more into detail regarding this subject in another post.)

Caplan and Ernest Invoices

We were quite surprised to see invoices with no information redacted at all – not even the names of individuals were redacted.

There has been a lot of consternation in Jefferson County about the agenda of the new majority on the school board, much of it rooted in uncertainty over the board's direction.

Recently, one priority has begun to take shape — equity in charter school funding — and we like how it looks.

The children who attend charter schools deserve the same degree of taxpayer support as those who attend district-run public schools. Charters are public schools, too, though they have different governance structures.