"non-material irregularities"
* see item H-01 in agenda for May 27 Board Meeting. This is regarding an almost 7 million dollar bid for school construction. Blog readers want to know.
-H. PLANNING AND FACILITIES DISCUSSION ITEMS
H-01.* Waive non-material irregularities in bids submitted by R.C. Construction Services, Inc., (“R.C.”) and Rudolph and Sletten, Inc., and approve contract for Project 1 at National City Middle School. (F/I: $6,998,000, Prop O.)
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Learn More about Prop 59 & Why that Calendar should be made PUBLIC
http://www.rcfp.org/ogg/item.php?t=short&state=CA&level=F1
California's Constitutional Sunshine Amendment: On November 2, 2004, California voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 59, an amendment to California's Constitution that elevated the public's right of access to public records and public meetings to constitutional stature. That amendment, set forth in Article I, Section 3(b) of the California Constitution, and commonly called the Sunshine Amendment, declares: "The people have the right of access to information concerning the conduct of the people's business, and, therefore, the meetings of public bodies and the writings of public officials and agencies shall be open to public scrutiny." Cal. Const. Art. I, § 3(b);
The rest of this will be posted in the comments section. It is long. It is time to learn about the Brown Act.
Another useful link:
http://community.pacificlegal.org/Page.aspx?pid=183
California's Constitutional Sunshine Amendment: On November 2, 2004, California voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 59, an amendment to California's Constitution that elevated the public's right of access to public records and public meetings to constitutional stature. That amendment, set forth in Article I, Section 3(b) of the California Constitution, and commonly called the Sunshine Amendment, declares: "The people have the right of access to information concerning the conduct of the people's business, and, therefore, the meetings of public bodies and the writings of public officials and agencies shall be open to public scrutiny." Cal. Const. Art. I, § 3(b);
The rest of this will be posted in the comments section. It is long. It is time to learn about the Brown Act.
Another useful link:
http://community.pacificlegal.org/Page.aspx?pid=183
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
STAR NEWS: Saturday May 22: Calendar Conundrum
The STAR-NEWS cannot be accessed on-line. The article is posted here for all who had no opportunity to locate one of the 32,000 copies available.
Publisher: Linda Rosas | Editor: Carlos R. Davalos
The Star-News, with all its associated publications, provides coverage of the South County. 32,000 copies are published every Friday and distributed throughout Chula Vista, National City, Bonita and EastLake. The Star-News is an officially adjudicated newspaper with general circulation for the cities of Chula Vista and National City.
Serving the communities of Chula Vista and National City
Vol. 128 No. 21 May 22, 2009 SINCE 1882
Front page: Weekly Newsline:
Local News
SECRET MEETINGS
SUPERINTENDENT DRAWS IRE FOR NOT RELEASING CALENDAR, p. 3
By Jon Campbell STAFF WRITER
Employees of the Sweetwater Union High School District are speaking out against Superintendent Jesus Gandara, accusing him of overspending and secrecy.
Lawyers for the district have refused to make public Gandara’s appointment calendar, and some employees are raising questions about expenses charged on his district credit card.
The complaints come after a petition drive that compiled 2,000 signatures of employees in the district who had lost confidence in the superintendent.
Lauren McLennan, a teacher at Mar Vista High School, said she questioned whether Gandara should be receiving perquisites at a time of economic hardship.
On top of his $240,000 annual salary, Gandara receives $800 per month for things like meals and other expenses incurred while doing district business, an additional $750 car allowance.
Gandara released and accounting of charges put on his district credit card from June 2007 through February 2009.
McLennan said that she questioned whether all of the expenses claimed by Gandara were legitimate, and that the refusal to release his daily appointment schedule made her suspicious.
“If we are truly in an economic crisis, funds need to be directed to the classroom and nowhere else…But if he is conducting school business (when he makes these purchases) and there are no problems, then why doesn’t he just give up the calendar?” McLennan said.
Some of the purchases that employees are questioning are items like a $5 charge at Mom’s Pie House in Julian, and meal expenses that in some cases top $100 per day.
While some months included airfare charges, the district released a travel log that showed all travel expenses were for district related trips.
Gandara said that he never uses his district credit card for any personal purchases, and said the meals listed on the credit card statements were all for working lunches.
In some cases, the purchases at area restaurants like Romesco’s topped $70.
Gandara provided verbal accounts to The Star-News and provided some documentation of the charges he was questioned about. He requested more time to verify others.
Gandara said he thought it was unfairto single out certain purchases as being inappropriate , saying his contract granted him broad discretion with how he used his expense account.
Referring to the charge at Mom’s Pie House, which he made while on his way to a conference in Borrego Springs, he said he thought people were out to make an issue out of nothing.
Every district employee receives $38 a day for meals and expenses when they travel for business, and they are free to spend it as they wish.
“The fact that I had coffee and pie in Julian speaks about my eating habits, but it doesn’t speak about me wasting money in the district.” Said Gandara.
He said he uses his credit card for virtually all purchases that he plans to submit to the district, as a way of ensuring transparency.
The refusal to release Gandara’s calendar came after a district employee requested a copy under the auspices of the California Public Records Act.
That law mandates that most documents created by public agencies are open to public review with certain specific exemptions.
In a letter dated March 31, the district denied the employee’s request, claiming that the public interest in keeping Gandara’s calendar confidential outweighed the benefit of releasing it.
A separate request by The Star-News was also denied a by school district attorneys for the same reason.
In a May 19 interview, Gandara offered to release a redacted version of the calendar, but requested a few days to get the materials together.
Gandara’s office first received the newspaper’s request for his calendar on May 7 and replied in a letter dated May 14.
Gandara said that when he refused to release the records he was acting on advice from a school district attorney.
Gandara said Bonificio Garcia told him that whom he meets with should be kept confidential.
Bonafacio did not return calls to The Star-News.
“The attorney has advised against that (release of the calendar)…People come to me at the times in the strictest of confidence, and if people get to look at the calendar then it might discourage them from doing that. And that’s case law, a California court found that to be the case,” said Gandara.
President of the California First Amendment Coalition Peter Scheer said that Gandara’s position was a misinterpretation of California law.
Regardless of whether some of Gandara’s appointments may be properly withheld, the law is clear that blanket exemption cannot be imposed on every entry in the log, Scheer said.
“The superintendent cannot withhold all of the calendar entries categorically. He has to go through each one” and determine which entries are necessary to withhold, he said.
Scheer said the law is intended to protect high level executives, like a governor, to ensure they have access to confidential advice, and noted that even at that level, many officials in California have begun voluntarily releasing their own calendars.
“Governor Schwarzenegger, the mayor of Los Angeles, San Francisco, the list of heavy hitter politicians who have (released their calendars) is getting longer, and it makes it more and more silly for government officials who are much lower on the food chain (to refuse),” Scheer said.
In other school districts, requests for public documents have not been met with resistance.
Superintendent of Chula Vista Elementary School District Lowell Billings agreed to release his calendar.
Also, staff members at National School District said Superintendent Dennis Doyle would also release his appointment calendar.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
1300 ? Did not unions report 2K?
http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/may/23/1sz23gandara183431-displeased-employees-want-super/?southcounty&zIndex=104130
Displeased employees want superintendent fired
1,300 sign petition to oust Gandara
2:00 a.m. May 23, 2009
CHULA VISTA — More than 1,300 employees in the Sweetwater Union High School District have signed a petition calling for the superintendent to be fired.
The signatures are the most concrete expression of discontent with Superintendent Jesus Gandara that has persisted throughout the spring as the district struggles with budget cuts and personnel reassignments.
There are about 6,000 employees in the district.
In March, the district put 109 educators on notice that they faced the loss of their jobs due to budget cuts. The district later rescinded all the notices. In negotiations with the teachers union, the district proposed a 2 percent pay cut for teachers. That, too, was retracted once the district was informed that it would soon receive $12.4 million in federal stimulus money.
Gandara also demoted several longtime and popular administrators as part of a larger plan to reorganize the leadership of the 42,000-student district. Karen Janney, the second-highest ranking academic administrator in the district and a former state principal of the year, refused to accept her new assignment and has left the district.
The petition calls for Sweetwater's five-member board of trustees “to immediately begin the process of seeking a new superintendent.”
The petition accuses Gandara of using intimidation to gain consent. Employees from all over the district signed even amid what some employees privately call a climate of fear. They say employees believe they'll suffer retaliation if they disagree with Gandara.
When the petition started circulating, board President Jim Cartmill issued a statement that called the petition “nothing more than a political tactic being used during difficult contract negotiations.”
Union leaders who organized the petition drive turned in the signatures at a board meeting this month.
Chris Moran: (619) 498-6637; chris.moran@uniontrib.com
Chris Moran: (619) 498-6637
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