The Shell Game

If you saw the Common Council meeting on Monday night or read today's Everett Independent, you know that people are all abuzz about the revelation by City Auditor Skip Coppola that the School Department has been maintaining a discretionary "reserve" fund through Shore Collaborative that has been used to pay for certain expenditures made by the School Department in order to avoid these invoices going through the prescribed approval process in the city. The Everett Independent is taking the view that Mr. Coppola is operating as the Mayor's henchman, trying to make the Superintendent look bad, and attempting to use it as a "red herring" in order to avoid fulfilling an agreement the City made with the School Department to fund teacher raises this year.

We take a different view.

While we believe that the timing of Mr. Coppola's revelation was ill-advised, it's important to look at the bigger picture and examine the hard numbers. The money paid by the City of Everett to Shore Collaborative is there for the purposes of providing special education services to the children in the Everett Public Schools who need them, and for the purpose of obtaining federal reimbursement money. According to Mr. Coppola, overpayments and rental fees were placed into a reserve fund, to be used at the discretion of the school department, instead of being returned to the city of Everett. Looking at the numbers -- numbers, by the way, that were provided to Mr. Coppola by Shore Collaborative -- there were significant funds paid out for services that one would be hard pressed to justify as special education expenses.

One of these "services" was payments made to the three local newspapers. The Independent states that the "mayor's underling" tried to blame the "slush fund on money Foresteire needs to pay for advertising that the school department buys in Everett's three newspapers. "Our name got tossed in that bad mix, except we don't receive a fraction of what the other two newspapers receive -- and they don't receive enough to make a difference in paying teachers' raises, " stated the Independent. The Independent, and others with this mindset, don't seem to want to acknowledge that 1) the total spent over two years from the reserve fund on items apparently unrelated to special education was more than $200,000, an amount which can impact both teacher salaries and educational services; 2) yes, there were funds used from this reserve account to pay the three local newspapers and 3) the amount each paper received is not the issue -- the issue is this: were monies that were earmarked for special education services used for other purposes? Looking at the numbers, any "fair minded and clear thinking" person would have to say yes. In fiscal year '03, Shore Collaborative paid out $34,389 to the three local newspapers. The Independent is correct when it says that they don't receive a fraction of what the other two papers receive -- but does any clear thinking person believe that $34,389 worth of advertising in the three local papers was related to special education? The expenditures in fiscal '04 were $18, 190 -- significantly lower than the previous year but still substantial enough to beg the question; how much of these expeditures was special ed related? The most notable "advertising" appearing in the three papers related to the schools at any given time is generally for football, followed by the activities of the band, followed by the publicizing of the academic achievements of the students. Where in that mix does special education fall that it would justify a $52,579 expenditure over two years?

The second notable expenditure is money paid toward expenses for the Homecoming Parade in '02 and '03. In fiscal year '03 (which would cover the October 2002 Homecoming Parade), Shore Collaborative paid out $15,150 that was categorized as Homecoming/Parade. In fiscal year '04 (covering the October 2003 Homecoming Parade), the amount was $21,550. Where is the benefit to the special education program in the Homecoming Parade? Don't get us wrong -- the Homecoming Parade has been a great tradition in recent years, and we missed it in 2004 -- but money that is supposed to provide services for special education students (because it is, after all, "about the the kids") should be used to provide those services, not to provide a high-priced cheerleading session for the high school football team.

The School Department has been playing a shell game with these monies, and while someone may -- and we emphasize may -- be able to make the case that what they're doing is not "illegal", it will be much more difficult to justify whether it is ethical. And while some people may believe that these most recent revelations are politically motivated, that does not take away from the fact that these are serious allegations with not insignificant evidence as to their veracity, and the situation should be fully investigated.