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HOLDEN, Mass. — The Wachusett Regional School Committee's Budget and Finance Subcommittee is moving forward on the drafting of a request for proposals (RFP) for the initial phase of a forensic audit, though members of the audit advisory board hope to narrow its focus.
Early in August, the school committee voted to develop an RFP for an independent stage I forensic audit to get to the bottom of errors made by Business Manager Peter Brennan that resulted in an over-expenditure of about $1.2 million for the 2012 fiscal year and an additional $1.4 million shortfall in employee benefits and insurance for 2013. The cost of the first stage audit would be capped at $50,000.
The district's auditors, Powers and Sullivan, completed field work on their own audit last week, and are in the process of compiling a report.
Though School Committee members presented an early draft of the RFP Thursday night, members of the audit advisory board were hesitant to see it go forward as broadly as drafted and repeat work being done by Powers and Sullivan.
Phil Mighdoll, board member from Princeton, said that a lot of what was in the RFP was a "replay of what Powers and Sullivan is doing." He said using the word "forensic" for the audit suggests something criminal was done.
"In my opinion, what we really need to do is something called a management process assessment," he said, which would look at the checks and balances and operations of the school's business office and school committee.
Board member Richard Carr, of Holden, said that while he understood the need to restore trust in the school committee, he said that unless there was something that led the school committee to believe there was criminal activity, such as missing money not as the result of an accounting error, "this is almost a witch hunt."
Brian Quinlivan, of Rutland, said he believed the forensic audit was a waste of money.
"We've decided to spend money on what we already know happened to build trust in the community, so my daughter is going to go without oil paint in her art class so we can build trust for the committee," he said. "If we want to spend money to review our entire accounting process, and come up with one that's going to be more efficient and less likely to make errors, then that's maybe where we should be going."
District human resources director Susan Sullivan said the Massachusetts Association Of School Business Officials has offered to do a review of the district's controls and procedures.
Audit School Committee member Julie Kelley said the community has asked loudly and strongly for a forensic audit and that the first stage would be directed at "the problems as we know them," with the findings to determine if a next phase would be necessary.
Committee member Michelle Sciabarassi, of Princeton, emphasized the motivation was to get to the absolute truth of the matter, have everyone understand it, and to make changes.
"We're all responsible for this budget," she said. "It's an $80 million investment, and I think $50,000 to clear the air is a very small amount."
To further guide the focus of the RFP, the subcommittee agreed to reconvene for a presentation of Powers and Sullivan's report and look at an RFP used by the Nashoba School District when it conducted a forensic audit 12 years ago.
Comments (70)
Good old Deminimus Maximus, she keeps fanning the flames with talk incompetence, ‘forensic audits’, corruption, conspiracies and witch hunts (her words not ours).
It almost seems like she wants to keep the heat on those responsible for making more than $3 Million in disastrous budget mistakes. Could she possibly be a double agent? Someone actually working to fix the school committee's continuing problems not just sweep them under the rug again? Way to go Maximus.
Yes, Mr. Pandiscio should be held accountable for his mistakes and yes the school committee should accept his resignation but in fairness the case of the mayor involved in the other $1.5 Million mismanaged public funds situation probably involves fraud or malfeasance of some sort.
I have followed the latest $3+ Million WRSD mistakes closely and I do NOT believe Mr. Pandiscio or Mr. Brennan are guilty of fraud or malfeasance in any way, shape, manner or form. These were mistakes. Very serious mistakes but mistakes.
This is the most disingenuous post you have ever written. You light a fire, call over and over again for multiple resignations, whip the public into a white-hot frenzy, then when folks start demanding the equivalent of public whippings, you bail: Who me? I never said crimes were committed.
Maybe not, but you birthed and aided and abetted and fomented and incited the notion that the district is a morass of incompetance and corruption. You never stop bashing and never correct your inaccuracies.
And now that some members of the public have followed you over the cliff, screaming for heads and voicing charges that may be libelous, you step back like Pontius Pilate and wash your hands.
How brave.
Yesterday or day before there was a new story about a public official (I think he was a mayor) in some MA town who is being proscuted for mis -managed public funds amounting to 1.5 million dollars. They are conducting a forensic audit and the DA is stating that criminal charges may be applied because this person was the administrator of public funds and therefore the person responsible . So what is the difference we have a public employee entrusted to manage public funds and bottom line is those funds were mis mananged ( who cares why) and now people want to overlook this error - well each of us owns a piece of that money and my vote for my piece is to fire him and find a person who will be more responsible with my money.
Who wants to overlook the error? No one. Is a forensic audit the right tool? The Audit Advisory Board is asking. One more time -- no one said to overlook the error.
How can you say in the same paragraph that someone should be prosecuted, funds were mismanaged and who cares why?
The person who made the error WAS fired. The superintendent resigned. Whose head do you want now?
Yours maybe?
You must not even care that you sound like a schoolyard bully.
Yup.
Yesterday or day before there was a new story about a public official (I think he was a mayor) in some MA town who is being proscuted for mis -managed public funds amounting to 1.5 million dollars. They are conducting a forensic audit and the DA is stating that criminal charges may be applied because this person was the administrator of public funds and therefore the person responsible . So what is the difference we have a public employee entrusted to manage public funds and bottom line is those funds were mis mananged ( who cares why) and now people want to voerlook this error - well each of us owns a piece of that money and my vote for my piece is to fire him and find a person who will be more responsible with my money.
Exactly!!
Something To help us understand:
fo·ren·sic /fəˈrɛnsɪk/ Show Spelled[fuh-ren-sik] Show IPA
adjective
1. pertaining to, connected with, or used in courts of law or public discussion and debate.
2. adapted or suited to argumentation; rhetorical.
By itself, the adjective forensic connnotes not much. It sounds neutral and kind of scientific and CSI-ish; the words in joedell's definition are as cold and colorless as can be, mechanical, unbiased.
Then place the word audit after forensic. Connotation? Fraud, wrongdoing, criminality are suspected. The bland definition cited by joedell is disarming but it is not the way the phrase "forensic audit" is being understood in this discussion.
The defanged definition above helps us understand nothing. The Audit Advisory Board certainly recognized the implications of the phrase forensic audit. We may want to go ahead with this but we must realize that what we are doing is deadly serious and may have consequences beyond what we can now imagine.
Maximus you are absolutely right, I cut and pasted right out of the dictionary. Now as to connotation why do you suppose that is? Now as to deadly serious and consequences again you are spot on. I too believe that there are things here beyond our imaginations.
Max, at what point do we draw the line to an investigation or documentation of facts and say, "There may be things here beyond our imagination, so we better not go there?" If journalists had that approach, then there would have been little or no reporting about Hitler (and there wasn't for awhile) or mass genocide in Rwanda or most recently, human rights violations against children in Ireland, and the many other atrocities that have been committed throughout history. Human nature is not always lily white. If law enforcement had the blinders approach, then mass murderers might not get investigated or caught and might continue in their violations of others. Lt. Col. Foley can tell you all about that. If judges had that approach, then abuses against neighbors, spouses, and children would be allowed to continue. We have a democratic system that supports that all men are created equal. All races, religions, and sexes have equal rights. Part of those rights are to know the truth about how our tax dollars - individually and collectively - are being used. There should be no sovereign immunity for any category of Americans, whether administrators, politicians, military, or others. It would appear that we are not going to be told about how the 1.2 million was used or designated until a forensic takes place. As far as I can tell, there has been no disclosure, and the people did not vote for that money to be used. That is a violation of law. If there is no legitimate disclosure, then we enter the realm of potential fraud. This is how investigations are performed. If there is any appearance that a crime has been committed against others, it becomes the responsibility of law enforcement to rule it out or verify it. It's how our democratic system works. We all have the right to know how our tax dollars that have not been officially authorized were used. Otherwise it is taxation without representation to some degree.
I didn't say draw the line to an investigation. I didn't say we better not go there. At least debate me on what I actually said. I was talking about the connotations of the phrase forensic audit.
You claim there has been no disclosure thus far. Really? No one knows how those mistakes happened? The superintendent has not explained? No one has mentioned spreadsheets and columns and precisely where the errors occurred? Whether you choose to believe what has been disclosed is another story, but the nature of the mistakes has been discussed at length.
Knock yourself out with investigations. Have a Nuremburg trial if you like, since we seem to be in apocalyptic world genocide territory or something now. No one said don't investigate. Just that there are tools other than a forensic audit, according to the AAB.
You made my point when you spoke of potential fraud and violation of law. That's what the term forensic audit implies. Defining the benign word forensic is not the same thing as defining forensic audit. That was my one and only point in my post.
How we got to Hitler and Rwanda is a bit of a puzzlement..
That's it. The discussion is over. I am invoking Godwin's Law.
QED.
(But I think you mean Lt. Calley, not Lt. Col. Foley.)
Just so you know:
It is considered poor form to raise such a comparison arbitrarily with the motive of ending the thread. There is a widely recognized corollary that any such ulterior-motive invocation of Godwin's law will be unsuccessful.
VPT also had it right re Col. Foley. Remember Whitey.
Oh, good grief, the Godwin's thing was a joke. And as far as Foley/Calley thing goes, I truly thought that Calley made more sense in the hyped-up context you employ. Whatever.
All the explanations and all the spreadsheets cost us 1.2 million dollars? No they didn,t. What exactly did 1.2 million dollars buy us? What assets or services and from whom did they come? Thats great that the "errors" have been identified. But what you leave out is the fact that the WRSD had a fully funded and approved budget that should have covered all of the expenses for the entire year. So now goods and services that were funded to the tune of 1.2 million dollars were not received because those funds had to be diverted. What were those items? Going forward we survived without them, maybe they can be eliminated in future budgets. So that brings us to the accounts that were overspent. Every single item in the accounts that were overspent needs to be identified-all of them. Receipts and purchase orders need to be revealed in thier entirety. Asset numbers should have been assigned sequentially-what are they. This is not rocket science. This is proper accounting procedure. If this can not be accomplished then we have an extremely clear cut case of malfeasance. dwilliams have fun with Godwins law in front of a judge. Do you get it?
This is what ENRON did on a larger scale. The only difference is they didn't have a money tree (taxpayers} that they could continually harvest.
No, I don't "get it"; Godwin's Law is an internet convention, mentioned in jest (or derision) more than anything else, and inapplicable in a court of law. Had I ever said it was in any way applicable there, you'd be in perfect right to criticize me, but since I never so much as hinted at such a thing, what in the world are you talking about?
But what's even sadder, joedell, is that you demonstrate that you have no idea what you are talking about, while simultaneously proclaim the situation to be a small-scale Enron. Hell's bells, were it that simple, we wouldn't need to spend a dime on any audit--forensic or otherwise--we could just ask you.
You and your running mate, Ms. VPT, are doing nothing but speculating on a subject you clearly know nothing more about than that what your fetile imaginations and fevered hopes of finding impropriety tells you.
I have never accused anyone of being ignorant or not caring about the central issues involved here. I believe that anyone taking the time to post here and express thier opinions deeply cares. I believe you do too. Personal attacks tend to diminish any point that you may try to make so as a matter of course I avoid that at all costs. I also do not single people out when a group is involved. I have also stated that I hoped deliberate wrongdoing is not the case. I think that being cognizant of all the possibilities is prudent and not drawing a conclusion at the outset allows me to weigh all the options and maybe at some point after enough information is gathered then a proper conclusion can be formulated. To do otherwise builds a bias and puts blinders on. You start at a point and list all of the possibilities and slowly as the facts come out your list of possibilities grows smaller until you reach the conclusion. If one stifles the discovery of information the probability of getting to a proper conclusion drops exponentially. This really needs to be concluded so everyone can move forward with whatever corrections or modifications that need to be made. The more information behind the conclusion the better the corrections. I believe that you and I have the same goal and that is to make the WRSD one of the best and most trusted institutions in the State.
I also belive that Mr. Brennan was fired for "job abandonment" not mistakes. Of course me being me, that adds another one of my questions. What would cause someone to walk away from such a good paying job that he had been performing for a good number of years?
It's Lt. Col. Foley, and trust me, it's relevant. More than you might want to know ....
More than I might want to know--right!--'cuz this thing has now taken on the proportions of Whitey Bulger, the Rwandan Genocide, and Adolf Hitler. You're irresponsible, an alarmist, or both.
I was building an argument based on historical context - things we should all be concerned about beyond the confines of the all-important fishbowl Wachusett District, center of the universe, because there are lessons to be learned from what happens in history and beyond our borders. That doesn't make someone an alarmist or irresponsible, it makes them philosophical. Hitler just happened to be the topic that our child brought to the dinner table recently because it was discussed in school, and he had a lot of questions about human nature and how that ever could have happened. And it happened partly because it was not nipped in the bud early on. And I am pondering the same - how did this happen in Wachusett, because I marvel at how Wachusett is still trying to figure out how to run a decent budget 5 years after I left the District when transparency was an issue in 2003 and 2004 and 2005 and 2006. And I marvel at to what lengths people will go to maintain the status quo and ignore the issue, and now look what we have gotten into that could have been avoided a long time ago. Wachusett has money for Smartbooks but not for the Munis System? Sorry, I have a hard time buying that argument.
Yeah, I understand. You were building an argument that the financial mistakes of Peter Brennan must be placed in the historical context of Whitey Bulger, the Rwandan genocide and Adolf Hitler. That was perfectly clear.
That is a misreprsentation of everything VPT and I have just stated. No comparison with those people was being drawn. Every bit of those posts was dedicated to the need to desseminate information. The comparison was about things that have happened as a result of failure to get the information out.
Joe is correct. Dwilliams is just trying to deflect away from the really important issues by personalizing the posts. The issues have to do with transparency, accountability, individual rights, taxpayer rights, and what can happen if we put blinders on. When a society is not alert to how leaders are leading, both can fall into the ditch.
Here's my press release that I sent out to all members of the school committee and other members of the Wachusett District. Note the date. The discovery of a $1.4 million error in the Wachusett District books in 2004, and it being corrected by the DOE, may well have prompted two state auditors and the Inspector General's office to look into transparency issues in the 30 state collaboratives. Sometimes the discovery and investigation of seemingly small errors can lead to bigger discoveries and even changing the system. I wonder how many children suffered by not receiving special education services while the special ed dollars were used for alcohol, parties, and trips to the Kentucky Derby, as was the case in the Merrimack Collaborative. It will be interesting to see how the FLLAC Collaborative did during the same time, if they undergo a similar investigation.
June 23, 2012
Contact: Galloping Hills Publishing
PRESS RELEASE
In January 2012, the Massachusetts House and Senate unanimously passed new legislation to increase oversight and transparency in the network of 30 special education collaboratives that serve over 8,000 special needs children in the state. The bill was approved after an extensive investigation by the Massachusetts Office of the Inspector General and State Auditor that found fraudulent practices in the system that resulted in the loss of millions in taxpayer dollars. http://articles.boston.com/2012-01-25/metro/30659501_1_accounting-practices-board-members-abuses
Inspector General Gregory Sullivan called it “one of the most outrageous abuses this office has ever seen,’’ according to the Boston Globe. “Both of these entities were created to help educate children with special needs. Instead, top officials have been helping themselves to high salaries, inflated pensions, lavish parties, and personal expenses, all on the taxpayer’s dime.’’
The Special Education Collaboratives investigation was opened by former state auditor Joe DeNucci’s office and then transferred to the Offices of State Auditor Suzanne Bump, who worked with the Inspector General’s Office in a lengthy multi-year investigation into accountability and transparency problems in the system, according to the Globe. The agencies uncovered serious systemic problems in the collaboratives network, which was created in 1974. In the Merrimack Special Education Collaborative alone, over $10 million was siphoned out of the system for trips to the Kentucky Derby, alcohol, excessive salaries, and personal gifts, according to the Globe.
Eight years ago, in 2004, a small Central Massachusetts newspaper became aware of the lack of transparency in the collaboratives system after discovering a $1.4 million error on the Department of Education (DOE) website in payments from a school district to its collaborative. The Editor of the Princeton Outlook newspaper brought the error to the attention of the DOE and school district, where it was promptly corrected. The following spring, The Princeton Outlook raised questions with the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office regarding its concerns about school budget transparency issues. The Princeton Outlook was referred to DeNucci’s office, where it raised questions about the lack of accountability and transparency in relation to school district accounting practices, including special education and the collaboratives system. The newspaper then wrote an investigative series of articles on special education in 2006. The newspaper shut down after receiving a threat letter in response to that series. The former Editor of The Princeton Outlook would like to thank state and federal agencies, legislators, and law enforcement officials for the investigation into the special education collaboratives that resulted in the new legislation, which can be viewed here:
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CGMQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffinance1.doe.mass.edu%2Fcollab%2Fnew_%2520law.doc&ei=7YToT7qQCvKA6QGHhpngDg&usg=AFQjCNHPtSMA3Q3tJmdbGq88arS06NQeUA
VPT please, if your up for it, call me tomorrow sometime after 10 am. I can be reached at Town of Rutland Conservation Commission. Phone # is on the town website.
The AAB made no final suggestions on a forensic audit. They want to meet with the Business/Finance Subcommittee and our current auditors.
All five seemed to be in agreement that a forensic audit may not be the appropriate tool but they absolutely did not make final decisions.
Whoever has the tape of this meeting should make it available to everyone before it is further mischaracterized or before someone starts calling for resignations from the Audit Advisory Board.
Maximus the tapes really dvds can be had for a small fee from the Rutland Cable tv folks. The fee is only to cover the cost of materials they don't charge for the labor as all of those dedicated folks are volunteers. One I would strongly suggest getting is the Aug. 6 meeting as statements made during that meeting would suggest the administration knew of this problem no later than March because they were already taking actions to reduce expenditures to compensate for the over expenditures that supposedly were not discovered until July. Specifically the fuel accounts for all the buildings. Truely amazing what the cameras catch.
Rutland Cable Phone #508-886-4730
Joedell, Are you implying that the unexpected fuel costs are partially responsible for the overruns? It was a really mild winter by New England standards. That's why the ticks were so bad this year, or so I've heard. If that's really the case, then we are looking at very basic mismanagement if they can't estimate fuel costs for the schools during a mild winter. The administration and school committee owe it to the taxpayers to divulge where the $1.2 million overrun went. That's part of their job - whether hired or elected.
No not at all, The overages didn't occur in energy as far as I have been able to determine. What seems to have happened is fuel deliveries were put off or delayed and reserves depleted so as to free up cash to cover overages in other accounts. I do not have reciepts in front of me or historic usages. What I said was based on statements at the Aug. 6 meeting. that inferred that that was commenced in March which means someone was aware of the situation then rather than in July as claimed.
Based on JoeDell and MakeSense's explanations, it seems premature for the AAB to be making final decisions on a forensic. We need more disclosure.
As I read it,there is no money missing, just huge errors on Brennan's part.
In simple terms, in FY 2012 they spent $1,000 but Brennan's worksheet had the spending at $950, therefore his run rate for the FY 2013 budget is the $950 rather than the $1,000, hence a $50 shortfall in the FY 2013 budget, in addition to that he blow to number for health insurance by another $50, hence a $100 error in the FY 2013. You would think health insurance is most likely the largest expense other then salary and that both Brennan and Pandiscio as well as the SC would be all over it and nail it down or clearly document their assumptions which may impact the number. Brennan's error would not have been made by an accountant, but then again he is not an accountant. The SC hired a banker for their accountant
Makessense I believe you are correct as to the assumptions concerning run rate. This does have a major impact on budget projections. Leading up to the budget votes the school committee was very proud of the fact that shrewd negotiations on thier part saved the district a million dollars thier words not mine and its on tape. This leads me to believe that they were all over it. Yet it was still missed. Thats 2013.
Now to 2012. They had a fully funded and approved budget. All the accounts had approved and funded amounts. Now what happened was some accounts were over spent by 1.2 million more than what was originally planned, budgetted, approved and funded. This means that there were goods or services puchased to the tune of 1.2 million that were NOT planned, NOT budgetted, NOT approved and NOT funded. What needs to be known is what were they, why they were needed and if really needed why weren't they in the budget and then who approved and puchased these goods and services. Now at the end of a fiscal year every budget has variances which necessitates transfers of 500 or 1000 dollars from one account to another to clean up and successfully close the fiscal year and really is no cause for concern. But 1.2 million should cause a lot of concern. What I just outlined is only part one of this problem. Part two is how was it possible to be able to transfer 1.2 million into those over extended accounts from accounts that supposedly were neccesary and occupied a position in the approved and funded budget. Mind you that this was at the end of the fiscal year and these accounts still had that much funding left over. This leads to the conclusion that they really weren't needed in the first place and begs the question what was planned for these unexpended funds. Historically the towns don't get anything back. Now that begs another question being how long have these particular items existed in the previous budgets as the loss or addition of line items should be accompanied by some justification. So is it reasonable to assume (dangerous word) that there were monies unexpended in previous years and what became of them. Then logic would dictate that the budget as presented was larger than needed. There are two reasonable explanations: ineptitude or fraud. Ineptitude would require many more inept people than Mr. Brennan alone.
Fraud on the other hand would require less people but need certain key people. I won't delve further into that because I want to believe that is not the case.
But I would reccomend Mr. Fusco's book on that subject.
Which brings me to the topic of slush funds. Every penny spent of school district slush funds should be posted on the Internet for all taxpayers to see how their money is being used. If a forensic audit takes place, the auditors and school committee members should scrutinize the slush funds to make sure they are not being used for illegal or illicit purposes, fruit baskets, spy equipment for boy's bathrooms (such as was done in 2002 and was a total waste of money in the end because they never caught the person who allegedly was lighting fires), and a range of other questionable uses. It's a great time to tighten up the ship, folks, because the economy may not bounce back anytime soon. This article talks about what Nashoba did to straighten out their "mess." In the end, the Nashoba District posted the budget on the Internet as a protection to taxpayers, because they know how much their "mess" cost them in time and money in the end.
My apologies for sounding like a broken record, but no one should make a decision about a forensic audit until it is disclosed to the public what exactly happened to the $1.2 million that got misallocated or lost or eaten by the dog. Did I miss a news report somewhere along the line that disclosed what happened to the $1.2 million? Was it like when you balance your checkbook ledger, and at the final tally you find you are $1.2 million off? And you are scrutinizing every entry and trying to figure out where your decimals were wrong? I mean, where is the $1.2 million?, that is the question. If we are told that the $1.2 million got eaten by the dog or flushed down the toilet by a toddler, then yes, I think we should have a forensic. If someone miscalculated on school lunches, and the high schoolers were just a lot hungrier than anybody had projected, that's totally believable - then maybe not. Anyone want to enlighten us on this? And if you can't, then enough information hasn't been divulged to the public yet. I don't care if it's been divulged or not to the 5-person AAB Board. That's only 5 people, and no offense to Princeton's Phil Mighdoll, but I'm not convinced the board is comprised of the best people to make such an important assessment. About 70% of Princeton's taxes go to the schools. So are they going to pay 70% of my tax bills for the last 10 years if we follow their advice and they turn out to be wrong?
Who's on first.....
Now lets see, we have a superintendant who was "unaware" of any errors, a school committee that was "unaware" of any errors, a business manager who was "unqualified" for the position who brought up the "errors" to the "unaware" people who magically balanced last years budget by transferring money from an "impossibly tight" budget that had to be inflated by at least the amount of that "error" then being made "aware" of an "underfunded error" in this years budget by the "unqualified" business manager who told the "unaware" superintendant who then relayed that information to the "unaware" school committee who then fired the "unqualified" business manager and was ready to ax 14 "unsuspecting" teachers who then were not axed in favor of canning all of the quite "understanding" librarians and then they quite "understandingly" explained the who, what and where of the "errors" to a "fully cognizant" audit advisory board of thier choosing who then "buys" the explanations from the "unaware" superintendant and "unaware" school committee and then recommends that a "forensic" audit is the wrong "tool" and a management review process will solve the "problem".
Abbott and Costello would indeed be envious!
Now if you will excuse me I have to get back to changing the air in my tires from summer air to fall air, gotta be prepared.
What a classic - I want to see it in print, t&g, landmark...
We need to change the air in the district!
Huh?
Look at Brennan's resume and ask yourself how did he get hired? Most people hire an accoutant to do an accountants job. I addressed the SC back in 2001 about the hire and was stone walled.
Conspiracies and witch hunts. Now we are publicly debating the character of Peter Brennan's sister, who served on the school committee years ago and what level of blame she deserves for the district's current woes. Have we gone completely insane?
I thought this thread was about the Audit Advisory Board's response to the efficacy of a forensic audit.
Silly me.
I wouldn't call it a conspiracy or witch hunt. I think there are a lot of people who are just trying to understand how this happened, and why, because there's a lot of money at stake. And we don't even know if there was more in previous years, because Mr. Brennan has been in that position for a long time, and he could have made similar "errors' in past years. But I'm with you, Max. I don't think Brennan's sister would have been solely responsible for Peter Brennan's hiring as Comptroller. That's pretty silly. Someone might have thought it advantageous that he had so little experience. I mean, why else would you hire someone as a comptroller or business manager who didn't have a degree in accounting?
OMG, do you even read Ed Meyer's, um, "contributions" to this discussion?
Actually, it's pretty clear how it happened; however, the actual facts are just not enough to satisfy people like you, Meyers, and others. The AAB is pretty clear on how it happened, the school committee is clear on how it happened, the district office is clear on how it happened, too. The only people who can't seem to wrap their heads around "what happened" are folks like you who have axes to grind.
Please direct me to the site where I can read the AAB analysis of the situation. I think that could be useful to those of us who are trying to sift through the various opinions and agendas to determine the truth about what happened. I have no axes to grind. I just want to be able to move back to our home in Princeton without having my family members threatened in relation to school district issues. Shameful. I think 99.9 percent of homeowners in the Wachusett District can relate to that.
The AAB analysis was stated at the recent meeting, and, quite frankly, they were somewhat aghast at the idea of a forensic audit. In criticizing Julie Kelley's assumption that one was needed, several members of the board expressed the inarguable opinion that it was the wrong tool for the wrong problem.
The proceedings were taped, thankfully, and I would hope that the tape will be made available for you and anyone else to watch it.
If the AAB is clear on what happened, the administration is clear on what happened, and the SC is clear on what happened, than can someone summarize for the taxpayers what exactly happened with the $1.2 million error? When I found a $1.4 million error in 2004 and brought it to the attention of Roger Hatch at the DOE and Peter Brennan at the Comptrollers Office, it was very clear what had happened: $1.4 million had mistakenly been allocated to the special education collaborative FLLAC, bringing the District's special ed costs up to a whooping 22% of the entire budget. That's how I discovered it. I looked at school districts across the state, and compared their numbers with ours. So where did the $1.2 million go? If Brennan had a spreadsheet that disagreed with the MUNIS system numbers, then is should be starkly clear where the error was. Did the money get misallocated? I am very concerned about all of this because I discovered several years ago that a former principal-turned-interim SPED Director was paid a salary and contractual money in the same year, and there was no District record of his having received a 1040 for tax purposes when the IG's office requested it in the spring of 2007. But then Peter Brennan suddenly came up with one four months later when I made an FOIA request of Susan Sullivan. That's disconcerting when you add it to the mix. We have a $1.4 million error in 2004, a disappearing/reappearing tax form, and the nearly $3 million in errors recently. Were there more in between? At what point do we reach the tipping point and ask for greater accountability in terms of an audit?