Category — It’s About Who You Know

What does a Marshall parent have to do to get a meeting with the mayor?

Mayor Sam Adams: Please check your messages and return calls to your constituents.

April 20, 2009 PPS Big Ideas Q & A offers some insight into the future.  Pull your wallets out because it will require BIG BUDGETS.

Q9: Is high school redesign leading to a facilities bond for PPS?

YES. However, to make any decisions about high school buildings, we must make decisions about the programs within those buildings.  How many high school buildings do we need?  What size, and where?  Should they include special spaces such as labs, workshops and performance space?  This high school design conversation will answer those questions and allow us to finalize a long-range facilities plan for PPS that includes high schools. [Read more →]

Marshall small school principal Fred Locke showed up at last night’s community meeting to plead with the community to please, please support his dream of a focus school at Marshall.  The crowd overwhelmingly said NO.  They don’t want a small school at Marshall.

Give it up Fred.  Your dream is Marshall’s nightmare. 

If you want to be king of a small focus school, start your search here.

 Position Titles – Administrative Directive 5.60.014-AD  

(1) Systematic procedures in personnel management require that there be consistency in assigning titles for classes of positions in which the work and responsibility are reasonably comparable.

In order to avoid the confusion resulting from the proliferation of different titles:

(a)  It is essential that we carefully control the addition of the new titles to those in general use in the district;

(b)  Titles must not be informally adopted or misused.

(2)  In order to respond to these two considerations, no titles for positions may be designated without the approval of the assistant superintendent for Personnel. In reviewing proposals for titles to be used, the assistant superintendent will give consideration to the level and scope of responsibility and the existing relationship of such titles to present positions. Departments should avoid using unofficial and/or informal titles, which result in confusion; i.e., it is inappropriate to call someone directing a project a “director” when that person’s level of responsibility and salary schedule has been set in the “specialist” classification.

(3)  It is equally inappropriate for stationery or business cards to be printed with other than an individual’s officially assigned title.

How many times has the PPS Central Office been reorganized in the last five years?  You can’t even find anything in the PPS Directory because department names have changed.  People have consistently picked up new titles and Human Resources hasn’t kept up with the changes.  None of the titles listed below can be found in the PPS Job Description database yet they’re all filled Central Office positions.

• Federal/State/Strategic Grant Program Director
• Special Projects Director (Special is always suspect)
• Strategic Partnership Director
• Special Assistant Broad Fellow
• High School Reform Broad Fellow
• Human Resources Regional Director
• Partnership Development Manager
• Funded Programs Director
• Family Involvement Manager
• Advisor to the Superintendent
• Executive Director of Systems

Not surprisingly all of the jobs listed above pay over $80,000 per year.

 Have you ever wondered about Zeke Smith’s qualifications to be PPS Chief of Staff and the lead on the high school redesign? 

The Chief of Staff  job description describes a very high level of job responsibilities but doesn’t list ANY minimum job qualifications.  

Would you expect the lead of a major education system redesign to have a background in education?  Well, Zeke doesn’t.

Zeke’s college background is in theater and international studies. 

District Administrators are required to be licensed but Zeke doesn’t hold any kind of license through Teacher Standards and Practices Commission.  The Oregon Administrative Rules provide the following definition of administrator:

OAR 584-005-0005 (1) “Administrators:” Superintendents, assistant superintendents, principals, vice principals, and such other personnel, regardless of title, whose positions require them to evaluate other licensed personnel.

The  PPS 08/09 budget states “Additionally, staff now working in Research and Evaluation, Compliance, Grants, and Project Management will be brought together as a new System Planning and Performance group in the Office of the Superintendent, reporting to the Chief of Staff.” 

Both Carolyn Leonard (Compliance) and Susan Kosmala (Title I) are licensed staff and according to the budget, reporting to Zeke.  That would make him an “administrator”.

Including PPS, Zeke has worked at three different places in the last 5 years.  He left his previous position with the Portland Schools Foundation making less than $50,000 per year.  His current salary as Chief of Staff is $115,000.  The Chief of Staff salary listed in the  2009/10 budget is $124,067 and proposed to be $129,030.

Zeke’s background in theater is certainly paying off.

At a time when the Portland Public School board voted to unanimously back measures 66 and 67, it seems strange that the PPS  Human Resources Department would list the Portland Business Alliance (PBA) as one of its Resources. 

Willamette Week  recently reported that companies were funneling large amounts of money through the Portland Business Alliance to defeat the two tax measures. 

As part of the effort to defeat measures 66 and 67, the PBA took out two ads in the Voter’s Pamphlet opposing the tax measures.

Right now working class families are paying more than their fair share of taxes to support essential services in Oregon because so many wealthy corporations are only paying $10. 

PPS board member Bobby Regan urged the public to support measures 66 and 67 saying “  “If we really value education, we have to view education as an investment in our kids, in our future work force and in our state. We have to begin reinvesting in our future, and although this is not the perfect measure, I would encourage you to vote yes.”

Exactly who is the  Portland Business Alliance  a resource for?

I’ve never forgotten my first visit to Whitaker Middle School in June 2001.  It was shortly after Willamette Week broke the story  The Poisoning of Whitaker.  The Willamette Week story exposed a long history of radon poisoning along with other indoor air quality concerns at the school.  For about 10 years, PPS administrators failed to adequately address building conditions or to inform staff or students of the health hazards.

The first thing I noticed when entering Whitaker School (Pictured in the Cheating in Class banner) was that the cove base had been removed from along the bottom of the walls exposing mold.  There was a solid, thick, black line that ran parallel to the walls.  I realized as I got closer that it was a trail of dead ants which ran the full length of the hallway.  It looked as if someone had sprayed for ants but didn’t bother to clean up the dead ants.

It was during that visit that a staff member gave me a sample of what appeared to be a mushroom scraped from the wall in a special education classroom.  The building smelled awful.  I later learned that the smell was probably coming from a squirrel that had died in the basement.

I am not an environmental health and safety expert.  I’m a mom.  A mom who recognizes mold when I see it.  Whitaker clearly had a mold problem. 

Still, PBS Engineering and Environmental who had been on contract with PPS for years, had produced report after report stating that there wasn’t an indoor air or mold problem.  They even produced a report the same month of my visit saying that “ventilation of the spaces tested appears to be adequate with respect to the ventilation parameters monitored and the particulate identified in the laboratory reports.”

In July 2001, Whitaker was vacated and later determined to be too toxic to renovate.  After spending $700,000 on maintenance for the vacant building over the next few years, PPS administrators decided to demolish the building.

The PPS board voted to borrow $2.1 million for the demolition in August 2006.

Well PBS may have missed the boat on the mold problem but they weren’t going to miss out on their share of the demolition dollars.  PBS oversaw the decommissioning of several underground storage tanks, hydraulic lifts and water wells.  They also developed erosion control and grading plans.

According to the PBS Engineering and Environmental project website:

“The Whitaker School project is a good example of how PBS incorporates their multi-disciplinary structure into a successful project.  Led by the Sustainable Design Group, all four PBS service areas - Engineering, Environmental, Health and Safety, and Natural Resources – brought this project to successful completion.”  It sure did!

You’d think that PBS would count their winnings and move on but no…they’re still providing services to PPS.  Their annual contract was amended on 10/12/09.  They continue to receive about $450,000 annually.

The Whitaker situation raises a question about potential conflicts of interest.  But that’s not new for PPS.

In 1998, PPS contracted with KPMG to conduct a comprehensive performance audit.  At that time, the district claimed to have solicited four firms to submit bids to perform the audit but only two firms responded.  KPMG’s proposal was incomplete.  The only mention of costs was a handwritten note at the bottom of a letter.  The note estimated costs at $300,000 – $350,000 with formal cost estimates to be sent at a later time.  The district didn’t follow their own Request for Proposals policy.

KPMG came up with 230 audit recommendations.  The most controversial being the recommendation to close 13 schools.  An Oregonian analysis conducted shortly after the audit found KPMG’s numbers to be inflated.  Many of KPMG’s findings are still in dispute today.

Research into KPMG’s background suggests that KPMG might have been motivated by their desire to profit from PPS closures.  KPMG was a partner in a for-profit education management company.  They used public school system audits to gain entry into schools. 

KPMG was actively involved in pushing charter school legislation, vouchers and privatization.  It makes you wonder why the PPS board would have approved a contract with a company hostile to public education. 

Now we have Magellan.  The Magellan website states:

Magellan K-12 is a specialty consulting firm providing services to education clients nationwide.  The firm is focused solely on the K-12 marketplace and provides Educational Adequacy and Suitability Assessments.  The firm develops educational standards and specifications, architectural programs, site selections, enrollment projections, geographic information systems, economic models, bond programs, and construction implementation plans.

Once again…one stop shopping.  Magellan can identify problems with PPS facilities, make recommendations about renovations and new construction, and manage all projects. 

Not surprisingly many of the PPS staffers involved in today’s questionable contracts are the same people who brought us PBS Engineering and Environmental and KPMG. 

I agree with the little girl.  There’s a fungus among us.  What do you think?