McHenry County Blog

At one point in the Financial Advisory Committee meeting, Huntley School District Controller Altmayer tried to persuade the committee that special needs children receive $10 million  more than what comes in for special education.  (Subject addressed here.)

Parents in the audience were visibly angered by this misleading assertion.

It is apparent to the parents their children should receive a proportion of school expenditures by virtue they are 1,300 students (per Altmayer) out of about 8,600 students enrolled.

The parents, of course, also pay property taxes and State Aid to Education comes to the district, based on student attendance.

If their students attend the district’s schools, the district receives money from the state, regardless of whether they are regular or special ed students.

The parents are intelligent and some are as well-educated as the administrators.

They can figure out that 1300 students comprise 15% of the district’s 8,600.

When the money specifically designated as Special Ed from the state and federal grants are added to this, they know their students are being financially shortchanged.

Not just in dollars, which is pretty obvious), but they can see it in the lack of services delivered.

Sara DiFucci, a Special Ed Mom in the district took issue with Altmayer’s numbers.

She pointed out that what he classifies as “Special Ed” includes services that are provided to all students.

Not all of the extensive social workers’ services, counseling or psychologist services for example go to Special Ed students. His numbers always assume 100% of these services and others are exclusively consumed by Special Ed students and 0% is used by regular education students.

Teenage pregnancy counseling, homelessness issues, socialization of grade school kids and many home life issues occur for both regular and Special Ed students.

Parents have asked for transparency in the form of a comprehensive, line item detailed Special Education budget.

When parents have asked administrators for a copy of the Special Ed budget, they were referred to the no longer employed Special Ed director.

When they would then ask the Special Ed Director, she apparently received direction to refer parents back to Altmayer.

You can imagine that such a daisy chain does not result in parents’ trusting fiscal services.

Huntley School District 158 Controller Mark Altmayer

Altmayer said he wasn’t able to make his computer display the presentation he had for the meeting.

He referred to it as a “link up problem.”

On the one hand Altmayer said:

“I’m just the finance guy.”

Later on, the discussion got onto the budget agenda item.

Altmayer was advocating his spending priorities, which is to spend more on computer and technical upgrades.

He emphasized how he has the entire staff (including teachers and service providers in Special Ed) 100% buying into his budget priorities.

The parents who work with their students’ staff have a different story.

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See also Part 1 and Part 2.

Special Education Administrator Perry Yates on the right hand side of the photo and Cheryl Kalfirtz, second from the left, have now left the Huntley School District's buildings. Stacy O'Dea, seen on the left hand side of the picture, and Karen Aylward, between Yates and Kalkirtz, remain. This photo was taken as Kalkirtz was explaining the revisions in how the Federal Stimulus money would be spent.

Yesterday we left the Huntley School District’s Financial Advisory Committee meeting after talking about how stunned those attending were to find out that Special Education Director Cheryl Kalkirtz was no longer with District 158.

Controller Mark Altmayer for some reason didn’t think it proper to share the information, even though the Daily Herald had quoted Superintendent John Burkey on the subject in an internet published article.

In the public comment period, parents spoke about their lack of trust, especially when they see services not being delivered to their children.

They expressed their concerns about a revolving door with Special Ed administrators who seem to disagree with top administrators about what is the right approach.

Huntley School District Contoller Mark Altmayer

Altmayer explained to the committee that parents had a distrust of special services but not the fiscal department (his area).

Parents then emphatically said they didn’t trust fiscal and wanted the committee to provide oversight regarding how the Federal Stimulus (initial time again, IDEA and IDEA ARRA) money is spent. They seemed to want a check and balance on whether it is being spent on where it is intended, that is, special needs.

Altmayer admitted that it wasn’t the district’s finest moments how “it took 4-5 months to get the IDEA ARRA funding correct.”

Strangely, in one breath, Altmayer cheerfully beamed,

“There is not a ton of issues.”

And, in another breath, Altmayer matter-of-factly referred to how administrators came up with how the Federal Stimulus money should be spent:

“It was pretty much a disaster.”

Huntley district 158 posted a five-year financial plan on its web site as part of its board packet.

It was up in advance of the meeting last night of the board’s Financial Advisory Committee.

When advisory committee member and former school administrator Lucinda Nelson wanted to ask questions about it (it was put on the agenda) there was one problem:

No school administrators were there to answer any questions.

When the question was asked by former school administrator Lucinda Nelson about the ARRA Federal Stimulus Funds, there was one problem:

No school administrators were there to answer any questions.

When Nelson asked if the administration was going to stay within budget this year, there was one problem:

No school administrators were there to answer any questions.

Can Huntley school administrators and Superintendent John Burkey make it more obvious they don’t want to make themselves available to answer questions even from board committees and board committee members?

Perhaps the most bizarre excuse for the administrators’ absence, including Controller Mark Altmayer’s, was given by committee member Michael Andre.

Andre explained to committee members how administrators work during the day.

Lucinda Nelson replied,

“Do you think other people on this committee don’t work during the day?”

Grafton Supervisor Linda Moore is a District 158 Financial Advisory Committee member. Grafton trustees haven’t bothered to show up for four meetings so far. Perhaps Superintendent Burkey is allowing school administrators to do the same.

Or, perhaps the Financial Advisory Committee means nothing to the administration and the school board.

It may be normal in most school districts for first-year administrators, such as Altmayer, to show up to meetings for which they are the school administrator.

However, this was not the first time Altmayer was a no show for a Financial Advisory Committee.

How often does the committee meet?

Once a quarter.

For “community outreach” to have meaning, it would seem someone from the administration or school board would have to be present to meet with community members.

Having members of the community show up and talk among themselves reminds me of that old Saturday Night Live skit, “Coffee Talk with Linda Richman,” featuring Mike Meyers.

In the District 158 context, who would say,

Mike Meyers, Madonna and Roseanne Barr in a Saturday Night Live skit.

“I’m all verklempt.”

Would that be before or after someone said,

“Talk amongst yourselves.”

Maybe Huntley administrators will show up for meetings when they want more money to spend.

I went to the Special Ed town hall meeting with school board members July 14th in Huntley District 158.

There I received this handout which you can see online or just click to enlarge the image above.

It’s on page 3 of the Special Education Revenue and Expenditures – Historical Overview

What struck me was the $14.3 million of special ed expenditures and the $4.7 million of special ed revenue. The document’s purpose was apparently to show how much more the district is spending on special ed than it’s receiving.

But is this true? Of is just the opposite true?

How much would be spent if all of the special ed kids were regular ed kids?

If you said all of the Special Ed kids were regular ed kids then you can take a percentage of total ed fund expenditures to come up with a dollar amount. This would be a proportionate expense.

It looks like $8.64 million.

In Huntley this number is easy to calculate. The proposed Ed fund budget is slightly over $60 million. The total enrollment figure of 9,032 was handed out on August 20th. From this and about 1,300 students with Individualized Education Plans (IEP’s) you can calculate the $8.64 million.

At first superficial glance $14.3 million is more than the proportionate amount of $8.64 million plus the $4.7 million of extra special ed revenue. By slightly less than a million dollars ($960,000).

That is until ………………..

The First Ooopsy:

Upon this being pointed out by a resident, Controller Mark Altmayer, admitted he “forgot” to include $800,000 in the revenue number.

Altmayer put about 800 grand into the expenditures number for the IDEA ARRA money, but forgot to put the same revenue paying for this into the revenue number.

Altmayer is a Certified Public Accountant. I’m not an accountant, but double entry bookkeeping comes to mind.

Even knowing this mistake, the handout for the next evening wasn’t corrected or footnoted.

After the first Ooopsy, it looks like a wash.

The $8.64 million that would be spent on the 1,300 Special Ed students, plus the $4.7 million in state money for Special Ed comes close to the amount Altmayer says is being spent on Special Ed.

That is until I looked at Huntley’s detailed line item budget.

The Big Ooopsy:

For the life of me I couldn’t add up to $14.3 million dollars in the budget for Special Ed items.

How can one get that high using only what is spent on real Special Ed expenditures?

The only way you can come up with such a high number is to include large expenditures that are for regular ed students and label all of them “Special Ed. “

What could be those expenditures be?

Not all of social worker services and salaries and benefits for example are consumed by special ed students.

Every school administrator knows this.

Just a fraction of social worker services go to Special Ed students.

Is their inclusion one way the Special Ed number got so high?

Same goes for psychologists and for preschool expenses. Kids having trouble adjusting don’t have to be Special Ed students. And, not all preschool expenditures are for Special Ed students. Plenty of testing and screening goes on for all students.

There has to be upwards of a million dollars of expenditures budgeted in the $14.3 million that isn’t really going to Special Ed students.

I have FOIA’d the line item detail. We will see what I get in the breakdown provided.

When you take out the exaggerated budgeting that isn’t really Special Ed, it looks as if Special Ed students are subsidizing expenditures for regular education students.

That is, when you add the $8.6 million that would be spent on the 1,300 students, if they didn’t have IEP’s, to the $4.7 million that is specifically earmarked for Special Ed, the total being spent on Special Ed seems less than $13.3 million.

And, if this is the case and if it has been for a number of years, how can the administration and school board argue that half of the Federal stimulus money the district is getting for Special Ed should be diverted to non-Special Ed uses–even if that is legal?

There may be a lot behind why a well-respected Special Ed Director and two Assistant Directors left Huntley all at the same time.

Neither of the two daily newspapers did exit interviews when they jumped ship earlier this year.

If services weren’t being provided, as mandated by law because other administrators wanted Special Ed to subsidize regular education, that might explain why they left. Maybe they really cared for the Special Ed kids and didn’t want to work in a district where they were being short-changed.

Special Ed expenditures were brought up at the Financial Advisory Committee by Mrs. Lucinda Nelson on August 25th. Nelson is a former school administrator with expertise in Special Ed.

Unfortunately the advisory committee decided not to review the Special Ed budget in any detail this year in spite of the discrepancies and concerns that Mrs. Nelson expressed.

The majority of the committee had no interest in looking at the detail.

A comment was made by one committee member that even if they did ask questions it wouldn’t make a difference.

“Wouldn’t have an impact” is what one committee member said.

Were these members saying the administration and board members wouldn’t listen, so why bother?

What chance do the Special Ed parents have when a district’s own Financial Advisory Committee complains publicly that “they” (administrators and board members) wouldn’t listen, even if the committee said something?

What if it turns out the $14.3 million Special Ed expenditures number was indeed exaggerated, as it looks like it was.

There is no legal requirement I’m aware for school officials to report such numbers truthfully.

Official oversight provided by having a C.P.A. and two M.B.A.’s on Huntley’s school board of education can’t protect against inaccurate numbers being reported to them.

Data processing folks used to talk about GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out.

When government employees are not fairly dealing with Special Education parents at the local level in person at local meetings what do you think will happen within a vast government-run bureaucracy for health care? How will those less fortunate, but needing more than average cost care be treated by the bureaucracy?

Waiting for the state legislature to levy monetary or criminal penalties for school officials who don’t report numbers accurately is about like expecting there will be no fraud in the Federal health care program now being debated.

Not likely.

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The close-up is of Huntley School District 158’s new Comptroller, Mark Altmayer. The second photo shows School Board President Shawn Green addressing the Special Education parents at the first meeting in mid-July. Two others show various parts of the audience. Between are most of the board members and administrators at the July 14, 2008, meeting.

Increasing borrowing costs with higher fees and interest expense was proposed Tuesday night in the Huntley District 158 board room.

Mark Altmayer, the new Huntley School District’s Controller, presented his plan to do this.

Instead of paying what’s owed in bond and interest, I’m told Altmayer and Superintendent John Burkey want to rack up higher interest expenses by stretching out a loan and paying a $45,000 fee for the “privilege” of being allowed to repay the bonds many years in the future.

In other words, pay more interest expense by stretching out the debt repayment and let some other superintendent and controller deal with controlling expenses.

Unfortunately residents or the media could never known this hour-long discussion was going to take place.

You see it wasn’t on the agenda, even though Altmayer had handouts and apparently planned to discuss it with the Financial Advisory Committee.

The Financial Advisory Committee (FAC) meetings are not videotaped so there is no video or audio recorded evidence of any potential violations of the Open Meetings Act.

From the posted agenda below, it’s apparent re-structuring bond repayment schedules was not an agenda item that the public was supposed to know about.

Meeting Notice

Financial Advisory Committee

President Shawn Green, of the Board of Education of School District #158, McHenry and Kane Counties, Illinois, has scheduled a Financial Advisory Committee (FAC) meeting on Tuesday, August 11, 2009 at 7:30 p.m. to be held at the Square Barn Road Campus, Administrative Building, 650 Academic Drive, Algonquin, Illinois in the board room.

Shawn Green Eric Zornow

Board of Education Financial Advisory Chair

Agenda

1) Call to order
2) Additions/Deletions to the agenda
3) Public Comment
4) Review and approval of minutes
5) Budget update
6) Future projects
7) Update on grant opportunities
FAC membership Terms
9) Open Discussion
10) Adjourn

7.30.09

There’s a question if the FAC members were informed ahead of time that Altmayer was going to bring this to their committee.

The FAC members were not given hard copies of the latest proposed budget to discuss either before or during the meeting.

I haven’t seen any evidence that electronic copies of the latest proposed budget were emailed to them.

FAC members suggested three alternatives to Altmayer’s “pay more money later” options to cutting expenses this year.

Altmayer was apparently unreceptive to FAC members’ suggestions about how best to go about refinancing the debt.

Somehow it must make sense to Altmayer and Burkey to pay about $45,000 in taxpayer money to make it easy to balance the budget this year and next, if that’s what they are proposing. It would free up money for raises for both administrators and teachers.

The FAC members did discuss all resigning and, in effect, dissolving the committee as it currently stands. There was sentiment the administration ignores its recommendations.

Why stick around if no one is going to listen to your suggestions?

For the previous FAC meeting, the administration forgot to email all members there was a meeting scheduled.

This time it looks like a pretty important agenda item was missing.

I wrote about how two members of District 158’s Financial Advisory Committee (FAC) went to the Board’s Finance committee meeting last month.

When it came time to discuss the audit there were no copies of the draft of the audit for anyone in the audience.

Not exactly a model for transparency.

Now turn to last Tuesday night—about three weeks later. The Financial Advisory Committee held its quarterly meeting.

On the agenda was an update of the audit.

In past years this committee reviewed the draft of the audit.

Seems like an appropriate role for a Financial Advisory Committee.

But not this year.

No audit information for them.

Makes you wonder what is revealed in the audit, doesn’t it?

When committee members asked for copies of the audit, the fiscal office administrator, Teresa Ferrier, refused to provide copies of the draft of the audit.

How?

By saying the audit was on the district web site.

But members said they looked that day and it wasn’t there.

Then Mrs. Ferrier thought she might try a Huntley two-step:

“Copies were available at the meeting.”

Except they weren’t. (Maybe you can find it now.)

This technique didn’t work because the FAC members said they were at the meeting and were told there were no copies for the audience.

Seeing a train wreck in progress in front of a Northwest Herald reporter and a teachers’ union co-president, board member Larry Snow in the audience suggested copies of the audit be made and passed out at the meeting.

Then Mrs. Ferrier made an interesting admission.

She said she couldn’t distribute copies of the audit unless she phoned Superintendent Burkey and he approved it.

Forget the fact that the document was discussed at length weeks before at a public meeting.

In the Huntley school district strange rules apply.

A committee of the board is not going to receive financial audit information apparently until the superintendent deems it’s time.

Was the phone call made to Burkey and he turned down the request?

Or was the committee blown off by his subordinate’s not bothering to make the phone call?

Either way, the committee didn’t receive a copy of the audit that night.

One member of the FAC called a spade a spade and said with $1.5 million of errors it looked like the audit work was sloppy.

This didn’t sit very well with Mrs. Ferrier who took umbrage to the remark. Ferrier said words to the effect that she is very proud of the precise accounting the fiscal office does.

Precise accounting and good work?

• Large material accounting errors that got past the auditor
• Internal control deficiencies that are first disclosed by the auditor to the entire Board at a public meeting

Huntley school administrators have a history of orchestrating financial deceptions.

And fooling the independent auditor.

In times past, hundreds of buses were depreciated that didn’t exist (to inflate how much money the state owes the district). The records of who sent in those false reimbursement claims disappeared.

When administrators inflated school attendance records to the state, that was a deception.

When they forgot to tell residents before the 55-cent tax increase referendum vote how $5 million in new unbudgeted money was a couple weeks away that was a deception. (All Superintendent Steve Swanson had to do was fax in a signed form to the state saying, “Okay, please send us the $5 million now.”)

It seems apparent someone in the fiscal office knew the district’s property tax revenue was being inflated in 2007 above how the original audit said it was calculated. And again when the fiscal office gave the auditor more inflated numbers for 2008’s audit.

Why would Superintendent Burkey reportedly exercise such tight personal control over release of the audit to board-appointed advisers?

What is there to hide in the audit?

One thing is probably the material internal control deficiencies that the auditor disclosed for the first time at a public meeting. There should be no surprise about that considering what former Chief Financial Officer Stacie Talbert discovered and reported to the board a year ago.

If the board majority wanted full disclosure in a timely fashion, I doubt Superintendent Burkey would be withholding such information.

I wrote about how two members of District 158’s Financial Advisory Committee (FAC) went to the Board’s Finance committee meeting last month.

When it came time to discuss the audit there were no copies of the draft of the audit for anyone in the audience.

Not exactly a model for transparency.

Now turn to last Tuesday night—about three weeks later. The Financial Advisory Committee held its quarterly meeting.

On the agenda was an update of the audit.

In past years this committee reviewed the draft of the audit.

Seems like an appropriate role for a Financial Advisory Committee.

But not this year.

No audit information for them.

Makes you wonder what is revealed in the audit, doesn’t it?

When committee members asked for copies of the audit, the fiscal office administrator, Teresa Ferrier, refused to provide copies of the draft of the audit.

How?

By saying the audit was on the district web site.

But members said they looked that day and it wasn’t there.

Then Mrs. Ferrier thought she might try a Huntley two-step:

“Copies were available at the meeting.”

Except they weren’t. (Maybe you can find it now.)

This technique didn’t work because the FAC members said they were at the meeting and were told there were no copies for the audience.

Seeing a train wreck in progress in front of a Northwest Herald reporter and a teachers’ union co-president, board member Larry Snow in the audience suggested copies of the audit be made and passed out at the meeting.

Then Mrs. Ferrier made an interesting admission.

She said she couldn’t distribute copies of the audit unless she phoned Superintendent Burkey and he approved it.

Forget the fact that the document was discussed at length weeks before at a public meeting.

In the Huntley school district strange rules apply.

A committee of the board is not going to receive financial audit information apparently until the superintendent deems it’s time.

Was the phone call made to Burkey and he turned down the request?

Or was the committee blown off by his subordinate’s not bothering to make the phone call?

Either way, the committee didn’t receive a copy of the audit that night.

One member of the FAC called a spade a spade and said with $1.5 million of errors it looked like the audit work was sloppy.

This didn’t sit very well with Mrs. Ferrier who took umbrage to the remark. Ferrier said words to the effect that she is very proud of the precise accounting the fiscal office does.

Precise accounting and good work?

• Large material accounting errors that got past the auditor
• Internal control deficiencies that are first disclosed by the auditor to the entire Board at a public meeting

Huntley school administrators have a history of orchestrating financial deceptions.

And fooling the independent auditor.

In times past, hundreds of buses were depreciated that didn’t exist (to inflate how much money the state owes the district). The records of who sent in those false reimbursement claims disappeared.

When administrators inflated school attendance records to the state, that was a deception.

When they forgot to tell residents before the 55-cent tax increase referendum vote how $5 million in new unbudgeted money was a couple weeks away that was a deception. (All Superintendent Steve Swanson had to do was fax in a signed form to the state saying, “Okay, please send us the $5 million now.”)

It seems apparent someone in the fiscal office knew the district’s property tax revenue was being inflated in 2007 above how the original audit said it was calculated. And again when the fiscal office gave the auditor more inflated numbers for 2008’s audit.

Why would Superintendent Burkey reportedly exercise such tight personal control over release of the audit to board-appointed advisers?

What is there to hide in the audit?

One thing is probably the material internal control deficiencies that the auditor disclosed for the first time at a public meeting. There should be no surprise about that considering what former Chief Financial Officer Stacie Talbert discovered and reported to the board a year ago.

If the board majority wanted full disclosure in a timely fashion, I doubt Superintendent Burkey would be withholding such information.

Tony Quagliano was a member.

Kevin Gentry was, too.

Larry Snow wasn’t allow to join, even though the administration recommended he be appointed.

What am I talking about?

The Huntley School District’s Financial Advisory Committee.

Applications are now being accepted for membership on the committee.

The press release says,
“Any interested individual should submit a resume for consideration to Ms. Anna Biernat, Administrative Assistant of Fiscal Services, Consolidated School District 158,
650 Academic Drive, Algonquin, IL 60102 or call (847) 659-6158.”

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Tony Quagliano is seen above on the left, Keven Gentry on the right and Larry Snow in the middle.

Tony Quagliano was a member.

Kevin Gentry was, too.

Larry Snow wasn’t allow to join, even though the administration recommended he be appointed.

What am I talking about?

The Huntley School District’s Financial Advisory Committee.

Applications are now being accepted for membership on the committee.

The press release says,
“Any interested individual should submit a resume for consideration to Ms. Anna Biernat, Administrative Assistant of Fiscal Services, Consolidated School District 158,
650 Academic Drive, Algonquin, IL 60102 or call (847) 659-6158.”

= = = = =
Tony Quagliano is seen above on the left, Keven Gentry on the right and Larry Snow in the middle.