Last night, the Jeffco Schools Board approved the JCEA contract prior to hearing its full financial consequences and without giving a large component of its constituents, parents and taxpayers, a chance to publicly comment on how bad that contract is.
That was flat-out wrong! Was that intentional? Was the Board afraid of what it might hear?
Let’s take a look at some of the things that should have been heard:
First, the size of the increase, 5% COLA, 2% one-time (bonus) along with Steps and Lanes, seems massive in comparison to inflation and private sector increases. This is on top of recent large JCEA increases as shown in ths image from Board Docs.
In total, JCEA has seen around 40% in increases over the past 5 years. That’s a pretty big number in anyone’s book.
However, what is more concerning is the lack of value that kids and taxpayers are getting from these large increases. Let’s take a look at the recent Spring ELA MAP results in comparison to last year’s. Keep in mind that one of the Superintendent’s evaluation goals was
The percentage of students who meet/exceed literacy standards and show evidence of being on or above grade level will increase at least 2-5% during the 23-24 school year
MAP Reading
Spring 2022-23
Spring 2023-24
Grade
Met or Exceeded 2022-2023
Met or Exceeded 2023-2024
Difference between 2023 – 2024
2
49.2
47.1
-2.1
3
51.2
50
-1.2
4
54.7
53.3
-1.4
5
54.5
53.3
-1.2
6
49.1
45.9
-3.2
7
49.7
51
1.3
8
49.6
47.7
-1.9
These are not the promised 2% – 5% increases, these are decreases! How does that even happen when Jeffco had $61M in ESSER III funding to address academic issues? Did the Board just reward teachers for these horrendous results? Why should teachers even care what happens in the classroom if they are going to be rewarded no matter how bad the results are? Did the Board even consider the message it just sent to the teachers and community?
In case you’re wondering, while Math scores were a bit better than Reading, they too didn’t get close to the goals the Board set for Dorland.
MAP Math
Spring 2022-23
Spring 2023-24
Grade
Met or Exceeded 2022-23
Met or Exceeded 2023-24
Difference between 2023 – 2024
2
40.9
39.8
-1.1
3
41.4
42.1
0.7
4
32.3
33.4
1.1
5
32.8
33.7
0.9
6
29.1
29
-0.1
7
28.4
30.5
2.1
8
31.8
36
4.2
What’s even worse, if that is even possible, is that the Board approved the contract prior to a complete discussion on its financial implications. Was it paying attention when CFO Copland told it what the contract does to the budget? There’s a $33M budget deficit this year and a $40M deficit in FY 27, which is bad enough. But, to keep the deficit at only $40M in FY 27 Copland already had to cut expenses and limited COLA increases to just .5% in FY26 and .9% in FY 27. Think about that in the context of the 5% COLA this year. There is no way the COLA increases will be that limited. The deficits she showed the Board are not going to be even close to reality. They are going to be much, much worse. In essence, the district is headed toward a financial disaster and this contract is a large contributor to that. But, but, but… Jeffco is going to go out for a Mill. The Board might want to think long and hard about exactly how much it can get from a Mill and whether it will be successful. It is going to be a very hard sell given the tax environment and the current public perception of Jeffco schools.
Unfortunately, the Board didn’t hear any of this before it approved the contract last night. There is something very, very wrong with that.
Here is a video documenting how Jeffco schools is failing to fulfill its 2018 campaign promise of contributing $138M in Capital Transfer to the bond fund and subsequently embarked on a deliberate and deceptive scheme to hide that fact from the Board and public.
Watch this video to gain a better understanding of just some of the deception and lack of transparency that has been pervasive in the bond program since its inception.
I find this unacceptable. However, once I saw this I now fully understand why Dorland and the Board have avoided having full performance and forensic financial audits performed as recommended by the first Moss Adams report. Because of that inaction, they are now active participants in the cover-up of the mismanagement of the bond program.
This is also why it will be a very long time before Jeffco regains my trust to vote for another bond.
Jeffco is covering up a fraud allegation of the CIP
On April 18, 2023 I sent an allegation of fraud related to the movement of $21M of the JeffcoNet project into the CIP to Jeffco’s CFO for forwarding to members of the Financial Oversight Committee.
Specifically, in October 2019 the Jeffco Board approved a $36M contract for the construction of a district fiber network. The agenda item stated that 60% (or $21.6M) of the funding for the contract would come from the “Building Fund Capital Reserve”. The source of this funding was distinctly different than other agenda items that evening that stated their funding would come from the 2018 Capital Improvement Program. In other words, JeffcoNet would not be funded from the CIP.
However, more than 2 years later a $14.6M Network Upgrade project with an Original Budget of $0 appeared on the monthly CAAC report. And, upon closer examination, the CAAC’s financial report had been showing a similar, but funded, Network Upgrade project with a cost of $7M.
The total cost of these projects, $21.6M, is the exact same amount for JeffcoNet that should have been funded by the Capital Reserve Fund when the Board initially approved it.
To recap, the Board voted on an agenda item which stated the funding for the project would come from the Capital Reserve Fund, yet somehow, without public Board discussion or authorization the complete $21.6M made its way into the Capital Improvement Program.
To make matters worse, the line from the CAAC report shows a note of “BD’ implying to the CAAC that the addition of this project to the program was “Board Directed”. That does not appear to be the cases and is deceptive.
To be clear, I do not disagree that Jeffco has the ability to add and delete projects from the CIP. However, I do believe that it is a violation of trust and fraudulent to move the funding for a project that the Board explicitly directed to come from the Capital Reserve Fund into the CIP without Board approval. The Association of Certified Fraud Examiners would call this “Internal Organizational Fraud” or “Occupational Fraud”.
What this does is destroys trust. The Board can no longer trust District leadership to carry out their directions and instructions and the public can no longer trust anything the Board says or directs.
Therefore, in my note to the FOC, I requested that they initiate an independent external investigation of the transfer of the project which clearly violated the Board’s vote.
The FOC discussed my note at their April 25th, 2023 meeting. However, from the Meeting Minutes you would never know that it was an allegation of fraud. Here is what was written in the minutes:
Meeting Wrap-up
District leadership made committee members aware of communication that was sent regarding the JeffcoNet project. The committee discussed the issue raised with district leadership. The Board is aware of the communication and that district leadership is taking next steps to reconcile the Capital Improvement Program per the Board’s direction. District staff will continue to monitor the financial wellbeing of the Capital Improvement Program.
There was apparently no discussion of the potential fraud, no apparent discussion on whether the movement of the project into the CIP was supported by a vote or policy, only that the Board was aware of the communication and, in a complete misdirect, that the district is taking steps to reconcile the CIP.
That is a complete cover-up of the fraud allegation.
To make matters even worse, not one person contacted me, either before the meeting or afterward to let me know that my email had been discussed and its resolution even though they had my email address and I clearly included my telephone number. In addition, I had previously emailed the chair of the FOC, Jessica Keene, 3 times in November 2022, December 2022 and February 2023 about the same issue and she never once had the courtesy to even acknowledge receipt of my emails.
Jeffco’s FOC is a joke. They are providing ZERO oversight. They are now, along with meeting attendees Board member Danielle Varda, Superintendent Dorland and CFO Copland, complicit in an apparent cover-up of a fraud allegation in the district.
Jeffco's February 2023 CIP Update is full of deception, lies and unbelievable statements.
In 2018 Jeffco told the community that they would be undertaking $563M of capital projects at district facilities.
This included about $545M in projects at ~140 district schools that were very clearly identified in the 2018 Flipbook and another approximately $18M in undisclosed projects that later turned out to be for the Outdoor Labs, Trailblazer, North Transportation center and several other projects.
Sometime between November 2018 and late 2019 the estimated costs in the Flipbook increased by approximately $30M and those numbers are now used as the “Original” budget numbers. Now, every single “Original” budget estimate and Variance shown to the Board, CAAC and taxpayers is a blatant lie. Those aren’t the “original” numbers. This is because the numbers used are based on the costs already inflated by $30M, not the numbers that taxpayers voted on and expected from the program.
Moss Adams identified this as a major issue and recommended that all reports align back to the foundational documents such as the H Bond cash flow spreadsheet and 2018 Flipbook. Unfortunately, 15 months later that still hasn’t happened. In fact, the latest Flipbook published by Jeffco is more misleading, inaccurate and deceptive than ever.
Now, all of the $86M in program contingency has been used and only $50M of $118M in bond premium remained in November before ROTS savings started to impact the CAAC report. That is $154M over the original budget and until only recently the Board and CAAC have only approved one out-of-scope project, the D’Evelyn addition.
On Friday, CFO Copeland and Interim COO Suppes will continue with the cover-up of the overages and mismanagement and perpetuate the lies and deception that have been present in reports ever since the bond passed.
Here are some examples of the blatant lies in their report (here) or here if they update it.
From Page 9 of the presentation.
Lie Number 1:
Capital Transfer into the CIP – $23.8M per year is NOT getting transferred into the Capital Improvement Program. $23.8M per year is going from the General Fund into the Capital Reserve Fund, but $3.2M/year is being siphoned off to pay for previous COPS, and in 2023-24 an additional $1.1M/year will be siphoned off for the Meyers Pool. Up until this year only $20.6M of the promised $23M transfer is making it into the CIP and next year that will be reduced to only $19.5M. This slide falsely represents what has actually happened with the Capital Transfer into the CIP. At the end of the program, the CIP will have been shortchanged by over $17M from the $138M that was originally promised to taxpayers.
Page 3 of the presentation states:
“We have added an estimated $82.8M in new scope and additional uses” and then list those. Most of the items they include in the new scope and additional uses are misleading and downright false. $34,102,610 more closely represents the amount of additional scope and new uses of funds, a far cry from the $82.8M staff want people to believe. See below for details on this deception
From page 13 of the Presentation:
There are numerous lies and deceptive comments on this page.
Deception Number 1:
Additional Charter Share – $11,136,694. The Board agreed that Charters would get their proportionate share of all bond proceeds. This is their rightful share of the bond premium and interest. To attempt to characterize this as New Scope or New Uses of Funds is deceptive and does not take-away from the fact that Jeffco is projecting that it will get nearly $122M in bond premium and interest over and above original revenue projections for just District projects. This is not a new use of funds, this is merely a reduction in revenue Jeffco received.
Lie Number 2:
567/581 Conference Place (purchase and renovation for a new PL center) – This is flat out lie. Note the date – 9/6/2018. This is before the bond passed in November 2018. In addition, this purchase has never appeared in ANY CAAC document relating to uses of CIP funds.
Lie Number 3:
JeffcoNet – $7M for JeffcoNet was included in the bond program budget reducing the amount that should be shown as Additional Scope or New Additions. Also, $5M was added in additional Capital Transfer in FY 22 to help offset the $14.6M remaining in JeffcoNet costs that were transferred to the CIP. Therefore the net Scope Additions and New Uses of Funds for JeffcoNet is actually $9.6M, not $21.6M as falsely stated in this presentation.
Lie Number 4:
Trailblazer Stadium – The renovation of Trailblazer stadium was always included in the original $563M in projects. It wasn’t disclosed to voters, but the January 2021 Askelson report and my own CORAs show that work for Trailblazer was included in the $18M in projects that were not originally disclosed to voters. This is not a Scope Addition or New Uses of Funds.
Deception Number 2:
D’Evelyn Addition- The D’Evelyn construction contract included not only the addition, but also already planned, and budgeted, Efficiency & Future Ready items that had a base bid of $777,000. CAAC reports show budgeted funding of $870,082. Therefore, the real cost of the D’Evelyn addition in added scope costs is $5,392,003, not what is shown on the presentation.
Deception Number 3:
ROTS Schools – This presentation wants everyone to believe that $32,920,785 in scope was added to the CIP. Yet, in every other presentation to the Board staff subtract from that number the amount saved from projects that are not going to be done at closing schools. In the February 9, 2023 presentation, staff told the Board that ROTS Schools were only going to cost the district $19,200,607 in additional costs. That is the same number that should be shown here.
The more accurate number for Scope Additions and New Uses of Funds is $34,102,610, not $82,877,150 that Jeffco staff wants people to believe. Jeffco staff is trying to inflate this number to hide the true magnitude of cost overruns and mismanagement in the CIP.
From Page 16 and 17 of the Presentation:
Lie Number 5:
Alameda Jr/Sr HS – The Original Cost Estimate shown to voters was $18,003,098, not the $19,055,745 shown in this presentation. This merely highlights how sometime in 2019 Jeffco inflated most project cost estimates and has been hiding $30M in cost overruns ever since.
Lie Number 6:
Jeffco Open School – The Original Cost Estimate shown to voters was $9,307,490, not the $9,700,287 shown in this presentation for the same reason described above for Alameda.
From Page 24 of the Presentation
Unbelievable Statement Number 1:
Jeffco is going to hire a consultant to reconcile the current actual and forecasted spend of all CIP projects.
What, after 4+ years of the program, Jeffco doesn’t have these numbers in a readily available format and that are reliable? This is just incredible. Basically, Jeffco is saying that everything they have told the Board and community over the past 4 years can’t be trusted at this point in time.
Unbelievable Statement Number 2:
Jeffco is going to engage a consultant to improve the program financial reporting.
This is just a shocking statement. Moss Adams Recommendation Number 5 said that Jeffco should improve the financial reporting. 15 months later Jeffco is just now getting around to say they may do something about this in the future? Better late than never people say. But wasn’t SE2 hired to do this exact same thing last April? What did they do for their $100k+ contract? Something is not right here.
Unbelievable Statement Number 3:
Jeffco is going to review all in-process and not-yet-started projects in the CIP and update the forecast-to-complete amounts.
To not already have this information only highlights the total incompetence of Jeffco staff. You can’t make sound financial decisions if you don’t update your forecasts when you have rampant inflation. This should have been done on a continual basis for all projects since the beginning of the program. The incompetence is truly unbelievable.
From Pages 28 & 29 of the Presentation:
Sad Fact:
The projects on these 2 pages total $110M. Jeffco is forecasting netting $122M for district projects from the bond premium and interest. How many of these Unfunded Priorities could have been completed if Jeffco had managed to its original budget and $86M in Program Contingency?
Most of them. We’ll see how little is left after the Friday presentation. Nonetheless, this is what the bond premium and interest should have been used for.
This presentation to the Board has so much deception, so many lies and so many unbelievable statements that Suppes and Copeland are either completely incompetent or they themselves are involved in the massive cover-up of the mismanagement and cost overruns in the program. In either case, they are demonstrating that they are clueless about the CIP and that the only way Jeffco is ever going to know the full truth about the CIP and prevent this from happening again is with a full Forensic Financial Audit and Performance Audit. After taking a critical look at this presentation I think we all know why Jeffco is resisting performing these standard oversight functions.
Superintendent Dorland does not deserve a 5 year contract extension
Only 19 months into her Superintendency, Dorland has not yet demonstrated that she can solve Jeffco’s academic, financial and trust problems. In fact, one can make a case that those problems have only worsened under her leadership. She has not demonstrated that she deserves a contract extension, yet.
Her Reading Curriculum initiative resulted in the selection of a program that has no known history of improving results anywhere. Jeffco’s pilot program did not show improved results and there are no other Districts nationwide that used Into Reading that can show improved results. She’s taking a stab in the dark with 1000s of kids lives instead of using data and results to make informed decisions on something so critical in the District. To compound the issue, Dorland allowed multiple schools to not transition to a standardized curriculum subsequently resulting in kids at 6 closing schools needing to transition to a new curriculum again next year. That will harm more kids than it helped.
Fiscally, Dorland presented what is now a $32.5M deficit General Fund budget which only gets worse in the years to come. In addition, she submitted that budget with no accompanying cuts and without a future plan to balance it. Any decent CEO would have presented a very specific plan to bring the budget into balance. Unfortunately, Dorland did not do that. How can you give a contract extension to someone who runs a massive budget deficit and doesn’t have a plan to fix it? You can’t.
Dorland came to Jeffco with a reputation of someone who could successfully run a bond program. To her credit she engaged Moss Adams for a cursory review of the program, the results of which were quite damning. She then promised the Board, and taxpayers, that she was developing a 30/60/90 day plan to address the numerous Moss Adams recommendations. Now, over a year later, $40M in additional unallocated contingency has been spent and there is still not a comprehensive plan to address the recommendations in the report. The public has only seen a new Flipbook that is incomplete and misleading and heard some vague promises about staff addressing a few of the recommendations that may be implemented at some point still in the future. By failing to keep her word in delivering and executing a plan to address the Moss Adams recommendations, Dorland has demonstrated that she can’t be trusted. You don’t give a 5 year contract extension to someone who you can’t trust to deliver on their promises.
Multiple schools needed to be closed. However, the process that Dorland used to determine which schools should be closed and the community engagement surrounding those closures can, at best, be described as ‘rough’ and left much to be desired. Anyone involved knows that it could have been much better and she lost the trust of many people in the community. It is not good optics to immediately award a 5 year contract extension to someone who just oversaw a deeply flawed school closure process. That’s not how you restore trust in Jeffco schools.
Dorland did expend considerable time and effort in the development of a new vision and strategic plan for Jeffco. Only you can decide whether that was a good use of limited resources given all of the other issues in the District. One of the key tenets included that of Integrity. Yet, her staff presented false data in the FCB, suppressed information relating to upgrades at receiving schools, presented a misleading and deceptive new Flipbook to the community and she took no apparent action when her COO falsely and repeatedly told the Board that Jeffco would have some ownership of the new Meyers pool. There is a culture of deception in Jeffco. Including ‘Integrity’ as a key tenet in her vision without taking action to ensure actual integrity only further erodes public trust and makes her look weak and untrustworthy herself.
Finally, I think the Board has to look inward and figure out why it wants to give Dorland the extension right now. In most instances organizations give extensions because a contract is coming up for renewal and they want to keep the employee, or they make the extension offer early to keep a rock star employee from going elsewhere. In Dorland’s case she still has a year and a half left on her contract so end-of-contract timing shouldn’t be the driving factor. Therefore, the Board has to ask itself the question of whether it thinks another organization would think that Dorland is a rock star and make her an offer for something better than Jeffco. Given that she has been in her position for so little time and has no track record of fixing problems I would find it very unlikely that another organization would make her an offer that she couldn’t refuse. Besides, do anyone really think the Board couldn’t get an equal, if not better, replacement for her? Once again, there seems to be no reason to rush the extension.
Dorland is a very good talker. However, she has not proven that she is up to the task of fixing any of Jeffco’s problems, many actually seem to be getting worse. The Board shouldn’t make the Russell Wilson mistake and give her an extension too soon. Make her prove that she is actually improving the District, especially academics, before rewarding her. The previous Board fell for Glass’s grift, don’t fall for Dorland’s smooth talking too. Hold off on giving her a contract extension until she proves herself.
