By Steve Gunn
EAGnews.org

MUSKEGON, Mich. – A funny thing happened Thursday morning.

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Flint school officials finally became interested in our investigation of their spending habits.


We had spent weeks trying to get them to help us track a bunch of questionable expenses we found on the district’s credit card statements and check register for the 2010-11 school year.

We wanted to know why Flint Community Schools spent nearly $200,000 on a handful of restaurants and nearly $50,000 at expensive hotels around the nation. Those are fair questions for taxpayers to ask, aren’t they?

But for weeks the district did as little as possible to help us find answers. We were told there were purchase orders for some expenses, but not for others. They said there were receipts for other expenses, but they never offered to send them. When we asked for quick delivery of the purchase orders that were available, they said they would try, but never came through.

And they just didn’t know off the top of their heads where all the money went. We would have to ask someone in another department.

But finally on Wednesday, when they learned from a reporter that we were about to go public with the information we found, district officials finally indicated they wanted to know what we were investigating so they could respond.

But they responded on their own schedule.

“In five minutes”

We contacted district spokesman Robert Campbell at about 8:15 a.m. Thursday, our predetermined publishing day, offering to email him a specific list of district expenses we were writing about. He politely accepted.  We told Campbell we could wait a few hours to post our story so he could craft a response.

We thought that was pretty generous after getting the runaround for so long.

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Then we waited, and waited, and waited some more. At 11 a.m. we called Campbell, who indicated he would be sending the district response “in five minutes.” But nothing came. We subsequently sent him two email warnings over the next hour, telling him we were going to post our story online very soon, unless he offered a good reason for us to wait. Still no response.

We finally posted our story around noon. Campbell’s emailed response came about five minutes later. Campbell called shortly thereafter and admitted he had already read our story on our EAGnews.org website.

We were left to wonder if he purposefully delayed sending the response because he thought it answered all of our charges and made us look stupid for jumping the gun.

If that’s what Campbell assumed, he’s very much mistaken. We stand by our story, down to the last paragraph.

Free refreshments for everyone

Campbell sent explanations for all of the expenditures we wondered about.  But very few of them held any water.

For instance, the district spent $143,167 over the course of the school year at a Little Caesars pizza restaurant. Campbell wrote that the order was for pizza lunches in the district’s secondary schools and Little Caesars won the bid to provide the food.

Fair enough, but was the restaurant pizza less expensive than the cost of serving a regular lunch? And since food preparation was not necessary, did the district give most of its union cooks the afternoon off without pay? Would it have been cheaper for the cooks to make the pizza in house than ordering out for thousands of students?

Inquiring minds want to know.

The other food tabs were completely inexcusable, particularly for a district that was battling a budget deficit of nearly $4 million at the time.

For instance, nearly $30,000 was spent at Captain Coty’s Family Restaurant for “district-wide professional development workshops: breakfast, lunch and dinner provided (grant funded).”

Is it possible to have professional development for district employees without feeding everyone three meals per day? Perhaps they could have eaten breakfast before the session, then been excused for  lunch and dinner.

As for the money being grant funded, so what? Wasted tax dollars are wasted tax dollars, whether they come from Washington D.C., Lansing or the Flint school treasury. The food expenditure was not necessary.

More than $13,000 was spent at Roma Pizzeria for “district-wide parent advisory council meeting refreshments.” We certainly hope they were all refreshed for that kind of money.

Nearly $5,000 was spent at McDonald’s for “breakfast for the Start Student recognition program, an incentive/reward program for students who’ve exhibited good citizenship.” Five thousand dollars is a lot of money, even for a big school district. Good citizens can be good citizens without free breakfasts.

Just over $4,000 was spent at David’s Pizza Catering. The stated reason?  “School incentives for students.”

Huh?

Staff training – lodging

Then there were the charges at the pricey hotels.

Campbell said the $16,000 spent at the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel was for “staff and student training (grant funded).” Did they really need to stay at an expensive hotel to be trained?  What in the world were students being trained for? And again, wasted grant money is still wasted tax money.

Nearly $3,000 was spent at the Lexington Lansing Hotel for “district staff for training – lodging.” Lansing is about 45 minutes from Flint. Couldn’t staff get their training and then drive home? Another $433 was spent at the Radisson Hotel Lansing for the same stated reason.

More than $2,000 was spent at the Rosen Centre Hotel (in a single charge) for “fine arts and curriculum staff training (two employees) – lodging.” Couldn’t those two employees have found a nice, clean Super 8 at a fraction of the expense?

Almost $1,500 was spent at the Gaylord Palms Resort and Casino for “Bridges to the Future staff training – lodging.” More than $5,000 was spent at a JW Marriott Hotel for “curriculum staff training – lodging.” Another $2,300 went to the Grand Traverse Resort and Spa for “staff training – lodging.”

Finally, more than $1,000 was spent at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel & Towers for “GASC Technology Center staff for training –lodging.”

Employee training is important and professional travel is sometimes unavoidable. But it seems obvious that Flint school officials were not very careful about making sure everything was done in the least expensive manner, since the district was (and still is) struggling with its finances.

It’s this kind of stuff that makes taxpayers hesitant to fork over even more money for government school operations.

We believe the thinking goes something like this: If they have enough money to stay at the Gaylord Palms Resort & Casino or the JW Marriott, they must have enough money for books and computers.

Right?