Source: Carmel Valley News, April 24, 2008
By Ian S. Port
Assistant Editor
The president of the Del Mar Schools Education Foundation questioned the viability and necessity of the fundraising organization in an April 2 letter to the Del Mar Union School District, saying that the district had not done enough help to ensure parent support of the organization in the wake of its controversial decision to buy out Superintendent Tom Bishop’s contract.
The letter from DMSEF President Bob Gans further underscored the tensions in a tumultuous period for the district, which in just over a month has seen the departure of Bishop and longtime school board member Linda Crawford, as well as noisy debate between factions torn over those and other decisions.
Gans said the DMSEF, which raises funds from parents to support the district’s enrichment curriculum, has suffered from a drop off of parent contributions in the wake of Bishop’s departure as parents who disagreed with the decision withhold funds in protest. He now sees that evaporation of support, along with the district’s reaction to an earlier request for help, as potential signs that the Foundation isn’t viable in its current form.
“[District] comments raise doubt regarding the necessity and desirability of maintaining a district-wide fundraising organization such as the Foundation,” Gans wrote. “Therefore the principal agenda item at our May 6, 2008 Board meeting will be to determine the feasibility of accomplishing our mission under the current environment, and whether it would be preferable to suspend our operations at the present time.”
This latest statement follows district trustees’ decision not to grant an earlier request from the Foundation that the school district apply its annual contribution of parent funds to the 2008-09 school year rather than the current year. (Under the current system, some funds go to toward the current year and some toward the next year.)
Gans said that change in policy would ease the ire of donors who disagreed with the decision to seek Bishop’s resignation by assuring them of the district’s financial viability in the current year. It would also create a fundraising system he said was simpler and which many have long desired.
But at its March 26 meeting, the DMUSD Board of Trustees reasoned that it wasn’t their place to tell the Foundation — a legally separate entity — how to allocate its donations. Calling the move to funding the future year “a smart decision,” trustee Katherine White said the Foundation could do it, but that the board should not require it.
“I have a problem as a board voting on constraints that we are giving to another organization,” White said.
Other board members and staff also said such a move would make them uncomfortable for legal reasons.
“To say that the only way that we could accept this would be with these conditions — I would just caution the board against doing that,” Interim Superintendent Janet Bernard said, adding, “I don’t think that what the Foundation is asking is unreasonable.”
The district was made more uncomfortable by the requirement included in the Foundation’s March 6 proposal that it fund enrichment staff at the same level for 2008-09 as it did in the current year. While the formula has not changed, trustees said, the number of students might, thus necessitating a change in the level of enrichment funding.
Gans said the district misunderstood his request, and sees their decision not to act on his proposal as a denial of support for the Foundation’s mission at a crucial time.
“We were never asking the district for permission to donate money for next year,” Gans said. “What we were saying is, we’re donating this money but we suggest you apply it all next year. And what I heard was them say well, that’s a great idea but we don’t really want to take responsibility for doing that.”
As a result, Gans said, the DMSEF continues to suffer from a falloff in contributions from angry parents. He also believes the district hurt the DMSEF’s goal of getting all schools to meet their base fundraising levels by telling one parent March 26 that a school could fund additional enrichment teachers even if it didn’t meet its base target. (Schools are allowed to fund two additional enrichment positions in addition to those allocated by the standard curriculum. The base goal includes funding only for standard enrichment staffing.)
“The last thing that you wanted to happen was for a school to be able to opt out of the baseline and then come in with extra money at the end and, unfortunately, I’m afraid that that’s the direction we’re headed in right now,” Gans said. “If there’s such a strong preference in this community for exclusively site-specific funding, then the question is why do you need a district-wide foundation?”
But the district has never answered the question of what happens if a school site fails to meet its Foundation fundraising goals and thus could not financially support either the enrichment staff normally allocated to it or any additional staff it may have purchased in past years. The deadline to issue pink slips to staff for next year — March 15 — has long passed, meaning the district is set with the current level of permanent teachers for next year, no matter what funds come in.
School Board President Annette Easton insisted that the district could not tell the foundation how to designate its donations to the district.
“Bob [Gans] wants us to tell him what we’re going to do, or how to have him give us the money,” Easton said. “But we can’t do that so that puts him in a quandary about how to give it to us.”
Part of the problem seems to be that the current situation is completely new to both entities. After legal worries led to a massive shakedown last year of the relationship between the district and the foundation, new steps were taken to ensure their separation. Thus, donations this year — the first new of the new relationship — may be designated differently than those in the past.
Dena Whittington, assistant superintendent of business services for the district, said that in the past Foundation checks have always included specific instructions on how the money is used — including for which school year.
“They’ve always told us what year in the past,” Whittington said. “What year, and what school … and for what part of their program.”
Gans said that would not be the case with this year’s check, which the Foundation plans to hand over April 15. The money will only be allocated for enrichment at specific sites, as laid out by donors.
“The foundation could certainly do that [designate the funds for a particular school year], however the Foundation never told anyone this year that we were restricting our contributions to a particular year,” Gans said. “We certainly would not take it on ourselves to allocate money for [the district].”
The school board put some of the district’s other divisive concerns to rest at its March 26 meeting, where trustee Katherine White apologized for statements she made in public that led some parents and staff to call for her resignation. The board decided then that White’s comments did not constitute a leak of confidential information and did not warrant a censure. But that didn’t keep White from facing more public criticism.
“I would like to ask you Katherine please, in the future, to think before you speak,” trustee Janet Lamborghini said. “I’m given to hyperbole in a lot of other methods of communication, but I think as board members we have to be very careful what we say. I’m just asking you personally to please do a little bit more editing as you speak.”
The March 26 meeting saw the district decide to seek a greater number of search firms before deciding on one to find a permanent replacement for Tom Bishop.
The school board also ratified a contract making Janet Bernard the interim superintendent, and agreed to appoint a temporary member to take Linda Crawford’s seat until a permanent trustee is elected in November.
The district has released an application packet for those who wish to be considered for the temporary post. The application is available on the district’s Web site [www.dmusd.org] and must be returned by 3 p.m. April 25. Candidates will be interviewed by the school board at an upcoming special meeting.
The district is legally required to fill the seat by May 12.
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