Open Letter to School Board on Legal Fees

Ladies and Gentlemen of the BOE, Misters Thurmond and Perrone,

In reviewing the vendor spends report attached to agenda item #2 of Monday's meeting I looked at thirteen lines related to legal expenses. Those lines include the columns "acct amt," "paid amt," and "remaining amt." 

In four of the thirteen lines there are errors in the remaining amount column which under-report the debt owed by the school district by $337,446. I am attaching a spreadsheet (see link below) so you can double-check my statement.

This should be an automated calculation. I cannot think of any explanation why these errors exist. It is frightening to extrapolate this rate of errors (4 of 13 or 31%) to the hundreds of lines in the report.

Another disturbing thing which caught my eye is one firm, Goodman & Goodman LLP, has not been paid even though they submitted invoices which first appeared in the December 2012 vendor report. It is irresponsible to be more than 90 days in arrears. 

I would appreciate someone asking Mr. Perrone about these errors during the work session on Monday. I have included him in the email so he can be prepared with a response. I would also appreciate an email response by Tuesday from someone as I may not be able to watch the meeting. 

One thing that has not changed with the changing of superintendents is the lack of response to stakeholders from district employees. Currently I am waiting for responses from Mr. Wilkins to an email sent on Feb. 18, Mr. Williams to an email sent April 7, and Mr. Thurmond to an email sent on April 22.

Additionally I have publicly asked Mr. Thurmond if he would order an outside financial audit, if all salaries would be looked at for appropriateness, and if he would lead by example and reduce his salary and am patiently waiting for answers to those questions.  

Please discuss among yourselves what can be done to encourage employees to better communicate with stakeholders. 

Thank you very much for your attention to my concerns and a prompt response. 

Kirk Lunde

Open as a Google spreadsheet