Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Roy Romer, left, spoke during a panel discussion titled, “Is There an Economic Crisis in Education?” Joining him onstage at the Arrillaga Alumni Center were Eric Hanushek, middle, a senior felow at the Hoover Institution, and New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein.

The Los Angeles Daily News Chews on Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Roy Romer in its editorial, Romer: Clueless or what?

Flap previously reported the Pay to Play Ethics controversy in this piece, Romer: Reveals Donors to Secret SLUSH FUND.

TO hear LAUSD Superintendent Roy Romer tell it, you’d think he was some country rube, a political novice who hasn’t yet been exposed to the darker, seedier side of politics.

“I have absolutely no issue of ethics in what I’m doing here,” he says of his $146,000 formerly secret fund to fight efforts to break up the LAUSD — a fund financed largely by big-bucks contractors who make millions doing business with the Los Angeles Unified School District.

Really, Roy? Really?

Romer doesn’t believe there are any ethical questions when a superintendent calls up his school district’s contractors and asks them to kick $10,000 into a political fund? He doesn’t think that maybe, just maybe, those ponying up the cash might think they need to contribute to stay in the LAUSD’s good graces — and renew their contracts?

Look at just a few of the generous contributors to Romer’s “Friends of L.A. Schools” organization:

McGraw Hill and Harcourt Inc. — two big-time textbook publishers.

DMJM H+N — an architecture, construction and engineering company.

Goldman Sachs — an investment banking firm.

Just good public citizens, right? These are firms that don’t even consider the fact that the LAUSD just so happens to be a major purchaser of textbooks. Or that it’s in the midst of a massive school-construction campaign. Or that it may soon be seeking a Wall Street firm to sell an additional $3.85 billion in school bonds.

Oh, please!

Romer ought to spare us the Mr. Innocent act. He’s no babe in the woods.

Three-time governor of Colorado.

Erstwhile chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Romer knows a thing or two about raising money. He knows how the game is played. He knows — or ought to know — an obvious conflict of interest when he sees one.

Having been in Los Angeles these past five years, Romer should have heard the phrase “pay to play” — the nickname for the scandal that helped to end the administration of former Mayor James Hahn. One would think Romer would see certain similarities between Hahn’s shaking down city contractors to fight off Valley secession and his own attempt to hustle moneyed interests to thwart the breakup of the LAUSD.

Romer has been around long enough to know that when government contractors make political donations, the public ends up paying. Some say the gifts are “only” $10,000, so it’s no big deal. Baloney. For the contractors, greasing the wheels of politics is simply a cost of doing business. They figure it into their bids. Somebody pays and that somebody is likely the taxpayer.

So every textbook, every new school, every bond deal will now carry a built-in surcharge — one indirectly financing Romer’s would-be political action committee.

Even if, by some strange chance, Romer really doesn’t know all of this, the school board that employs him should. Its members should be furious, and they should be demanding answers.

Because either the district’s superintendent is as clueless he claims, or he’s corrupt — and neither one bodes well for the LAUSD

Flap hears a Grand Jury calling Roy Romer’s name……Pay to Play…….Pay to Play…….Pay to Play…….

Flap previously reported about Los Angeles Unified School Distict, Roy Romer’s dipping into the special interest money to form a secret non-profit slush fund, praising his and the school district’s accomplishments.

Now the Los Angeles Daily News and the Los Angeles Times have pieces:

Romer reveals donors

The nonprofit organization Superintendent Roy Romer set up to defend Los Angeles Unified’s image against political attacks relied almost entirely on contributions from construction firms, textbook publishers and other school contractors, records released Tuesday showed.

Friends of L.A. Schools Inc., which Romer formed in February just days after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced his support for plans to break up the district, received single donations of $10,000 from investment bank Goldman Sachs, DMJM building consultants, Turner Construction and publishers Harcourt Inc. and Pearson Education – all of which have contracts totaling millions of dollars with the school district.

An ol’ Pol who formerly headed the Democrat National Committee, Romer has committed a major blunder – A QUID PRO QUO or at least the appearance of one.

Romer defended the more than $146,000 in total donations, which he sought personally, saying his fundraising never influenced LAUSD business.

“I have absolutely no issue of ethics in doing what I’m doing here. I’m clearly representing the district here and I have no hesitancy in going to people for money,” Romer said after releasing the list. “I’m not going to skinny down in some hole like I did something wrong.”

The LAUSD Board deserves answers to pointed questions as to the ethical conduct of its Superintendent.

“It’s an ethical question,” said Bob Stern, president of the nonpartisan Center for Governmental Studies.

“The question is why are these companies giving? They’re giving because they want to curry favor from the school district and by giving money to this fund they will gain an advantage. Decisions are supposed to be based on the merits, not on who’s giving to Roy Romer’s fund. The perception is that you have to give if you want to receive benefits from the school district – that money has an impact.”

Kathay Feng, executive director of California Common Cause, said Romer’s fund and its activities raise serious ethical and legal questions and should probably be investigated or audited by an outside authority, although she was not certain whether county or state officials would have jurisdiction.

“The problem of somebody who is holding a public service office soliciting money from people who are vendors to that office – that raises serious questions about the ethics of the relationship between the officeholder, Roy Romer, and the vendors,” Feng said. “It raises serious concerns for us that there is pay-to-play politics involved.”

You betcha it is an ethical concern (PAY TO PLAY) and do not be surprised to see Romer called before a Los Angeles County Grand Jury soon.

Romer’s office will release by the end of the week a detailed account of the fund expenditures, but the money was spent on the district’s State of the Schools address in May and related community forums to get its accomplishments out to the public, special assistant to the Superintendent Gritzner said.

Friends of L.A. Schools Donors

Here is a list of the contributors to Superintendent Roy Romer’s nonprofit agency, formed to promote the Los Angeles Unified School District.

Donor, Connection, Amount

Francie Alexander Unavailable $500

Suellen Atkinson Unavailable $355

Celeste DeCuir Publishing representative, Glencoe/McGraw Hill $500

Chet Foraker Vice president, SRA/McGraw Hill $525

J. Stuart Horsfall President, Sopris West Educational Services $375

Theodore Mayer Unavailable $500

Shirley M. Owens Unavailable $500

Patricia L. Williams Unavailable $1,000

Apple Computer Inc. Computer equipment and curriculum software $10,000

Bovis Lend Lease Inc. Construction and project management $10,000

Cambium Leaning Inc. Instructional materials, services and technology $12,500

CCG/Harris Construction management $10,000

DMJM H+N Architecture, engineering and construction services $10,000

Goldman-Sachs Investment banking and securities $10,000

Harcourt Inc. Educational publisher $10,000

HMC Architects Construction planning and design $10,000

Parsons Corp Construction and engineering $10,000

Pearson Education Educational publisher $10,000

PinnacleOne Inc. Construction and consulting $10,000

Scholastic Inc. Educational publisher $10,000

Time for Kids Time Magazine children’s publication and Web site $2,500

Turner Construction Co. Construction $10,000

William J. Yang & Association Provides minority- and women-owned business directories $10,000

Total $146,755

SOURCE: Superintendent Roy Romer; Daily News research

The Los Angeles Times piece, Firms Tied to Schools Gave Money is here.

Former California Assembly Speaker and Los Angeles Mayoral candidate Bob Hertzberg asked yesterday for full disclosure, An Open Letter to Superintendent Roy Romer.

RE: PUBLIC RELEASE OF “FRIENDS OF L.A. SCHOOLS” DONORS AND CONTRIBUTIONS

Dear Superintendent Romer:

I am writing to urge you to comply with the spirit of the state Political Reform Act and the Los Angeles City Ethics ordinances by immediately releasing to the public information with respect to donors and contributions made to Friends of L.A. Schools, Inc.

Mayor Frank weighs in here.

Boi From Troy adds this, Builders, Booksellers buy influence with Romer slush fund

Stay Tuned.

Well, I guess you cannot have it both ways in politics.

Chief Parker over at Mayor Sam’s place has a piece on who is hot and who is not in their Tuesday Briefs.

HOT

1. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa — Everything he does gets media coverage (even when he sneezes) this is the way media in LA should be, but let’s see how long the coverage lasts. I am sure Joe and Janelle would prefer one less call so they can set up their voicemail.
2. Councilwoman Wendy Greuel — The most effective Valley Councilwoman continues to wow local city hall watchers with her grasp for mundane policy matters and smart political instincts.
3. City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo — Regardless if he’s running for prez, he raised over $1 million dollars in his bid to become California’s Attorney General — Jerry Brown has over $2 million but it took him a whole year to raise it, Rocky got his in 10 weeks, very impressive.
4. Speaker Fabian Nunez — Seems as though this little speaker could, get what he wants. A Speaker who many pundits predicted would be defined only by the Governor has shown that his team of Communication experts are playing major league baseball right now and could get top dollar anywhere in the nation. The real kudos go to Steve Maviglio and Gabe Sanchez.
5. Councilman Bill Rosendahl — He much in a Villaraigosa type fashion has been everywhere recently — attending any and all functions his district can offer — of course this can only be made possible by the very impressive staff he has hired.

NOT

1. Nick Pacheco — In an e-mail that was laughed at more than taken seriously Nick’s campaign proved that just because you are born with a brown nose, you can easily get it browner with a little butt kissing to the new mayor.
2. Roy Romer — So your 8-team press operation were completely busy doing other things and unable to help SELL THE DISTRICT THEY WORK FOR so you fundraise to get some good PR. Here is some free PR from the Chief — If you as a Government entity must FUNDRAISE to get PR (especially if you already have an office to do your PR) that is NEVER,EVER good PR.
3. Governor Schwarzenegger— Yes you signed a budget, but now what? Your internal media memos had you beating up Sacramento special interest until late July when your media team thought you’d have a budget signed. 18 days and no media strategy, what is a Governor to do?
4. Jim Hahn — Not really wanting to pile it on, but it has to be hard to read news clips every morning with Ethics pledges being signed and PR execs pleading guilty.
5. LA Weekly — The early Antonio bashing may seem like fun for your paper to do, but in actuality, the more you bash the more centrist you make Antonio look. I was just wondering if you guys knew you were doing him a favor.

YUP!

When is the Governator going to respond to those nasty school teacher ads?

The Bob Hertzberg folks are back blogging, Big Ideas 4 LA.com.

Brian Hay posts:

Welcome Back! While the site upgrades have not been completed, the behind the scenes activities of Big Ideas 4 LA are starting to take shape. Now that Bob Hertzberg’s involvement with Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s transition activities has begun to transition itself into the implementation phase (as oppossed to the ever time consuming information gathering stage), we have been able to set the plans in motion for this organization to move into a transition phase of it’s own. We look forward to the many projects and changes you will see coming in the near future.

In the meantime, it is time for me to dust off the cobwebs of web inactivity and get myself into fighting shape. To do this, I figured the best way to get to speed was to once again start up our popular feature of the Daily Headlines, a roundup of headlines, stories, and posts from the LA region which affect our lives everyday.

Thanks again for your patience, and I look forward to starting the dialogue with you again as we work to make this city the greatest it can be!

Note Well:

They linked Flap twice….. but that did not have anything to do with posting this.

But………..

Bob Hertzberg will be speaking at The Bear Flag League Summer Conference.

So sign-up and meet Flap and Bob.

You will be glad you did!

Flap reported yesterday on Superintendent Roy Romer’s Secret Slush fund in this piece.

Now, Mayor Sam via Full Disclosure has this piece, Secret LAUSD Bond Operation.

Full Disclosure Network will be issuing a report that claims that the Los Angeles Unified School District maintains “a secret public financing operation whereby they quietly issue non-voter approved, tax-exempt bonds, mounting billions in public debt, and which is passed on to unsuspecting taxpayers for undefined projects.”

Anthony Patchett, special district attorney and head of the LA County D.A.’s Belmont investigation, describes the LAUSD financing operation as a “pyramid scheme to defraud the voters” and LAUSD Chief Facilities Executive Jim Mc Connell confirms the existence of a secret public benefit corporation saying the LAUSD Land Bank is funded by Certificates of Participation (COP) bonds.

Full Disclosure has a video report online featuring interviews with Patchett, LAUSD Inspector General Don Mulllinax, former US Attorney General Ed Meese who describes the secret bond financing process as a “gimmick” to fool the taxpayers. To view the report and interviews, click here.

Actually, Certificates of Participation are not secret nor illegal.

However, do they avoid the intent of voter adopted Proposition 13? Do they increase debt with little public scrutiny? Do Bond underwriters make commissions?

You betcha!

Superintendent Romer has alot of explaining to do…… eventually before the Los Angeles County Grand Jury.

Former Colorado Governor, Democrat Party Chief and Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent has been dipping into the special interest money to form a secret non-profit slush fund, praising his and the school district’s accomplishments.

Days after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced his support for an effort to break up the LAUSD, Superintendent Roy Romer quietly created a nonprofit organization that has raised nearly $150,000 to tout the school district’s accomplishments, the Daily News has learned.

Despite having the district’s nearly $1 million public-relations operation at his disposal, Romer founded Friends of L.A. Schools — with himself as CEO — to counter criticism by Schwarzenegger and then-mayoral challenger Bob Hertzberg that the Los Angeles Unified School District was too large and inefficient.

“This began in February when there was a lot of criticism of the district, to disband the district, and I felt we needed to communicate positively about what this district was about and what it’s doing,” Romer said Friday in a phone interview. “And when you get into the area of communications, I like not to spend public money if I can avoid it.

“Everybody else in town was talking about LAUSD and we thought we should talk about it too. There’s no secret or mystery about it.”

Disclosure of the fund raised questions among school board members who said they had only a vague knowledge of it and would press Romer for a full explanation next week.

Well, some of that “pay to play” construction money for the LAUSD had to go somewhere and why not to an old Pol like Romer.

The LAUSD is spending tens of millions of dollars on new schools and on a district administration bloated with waste.

Either break-up the district or let Mayor AV have a crack at it under the City of Los Angeles.

HT: Mayor Sam – check out their comments section

Mayor Sam, his wife and the other Dum Dums over at Mayor Sam’s Sister City are live blogging the inauguration of the new Mayor of Los Angeles, Antonio Villaraigosa.

So, what are you waiting for….. get over there and read.

KNBC Los Angeles televison is carrying it live too!

More on the Mayor later… but today happy thoughts and a honeymoon from commentary.