The Association of Brownsville Educators (AOBE) has announced its endorsements for the Nov. 6 election of the Brownsville Independent School District.
True to form, they have announced that they will urge their members to vote for a slate of candidates of the leadership's choosing. These are, after all, the same bunch that have shown their support for advancing education when they endorsed GED holder Ruben Cortez over Celeste Sanchez, an assistant superintendent with the San Benito ISD with more than 45 years in education ranging from classroom teacher to administration.
Their endorsement list should come as no surprise.Take a gander at the list below.
In place 3, former trustee Herman Otis Powers got the nod from the group. You remember Otis. He's the good ol' boy whose office is a mausoleum for half of the deer population in South Texas. Ask him how many of those trophy heads came as a result of trips to hunting leases paid by vendors with the district. At about $3,500 per stuffed rack, it amounts to a hefty little amount of bennies, and Otis loves his bennies. The AOBE also chose to ignore the fact that Powers was recorded urging the former CFO of the BISD Tony Juarez to file a grievance against the then-superintendent of the district Hector Gonzales so that his buddies on the board (Rick Zayas, Ruben Cortez, Joe Colunga, and Rolando Aguilar) could have a justification for firing him.
That bunch was the reason that the BISD and their insurer just shelled out $1.5 million in a settlement when Juarez and Gonzles refused to join the conspiracy and went to the FBI and state law enforcement instead.
In the tape recording Juarez took to the FBI, Powers is quoted as saying:
"So…you gotta, you gotta, I…I…"I’d file a grievance...Your grievance is against Hector Gonzales and the board is gonna love you for that."
That's not all.
Otis is a family man. He looks out for hearth and kin. This is from Gonzales' lawsuit against the BISD.
– April 2007: Gonzales transferred Mary Tolman (who commands a $103,505 salary) from her position as principal of Rivera High School to the Central Office. Trustee Otis Powers was very upset and told Gonzales that this was not right and "this was not going to end there." Powers told Gonzales he shouldn't have transferred her because she was his sister-in-law.
But enough about Otis. How about the selection of Juan (or is it Juyan?) Manuel "Butch" Barbosa, whose claim to fame was his appointment to the Bond Oversight Committee that spent $135 million in taxpayers' money to fuel the facilities-construction binge that gutted the district with cost overruns and change orders to the tune of about $100 million?
Butch, an ingrate who was basically taken under the wing of the late federal judge Filemon Vela, ended up endorsing Denise Blanchard for congress over Filemon Vela Jr., the judge's son. A notorious low achiever, he lived up to expectations in his role as chairman of the oversight committee.
Here's an analysis by Fitch Ratings of Butch's performance overseeing the Big Bucks splurge:
Declines in operating reserves in fiscal years 2009 - 2011 were largely to fund facility construction but were exacerbated by construction cost overruns, unplanned capital outlays, and over-budgeting of enrollment-driven state revenues. The net effect has been a cumulative 44% decline in general fund balance during this three-year period and a drop in the unrestricted general fund balance (the sum of committed, assigned, and unassigned per GASB 54) to $83.3 million or 19% of expenditures and transfers in fiscal 2011."
Oh, yeah. The AOBE can pick some winners alright.
Shall we continue with hapless Minerva Peña?
Peña, who still hasn't realized she is no longer a cheerleader at Porter, can't seem to get over the fact that she is no longer competing for Most Popular in her high school class. A brick shy of a full load, she drives most rational human beings batty with her antics. We used to have a healthy regard for DPS personnel, but this girl ain't the sharpest tool in the shed. If this is the level of intelligence that is rewarded with Los Zorrillos, we have to rethink our assessment of the department. Perhaps AOBE thought a bit of chronic comic relief would do the board good. Who knows?
Which brings us to Jose Hector Chirinos. Jose is a likable guy as far as that goes. But let's face it, his campaign sign photos make some of us uncomfortable. Doesn't he look like an undertaker sizing you up for a nice fit?
Considered somewhat of a galan in his previous appointments with the district, he used to have a bevy of "queens" following him around at Porter and at the BISD Transportation Department which was found to be so ineptly run that now administrators are questioning why he stocked up inventory totaling 100,000s of dollars. The bus drivers' union (Choferes Unidos) are solidly behind Chirinos. He was, after all, the man who would let them pile up millions in "overtime" at the expense of the district. Remember this from the forensic audit report on transportation?
In interview, Chirinos stated the overtime abuse was there within the Transportation Department when he took over in 2005. He indicated his efforts to curb the abuse were thwarted by the unions and the board. Chirinos blamed the lack of supervisory assistance yet he himself failed to take a hard line on the issue. Based on the interviews of the drivers and monitors, they took full advantage of the ineffectiveness and complacency displayed by then administrator Chirinos...
If conservatively only 70 percent were abusing the system by riding the clock one hour per day, the Forensic Audit Staff would put the loss at $420,000 a year, or roughly $2.5 million over the six years in which Chirinos was administrator.
It is highly recommended that strong administrative action with the possibility of termination be taken against Jose Hector Chirinos (and that BISD) hire professional business people with experience in running a transportation department...Of all the violators and abusers, the average number of years with the district was 17 years seniority.
Thanks, but no thanks AOBE. Let's hope our educators have more sense than the leadership.
0 comments:
Post a Comment