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Phil Lewis: Answers still sought in school dispute
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It’s an election year and our editorial board is busy meeting with candidates for public office so the newspaper can prepare endorsement editorials in the various Collier and Lee county races.
There are county commission candidates, public defender candidates, state House hopefuls and school board contenders and there are a number of shared issues and recurring themes, such as a tight state budget and fewer local tax dollars to spend.
One theme that is not recurring is trust, or the lack thereof. It’s not as if our editorial board members haven’t heard the term “mistrust” during candidate interviews. We have, but it seems to be confined to a particular type of race — Collier County School Board.
Candidate after candidate has referred to a “disconnect” and a “mistrust” between the community and the School Board. They point to the firing of Ray Baker as superintendent and the hiring of Dennis Thompson as his replacement. Then, they make clear that they aren’t running on a platform against the new superintendent. They are running to restore the lost trust and repair the disconnect.
With the one-year anniversary of the Baker firing rapidly approaching, it is clear there are wounds that will take more than a purge at the polls to truly heal.
What is needed and has been needed for a long time is a serious, in-depth investigation by the State Attorney’s Office into suspected Sunshine Law violations.
About this time last July, a train that was set in motion in late June was barreling down the tracks. By the end of the month, Baker was out of a job and Thompson was packing his bags up in Illinois and moving south. A lawsuit followed.
The public never saw the train coming. It was a smelly affair.
It’s been a year, but the odor lingers. It’s the odor emitted when the people’s business is done in the shadows and behind closed doors.
E-mails, cell phone registries and video-taped depositions, all now in the public record, show that if Florida’s “Government in the Sunshine” laws weren’t violated, the spirit of those laws was trampled and spat upon.
The public record is rife with evidence of “daisy chaining,” a term used in the newspaper business to describe an all-too-popular way for elected officials and public bodies to sidestep open meeting requirements.
Daisy chaining occurs when a person not governed by open-meeting laws acts as an intermediary between elected members of the same board. The intermediary talks with one board member, relays thoughts to one or more other board members, then reports back to the initial board member to complete the chain. It’s a way for public officials to share thoughts and ideas out of the sunshine. In far too many cases, plans of action are actually brokered in this manner so that subsequent public meetings — where official votes are taken — are nothing more than a sham. When that happens, the law has been broken.
Phone records suggest that last June and July, more than one intermediary was involved in a Collier County School Board chain. The State Attorney’s Office, if it looks, will find more than enough evidence to warrant a full investigation. Such an investigation was paid lip service last fall, but was never pursued.
The public is owed answers and it’s not too late for someone with subpoena power to ask hard questions and jog memories. Until that is done, the disconnect and mistrust mentioned by all those school board candidates will remain with us.
Phil Lewis is editor of the Daily News; his email address is plewis@naplesnews.com
Comments
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Phil Lewis is correct in his assessment of the need for the SAG to investigate.
What I really wish that Mr. Lewis as Editor of the NDN would do is to develop an investigative team from within the ranks of his capable reporting staff and do some honest to goodness invetigative reporting.
That alone might be the impetus the SAG office needs to get off its own duff and work for the people and you know, justice and the American way.
If the NDN can write an award winning investigative report on the condition of the Gulf of Mexico, surely it could do the same to discover the source of the stink on the School Board.
#1 Posted by Wisernow on July 19, 2008 at 10:48 p.m. (Suggest removal)
One school board member, Steve Donovan, has never been deposed. Do you think he is hiding something? I do.
#2 Posted by ozjr5170 on July 20, 2008 at 6:20 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Outstanding Phil. Please print a timeline of the events known through the gleaning of the open records files your team has assembled. Let us see what you have based this account on. We deserve to know. We know there is a breach of the public trust and we want to put the puzzle pieces together.
You have always been a strong advocate of freedom of the press and protecting freedom of speech. How can we have either when the behavior of our political leaders are hidden from us?
Here is the perfect opportunity for you to keep our community informed by presenting the facts from the in-the-shadows behavior of our school board members.
We have a right to the truth.
#3 Posted by conchsoup on July 20, 2008 at 10:05 a.m. (Suggest removal)
This is a great editorial highlighting the need for answers in a matter which is not only "smelly" but downright rancid.
Thank you, Mr. Lewis, for a well written, hard-hitting essay.
And, thanks to all the thousands of citizens here and in Rockford and beyond who continue to visit my sites on this matter:
http://dennisthompsonresponds.blogspo...
(This site, above, is an on-going collection of Letters to the Editor written by actual citizens in Collier.)
http://dennisthompsonbackgroundquiz.b...
(This site, above, concerns Thompson's lack of qualifications to even be a superintendent. Take this online quiz and find out how much YOU know about his actual background!)
http://labbottsaysvisitrockford.blogs...
(You can still vote on the above site and its 6 questions -- the original parody site, now revised to focus on Thompson and this mess.)
BTW, I have had many visits from the journalism competition I entered for two of my sites above -- and the judges are big-wigs in national media. They have made repeat visits to my sites.
Even if I do not win any awards for innovative interactive journalism/parody, I expect you will continue to see my sites in the blogosphere -- and perhaps elsewhere, as MANY people seem to be interested in knowing how someone as unqualified as Thompson becomes a public school district superintendent. Now they know. (The answer is POLITICS and probable ILLEGAL CONDUCT.)
Collier County is gaining quite a reputation thanks to this mess!
#4 Posted by flcertifiedteacher on July 20, 2008 at 10:21 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Re post #1 - Yes, and a good place to start would be to get public records disclosing the actual organizational chart of the current CCPS district administration, and their salaries -- all of which should be disclosed to the public but is not.
#5 Posted by flcertifiedteacher on July 20, 2008 at 10:23 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Glad to see this issue hasn't altogether died in the NDN, but I think, Phil, you are still towing the corporate line when you say, "they [Candidates for school board] make clear that they aren’t running on a platform against the new superintendent."
Superintendent Thompson has done little to earn such deferential press. The Chicago Tribune would have grilled him on the hot seat. For a paper that so honors the cowboy-style of Mr. Bush, you'd think some reporter would have enough gumption to call Thompson out at High Noon.
I no candidate for school board is willing to denounce the year's supervisory experience in CCPS, none deserve to be elected. This has been the worst year on record.
#6 Posted by Tamara1 on July 20, 2008 at 1:09 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Well, I think the NDN is guilty of violating the Spirit of the Sunshine laws themselves - haven't they done this themselves - spoken to board members about board members and then told board members what other board members have told them?
Gee - get over it already
#7 Posted by fedupinnaples on July 20, 2008 at 1:29 p.m. (Suggest removal)
This editorial's assessment is absolutley correct. Regretably, until the truth comes out, there is little chance that the public will support more operating dollars for the CCPS. Ethical behavior is the minimum requirement for leadership at the Board and Superintendent levels.
#8 Posted by Wonder on July 20, 2008 at 2:27 p.m. (Suggest removal)
unfortunately, the truth behind this whole mess will never be found nor told. Time marches on and so does the school board, school system and superintendent. This hot potato situation has cooled off and most people have lost interest in it ( exactly what the school borad hoped for). Until some real IMPORTANT movers and shakers in this town step forward ( and it doesn't look like any will) and start asking questions, nothing is going to happen and the status quo will be maintained.
#9 Posted by biomanogt on July 20, 2008 at 3:09 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Just curious biomanogt-What does a mover and shaker (or anyone else for that matter) do to step forward? What is the proce
#10 Posted by sailingby on July 20, 2008 at 4:31 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Hurray watchdogs! We've heard your bark now let's see your bite.
#11 Posted by sharon on July 21, 2008 at 2:57 p.m. (Suggest removal)
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