LITTLE ROCK — A Little Rock School District parent who has made it his mission to find, air and correct governance violations in the state's largest district registered complaints with state and county officials about the district payment of $6,400 to School Board member Katherine Mitchell.
Robert J. Powers, the creator of a new Web site on which he exposes the reported shortcomings of School Board members in complying with district policies, has asked Pulaski County prosecutor Larry Jegley to initiate an investigation into the pay Mitchell received from the district in 2004 and 2005 for being an instructor in a nontraditional teacher licensure program.
Jegley was out of his office Friday afternoon and could not be reached for comment.
Powers also filed a written complaint with the Arkansas Department of Education about the payments.
And he said Friday afternoon that he had a complaint in his pocket waiting to be mailed to the Arkansas Ethics Commission.
Arkansas Code Annotated 6-13-616 says school board members are not eligible for employment in the same school district. Another set of statutes, 6-24-101 through 6-24-120, restricts school board members from using their positions to "secure privileges," "self-dealing" or "knowingly enter into contracts or have an interest in contracts with the educational entity for which they serve" - although exceptions are allowed.
Mitchell, a School Board member since 1988 and currently board president, received $1,600 in 2004 and $4,800 the next year from the district for teaching in what was largely a summer program at Philander Smith College.
That program, funded by a grant from the state to the district, was for people who have college degrees in fields other than education but are seeking state licenses to teach. People in the nontraditional teacher licensure program generally earn their licenses by taking summer and weekend workshops while holding down regular teaching jobs.
Mitchell, an education professor at Philander Smith in addition to being a School Board member, said this week that she did teach in the program and was compensated for it but she didn't realize it was a district program. That was despite the fact that the checks were Little Rock district checks and that Marion Woods, the district's staff development coordinator, was over the grant and recommended her for the work.
Friday morning on KARNAM, 920, with talk-show host Scott Wallace, Powers described his own investigation into the payments and his requests for official reviews.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette obtained a copy of Powers' complaint to Arkansas Education Commissioner Ken James. The complaint said Mitchell did not meet the requirements for an exception to the law that prohibits school board members from contracting with their school districts.
Those requirements call for the full disclosure of circumstances and payments to be presented and approved by the school board and, in some cases, approved by the state education commissioner.
"There is no General Disclosure Form as specified and no minutes or agenda items where the LRSD Board of education voted to approve the paid services from Dr. Mitchell in July 2005," Powers' letter to James said.
Additionally, Powers cited Arkansas Code Annotated 21-8-701 and Act 1599 of 2001, which requires school board members and others in public service to file financial statements or face fines of up to $1,000 or even jail for knowingly or willfully failing to comply with the reporting provisions.
Powers also said Mitchell "failed to note on her 2005 Statement of Financial Interest" the Little Rock district's payments to her. Such statements are filed annually with the Pulaski County clerk's office.
With his complaint, Powers submitted nearly 40 pages of copies of checks and contracts dealing with the summer program as well as copies of Mitchell's financial interest forms.
"We are reviewing the complaint to see what the department's obligations are, if any, as related to ... the ethics chapter [in the law]," said Scott Smith, an attorney for the Department of Education. "Bottom line, we're looking to see what our responsibilities are."
Smith said the department gets requests for commissioner approval of exceptions to thelaw. He said complaints about potential violations of the law are less common.
Graham Sloan, executive director of the Arkansas Ethics Commission, said his agency is compelled by law to keep pending matters confidential and he could not say whether Powers or anyone has filed complaints about Mitchell. However, the outcome of any complaint does become public record after the commission's review and decision.
"Once a case is over, there is public information," he said. "We send out a final action letter in every case. If a case gets dismissed, that public action letter would be the only public action letter. If a violation is found, then 30 days later all records relevant to the investigation relied upon by the commission in reaching its decision do become open to the public."
In regard to school boards and districts, Sloan did say that statutes pertaining to school districtemployment of board members do not fall under the purview of the Ethics Commission.
Laws dealing with the statements of financial interest, requiring the listing of every source of income of $1,000 or more, are within the commission's jurisdiction, he said.
Powers, the parent of a Little Rock School District high school student, created a Web site earlier this year on which he posts court decisions, school district reports, financial records, legal memoranda, e-mails and even audio clips. Many of the posted documents and e-mails are those he found by using the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act to comb files on district-owned computers.
The Web site is www.lrsdparents.org.
The privately funded site has spawned a new citizens organization that goes by the same name LRSDParents.org. Part of its stated mission is to organize people who are concerned about Little Rock "into one entity and voice our concerns and approvals of the direction of the Little Rock School District."
The fledgling organization has met at least once and is planninga picnic and another meeting for Tuesday at Dunbar Community Center. One of the purposes of that session is to make plans for calling a special meeting of the Little Rock School Board during which organization members would express their views.
"Please join today and help the LRSD become the best school district in the nation," Powers said on the Web site. "Our schools are our future. We need to have at least 300 to 500 members. The membership is growing but we need to grow faster."
Powers said Friday that he has had to convince the different agencies that he is serious about his interests and pursuing complaints.
"Nobody knows who I am," he said. "First thing they think is I am a crackpot."
However, Powers said, he is undeterred.
"There's more to come," he said about his review of the work of School Board members and district administrators. "Maybe we can get this cleaned up."
Front Section, Pages 1, 10 on 06/23/2007