Romer's Secret Pay to Play Fund
Romer's secret fund - Nonprofit created to talk up LAUSD
Saturday, July 09, 2005 - 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. Hertzberg, whose breakup proposal brought education to the forefront of this year's campaign, questioned why Romer would need to spend money to promote the district. "This is ridiculous," he said. "The best P.R. you can get is to do your job." Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa knew nothing about Romer's organization but withheld comment until he gets more information, spokeswoman Janelle Erickson said. Council President Alex Padilla, who worked with LAUSD board member Jose Huizar to create a joint committee to study district operations, said he was surprised at the Romer effort. "We are trying to offer an olive branch to the school district to deal with its problems and the future of the district," he said. "I'm not sure what he has in mind with this." In three months, Romer's charity raised $145,000 from donors that he and other district officials declined to name. They also refused to disclose other officers or provide copies of the documents creating the nonprofit organization. However, copies obtained from the Secretary of State's Office list Cary Davidson as chief financial officer and Flora S. Yin as secretary. Davidson is a partner and Yin is an associate at Reed & Davidson, a law firm at 520 S. Grand Ave., Suite 700 -- the same address as the charity's. The firm's Web site says its clients include the committee that organized the Democratic National Convention in 2000, when Romer was head of the national party. The articles of incorporation say the purpose of Friends of L.A. Schools is "to educate and inform the public about the Los Angeles Unified School District, including its programs and facilities." Romer said he's spent a total of about $70,000 of the $145,000 on his State of the Schools address and related community forums, as well as on a breakfast for schools that had increased their academic achievement scores. "This is very much what any organization would do to say, Let's have people understand us," Romer said, "and you go to Friends to help us tell the story." The district has a communications department with a staff of seven and a budget of $862,000, but it was unable to take on anything more than its day-to-day tasks, said Glenn Gritzner, special assistant to Romer. Romer said he told the school board about the nonprofit organization, but members said they were unclear on the details. "In this particular situation I do not believe we were fully informed and we need to be. Obviously we need more information and I'm going to work toward getting us fully informed," board President Marlene Canter said. Board member Jose Huizar said the board is entitled to information from the superintendent on matters in which the district's name is used to form an organization. "I would also ask questions as to who put in money for those funds and did it cross the line as to who had contributed," he said. "It's about transparency, and as trustees of the public, the superintendent should have the judgment to keep the board aware of its activities." Bob Stern, president of the nonpartisan Center for Governmental Studies, said that while he's heard of public officials soliciting money for charities, he's never heard of one setting up a charity that he controls. "The question is, where is he getting the money and how much money they're giving. He's a public official and he should be disclosing any money he's getting in relation to his job," said Stern, whose Los Angeles-based group looks at campaign financing and ethics. "For example, let's say he's raising money from school contractors -- that's relevant. People should know that. The faster he discloses the donors, the better it will be." The circumstances around the creation of Friends of L.A. are similar to those of the creation of the LAUSD Education Foundation, which Romer launched in 2003 to raise funds for his education-reform initiatives. Naush Boghossian, (818) 713-3722 naush.boghossian@dailynews.com
1) Why not release the donors? Afterall, you aren't hiding anything, right?
2) Where in the fu%k is the School Board. He told them about this and they just didn't follow up or ask questions? Was Huizy asleep at the switch?
3) How can Romer be so stupid? Was he under a rock the whole last election? Wasn't Hahn's entire problem that his commissioners were out doing stuff behind everyone's back? At the time of creation wasn't everyone screaming about transparency in government?
4) Aren't you about to go in front of these voters for like the 18th time asking for more money in the coming months? You pull a stunt like this?
5) Why would you even need to hide this? No one would have had a problem with you standing up to defend your district. What do you gain by hiding it?
5) You have the City Council Special Committee, the Mayor's new committee, Hertzberg chomping at the bit to bust up LAUSD, all the press a few weeks back about the Mayor appointing the school board putting LAUSD under even brighter lights and this is going on. Now you don't have a leg to stand on. We will never trust you again through any of these committees. You are FU%KED!
Gritzner better pull the 'ol Gov aside and hit him upside the head, because I can guarantee it is going to be a lot more painful for the blogosphere and press to find out who the donors are than for you to voluntarily provide them.
This could very well mark the end of Romer and the LAUSD as we know it!
16 Comments:
Anonymous said:
I don't know even where to start with this. First, Griztner has very little to do and could have -- and should have -- taken on this role. What are we paying this guy for? Jesus, the more you know about the District the worse it gets.
Second, where was the President of the Board and the other Boardmembers? Don't they read what comes before them? Didn't Huizar, the one attorney in the lot, read the documents provided to him? How can we expect this guy to represent CD 14 when he can't do his job as president.
Finally, Romer should start packing. It's incredible that he would raise money from people that have contracts with the District. I guess when you are superindent, conflicts or the appearance of conflicts means nothing.
Anonymous said:
Don't be surprised if you hear the board members now fein complete ignorance. Their job is to know what is going on (even if people like Romer don't know what is going on).
What Romer and the board did is such bad form that all of them should banned from holding office again.
Anonymous said:
HUIZAR YOU WILL NEVER GET MY VOTE.
Anonymous said:
If Romer used the fund actively to stop Hertzberg, doesn't that mean the "no-political" non-profit just actively campaigned and didn't report it? Wouldn't this be an IE?
Anonymous said:
http://www.royromer.com/
Anonymous said:
as usual romer+teachers=self interest. the kids lose out again at obtaining a good education. the lausd is a giant mess break it up!
tom cat:)
Anonymous said:
Oh, f#*k this hypocrisy! I ain't no Roy Romer fan by a long stretch, but this piss-ass story doesn't come close to what Governor S. is doing - literally raising tens of MILLIIONS of dollars pushing special election initiatives for an unnecessary $80 MILLION election.
And Mayor Frank: $5,700 split 6 ways doesn't buy much influence! I'm fairly certain you received a hellava'lot more from shadier donors in your day.
Anonymous said:
3:21 Huizy does not pay attention to anything that he does not benefit from. Romer is getting framed, to take the negative light away from the incompetency of Huizy musketeer.
Mayor Frank,
Thanks for that inform. I had no idea on the contributions made to all these crooks.
However, I do think that there is exaggeration made about this fund. AV/Meruelo/Huizee have a much larger and criminal mess and has not received the attention this little Romer has done. Florida Gate...
Anonymous said:
BREAK UP THE DISTRICT. Enough is enough.
Anonymous said:
Refer to Emmy Award winning website that provides investigative journalism and documentary film on the corruption at LAUSD ...
WWW.FULLDISCLOSURE.NET
HUIZAR is GUILTY. et. al ...
SantaBarbarian said:
This is just the sort of crap we are supposed to stay away from.
Roemer needs to go. NOW.
Anonymous said:
Is Glenn Gritzner related to/married to Lisa Gritzner, former Chief of Staff to Cindy Micsokowski (sp?)?
Anonymous said:
Big PR to keep something BIG and unwieldy from being broken up? Do we have a SUPERINTENDENT Poopy on our hands? Or a BOARD of Poopies???
SantaBarbarian said:
Mr. Mayor - I posted a link to you on Daily KOS.
I think that this is an important issue that Democrats nationwide need to know about.
We can't be pulling this sort of c**p.
A former Gov. of Colorado and a former General Chair of the Democratic National Commitee should KNOW better. Especially after all of Hahn's problems.
Hope more people discover your FABU blog via the link.
Anonymous said:
To the previous poster, yes, Lisa Gritzner is married to Glenn.
Anonymous said:
Not assured.
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