APS; number 1!

In the report out of the Office of State Auditor Tim Keller, link, APS is ranked against other agencies in "repeat findings".  With regard to audits; findings are bad; repeat findings are worse.

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Keller found that APS had more repeat findings than anybody else.

That, should come as no surprise to anyone in the know; auditors from the Council of the Great City Schools once "found" that the leadership of the APS "routinely ignore audit findings".

I am supposing, Keller is concerned with findings of "financial" audits.

Of more concern to stake and interest holders are the findings from all of the other investigations; the investigations that were done when senior administrators or school board member broke the law, and the board needs to find out what happened in order to react. 

The investigations are always done by their lawyers, their private investigators, and even by their own publicly funded private police force.  

Evidence and testimony so gathered, can be more easily hidden from public knowledge.  In especially,

• when they have unlimited access to the operational fund, and 

• are allowed to spend it in meetings in secret and without any real oversight,

• to underwrite the litigation and legal weaselry they want.

Corruption and incompetence in the leadership of the APS has been investigated on a number of occasions.

Imagine that you file a request for public records for all of the findings of all of the investigations of allegations of administrative and executive corruption and or incompetence done in the last 13 years.

Imagine that APS actually produced those records in a timely manner.

You will be surprised by how bad it really is; the number of really disturbing "findings" that have come up over and over again in "audits" only to be swept under the rug.

APS fell to 2nd place, in Keller's calculations, on the entities with the most findings.  APS had the second highest number findings.  Remember, findings are bad; high numbers of them, worse.

There is a need for an immediate independent examination and review of ethics, standards and accountability in the leadership of the APS.  It needs to been done before another superintendent is hired, and the findings need to be made public.