APS’ Everitt stonewalls Rep. Heather Wilson

The APS ethics and accountability scandal has been brought to the attention of Representative Heather Wilson. She wrote a letter to APS Superintendent Elizabeth Everitt. The superintendent was asked to respond to my allegations.

45 days were allowed for the APS Superintendent to respond to the congresswoman’s office. That deadline has expired and there is no response. The allegations remain un-refuted by the leadership of the APS, and a congresswoman has been disrespected.

Previously a similar letter from the office of United States Senator Pete Domenici failed to prompt any response from APS leaders, except to stonewall.

Governor Richardson has stated on the record that APS leadership enjoys a statewide reputation for dodging accountability. A reputation so bad that the Governor had to ask voters to ignore it when they voted on a third of a billion dollar tax increase upon themselves.

Mayor Martin Chavez argues over and over again, that the lack of accountability in the APS is so profound that our public schools can only be saved by a mayoral takeover of the school board.

The entire board has refused repeatedly and individually to be held accountable to any meaningful standard of conduct. Board member and candidate, Robert Lucero argues that the board is not bound even by the diminished employee code of conduct because; they are not “really” employees. A request for public records failed to produce a board member W-2 form for examination, I presume because the box for “employer” said the APS.

The Superintendent has also refused repeatedly and on the record, to hold her self honestly accountable in either her character or her competence. She can demonstrate no system in the APS whereby she or any other administrator can be held honestly accountable for ethical or criminal misconduct. That’s why she won’t respond to a Congresswoman or to a United States Senator.

Not one Albuquerque City Councilor will defend the integrity of the APS Leadership, not even Councilor Brad Winter, himself an APS administrator; nor will the Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce, nor the Character Counts Leadership Council, nor the APS Education Foundation, nor any senior APS administrator.

The expression, the elephant in the room, refers to something that everyone can see but that no one will acknowledge. The ethics and accountability scandal in the APS goes beyond an elephant in room.

It is more like an elephant squatting on your head.

“Shite” rolls downhill for a reason.

It is moving away from power. Those at the bottom of the hill are less powerful and held more accountable.

Because that works out well for the powerful.

Were there reason in the situation,the power would be at the bottom of the hill close to its rightful owners.

And accountability would roll up to the top.

APS Police Chief Gil Lovato under investigation, finally.

Among the allegations; he “misappropriated” evidence from his evidence room. He claimed that he had no access to the room. Others claimed the truth to be, he had a master key. When asked by KRQE for the truth about the master key access, he told them it was none of their business. By extension, the truth is none of the public’s business. The truth about the public service of a public servant is none of the public’s business.

That argument has a familiar and disturbing ring to it; does it not?

According to the Journal, “Another top APS official (apparently Tom Savage) instructed all sworn and civilian personnel in the school district police department not to discuss the audit or reveal what was said to auditors.” In other words, no public servant is to tell the truth to any member of the public regarding the details of their public service.

Superintendent Everitt told the Journal that “she couldn’t get into the reasons behind her decision to place Lovato on leave…” The public has no right to know the details of the betrayal of public trust by a public servant.

When asked about apparent inconsistencies in the handling of Lovato’s case, Everitt said, “It just depends on circumstances. …It’s really just based on circumstances.”

When asked why Lovato still had his master keys and a company car, Everitt offered, “it really is dependent based on individuals…”

It is a familiar theme in written standards for APS leadership; follow the rule unless you decide that you want to do something else. It is based on the premise that if you are powerful enough you can except yourself from the rules. And, if you are arrogant enough you can actually write your exception into the rule. They like to decide things on a “case by case” basis. The system works well for their friends. It works less well for their enemies.

Lovato is the subject of previous unresolved allegations of ethical and criminal misconduct in the handling of evidence. The allegations were denied a principled resolution by the leadership of the APS who used Modrall lawyers, unwitting taxpayer support of “education”, and weaknesses in the legal system to prevent the resolution of those allegations and of other allegations against senior administrators and board members.

Actual immunity from allegations of criminal misconduct was purchased for senior APS administrators and board members, by and through Modrall, when public funds were exchanged for that immunity.

When senior administrator Michael Vigil was on his way to jail for aggravated drunk driving, he is reported to have asked to be allowed to call Gil Lovato. For what do you suppose? Perhaps it was to discuss their mutual respect for the law, and for honest accountability to a meaningful standard of conduct.

According to everybody’s mother; “where there is smoke there is fire.”

So is this smoke, or is this fire?

Nature abhors a vacuum

If in public service there is a vacuum of accountability, who rushes in to fill it?

Will it be filled by those who support and will submit to honest accountability?

Having filled the vacuum, who will they then allow to join them; those who support and will submit to honest accountability?

According to the Council of Great City Schools; in the APS, administrative evaluations are “…subjective and unrelated to promotions…” That doesn’t sound like honest accountability to me.

Good leadership accepts accountability.

Great leadership demands it.

Why does it cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to fire an APS administrator?

Corruption, incompetence, and the cover up of corruption and incompetence.

You can vote yes

I don't know the details of the current plan for spending the money that you will be asked for on February 6th.

I do know that if I am elected,and with your continuing support, it will be spent differently. There will be illumination of the whole truth. Decisions will be made by stakeholders and there will be honest accountability for the spending.

There will be none lost to corruption and or incompetence.

The system will not allow it.

Site based decision making

No one of us is as smart as all of us

No one of us must make all decisions. Decisions need to be made at the location of the expertise and the experience and by stakeholders; and not at the accumulation of power.

The best use of power in public service is not to make decisions, but to guarantee that power is exercised according to the expressed interests of its rightful owners.

I guess we just won’t ask

With the removal of the public forum from school board meetings, the forum is no longer on the record; questions asked during the forum can now be ignored with impunity.

Stakeholders can no longer expect answers to questions like:

• Why did the board unnecessarily renovate a board room at a cost of $600,000 while students are being taught in hallways and closets?
• Why is there no one to hold accountable for that decision?
• Have the Leaders of the APS deliberately, methodically, and routinely ignored the requirements of the New Mexico Inspection of Public Records Act, and the Open Meetings Act, and the Governmental Conduct Act?
• Will the record of the tax dollars paid to the lawyers of Modrall, show that the money was spent in the public best interest; or will it show that it was spent enabling senior administrators and board members to dodge accountability to any meaningful standard of conduct?
• Character Counts Leadership Council President, NM Broadcasters Association President and, APS School Board President Paula Maes is married to the President of the Modrall Law Firm. They are the third in the axis of administration, board, and Modrall; the one that stands between APS Leadership and honest accountability. Is this relationship appropriate? Has it been abused?
• Did APS Leaders, by and through lawyers from Modrall, purchase personal immunity from accountability to allegations of felony criminal misconduct, with tax dollars?
• Does their record show that they are accountable to the law?
• What justifies the fact that students in the APS are accountable to the Pillars of Character Counts; and the Leaders of the APS are not?
• Is it acceptable for them to self-except themselves from accountability to the standard they enforce upon students?
• Are they accountable as role models?
• Are they obligated to lead by example?
• Why is prohibited behavior routinely permitted on school campuses; why are students in charge in schools?
• Why does the District have no discipline philosophy despite the obvious problems caused by the lack of discipline in schools?
• Are administrative evaluations still “… subjective and unrelated to promotions or step placement…”?
• Is the culture of the APS still one of retribution and retaliation?
• Why won’t APS Leaders refute even one allegation that has been made against them? Why is stonewalling their only response?
• Has the Leadership of the APS deliberately interfered with efforts to inform stakeholders and to enable their participation in decisions that affect their interests?
• What is the ethical justification for removing pubic forum from the public record?
• What is the justification for removing from their own code of conduct the expectation that, “…in no case shall the standard for an adult be lower than the standard for students…?
• Why won’t they answer the question; will you hold yourself honestly accountable to a meaningful standard of conduct?



There are other questions of course. These are enough to prove that they will not answer even one; … on the record.

And that is why the public forum is no longer on the public record.

If the Journal and Trib asked these questions, and then reported the truth to stakeholders; the results of the February 6 elections would be affected.

Does it not follow then that, their refusal to investigate and report upon the APS ethics and accountability scandal will affect the election as well?

Are they deliberately fixing an election?

That would be wrong; right?

APS school board candidate bounced from Board Meetings.

It had to do with a dispute over parliamentary authority.

APS Board Policy B.14 Parliamentary Authority

Roberts' Rules of Order, newly revised, will govern the Board of Education, except when state regulations prevail. …Actual procedures will be left to the discretion of the Board president.

Under Robert’s Rules of Order, it is at times appropriate to interrupt a meeting. An interruption that is provided for by the rules is not a disruption.

But if you are powerful, unaccountable, and so inclined, you can suspend the rules and declare the interruption a “disruption”. And then summon four members of your Praetorian Guard to escort the offender away. Twice.

One would think from reading board policy that board meetings are subject to Robert’s Rules of Order. Not so.

The final sentence manifests the fountain of the ethics and accountability issues in the APS Leadership; the belief that rules only apply until you want to do something else instead.

Sacrifice is the currency of commitment

Because our power is exercised by and through public servants; it is important that public servants are accountable to us. It is our only control over the power we entrust to them.

Public forum is the only place where a community member can personally hold public servants accountable for their conduct and their competence.

When the public forum was removed from the public record; it was at the forfeit of its purpose.

Public servants have decided that they will not answer questions about their public service on the record.

We have lost control of our power. What more proof do you need than the fact that they can refuse to answer questions about what they are doing with it? And then get away with it.

It is unacceptable. We must regain control over our power. We do that by establishing accountability for its use; accountability to us.

With membership in a community comes dues; the obligation to fair share the burdens which must be borne in community best interests. Sometimes the burden includes standing in defense of principles that are important to the community.

Like the following principle.

The least powerful citizen should be able to hold the most powerful public servant honestly accountable for their conduct and their competence.

Those who believe in that principle have dues to pay in its defense.

The only proof of commitment to a principle is to stand up in its defense; even at some sacrifice. There is no equivalent gesture. There is walking the walk; and there is everything else.

Principles are protected only by those standing in their defense.

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. Martin Luther King, Jr

Public forum died Thursday evening not by the words of its enemies. It died by the silence of its friends.

There's a school board election ahead

Yesterday, all of the school board candidates had an opportunity to meet with representatives of the unions of the people who tend to the needs of 98,000 of our sons and daughters every day in school.

I promised them a seat at the table where decisions are made.

The same promise is made to every stakeholder in any decision in which I participate as their public servant.

I guarantee that promise with a signed resignation; to be executed the instant that it has been impartially determined that I have failed in my public service; to hold myself honestly accountable to the student standard of conduct; the Pillars of Character Counts.

I offered the opportunity to regain control over their schools beginning with the meaningful participation of stakeholders in local decision making.

I offered to reestablish the authority of adults over children in schools. I will begin by reestablishing the moral authority of adults over children, by restoring to the employee code of conduct the expectation that, “… in no case shall the standard for an adult be lower than the standard for students…”

I offered to end the waste of human and financial resources by ending administrative corruption and incompetence. I intend to reach that goal by establishing for the Leadership of the Albuquerque Public Schools; honest accountability to a meaningful standard of conduct; accountability for their character and their competence, even against their will.

Leadership in the Albuquerque Public Schools will be by personal example.

I offered to surrender the truth to stakeholders. There will be absolute transparency; more than that, there will be illumination of the truth.

A good faith question will receive a good faith response. There will be a public forum at board meetings and, it will be on the record.

Board members are stewards of more than a half a billion tax dollars every year. They have a significant impact on the intellectual, physical and emotional growth of 98,000 of our sons and daughters.

It makes a difference who gets elected.

The night the forum died

What is a public forum, if it is not an opportunity for the least powerful person in our community to ask the most powerful; why did you spend $600,000 dollars on a board room that you don’t need; while there are students learning in hallways and closets?

And then expect them to answer.

NMIPRA request of the DA

(IGNORE THE DATE OF THIS POST, WHICH IS NOT ACCURATE)

Ma'am,

If you are not the custodian of public records for the District Attorney's Office; please forward this request to the custodian.

To: Custodian of Public Records, District Attorney, 2nd Judicial District

From: Charles MacQuigg, XXX XXXXX, Albuquerque, NM 87108, (505)XXX-XXXX

This constitutes a request foran opportunity to inspect and/or copy;

all public records released by the APS, to the office of the District Attorney, of the investigation of the APS police department and Gil Lovato; its former chief; whether by their internal auditor, independent investigator, or other

All other records of investigations of the APS police department regardless of source.

If you would please, acknowledge that you have recieved this request and that it meets your needs.

“There is a time for ethics reform;

And that time is now”, said Governor Bill Richardson as he began his second term today.

He knows that the Leadership of the APS refuses to hold itself honestly accountable even to the code of ethics to which they hold students accountable.

If the time is now; isn’t today the day he should tell the Journal and Trib to tell stakeholders the truth?

a copy of the NMIPRA request of the APS

To: Custodian of Public Records, Albuquerque Public Schools

From: Charles MacQuigg, XXXX, Albuquerque, NM 87108, (505)XXX_XXXX

This constitutes a request for all documents, papers, letters, books, maps, tapes, photographs, recordings and other materials, regardless of physical form or characteristics, that are used, created, received, maintained or held by or on behalf of any APS and relate to public business, whether or not the records are required by law to be created or maintained and excluding any records whose request is prohibited by any agreement between myself and APS.

All public records of investigations into the conduct and competence of Gil Lovato within his public service for the public schools; the APS.

Your previously expressed denial

"...those complaints (the public records that I requested) are confidential and are not public information because thy include "letters or memorandums which are matters of opinion"

is unacceptable.

I would point you to the law which states;
"Requested public records containing information that is exempt and nonexempt from disclosure shall be separated by the custodian prior to inspection, and the nonexempt information shall be made available for inspection."

If you would please, acknowledge that you have recieved this request and that it meets your needs.
Ched MacQuigg

a copy of the IPRA request of the BCSO

To: Custodian of Public Records, Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office

From: Charles MacQuigg, XXXX, Albuquerque, NM 87108, (505)XXX_XXXX
This constitutes a request for all documents, papers, letters, books, maps, tapes, photographs, recordings and other materials, regardless of physical form or characteristics, that are used, created, received, maintained or held by or on behalf of the BCSO and relate to public business, whether or not the records are required by law to be created or maintained.

All public records of investigations into the use of BCSO computers by APS personnel.
All public records of comunications regarding the consequenses of the conduct revealed by any investigation of the use of BCSO computers by the leadership of the APS.

Your previously expressed denial

Mr Macquigg- We have no documents that are responsive to your request.

is catagorically unacceptable; it.is simply not credible. It is impossible to believe that there are no electronic or written logs that track data for an Interstate Identification Index Checks. I insist upon an honest response.

If you would please, acknowledge that you have recieved this request and that it meets your needs.
Ched MacQuigg

Benjamin Franklin: “Force shites upon reason's back.”

By which he meant I think; if the demands of Reason and Power conflict, Power prevails. It is true, still.

In what must be among the oddest of ironies, the laws supposed to protect us from the abuse of power, do not apply to the powerful.

Next Thursday night, the APS School Board Policy Committee is going to rewrite its Policy on the Public Forum. They will rewrite the rules to legitimize their previous misconduct; to dodge accountability for violating their own policies, and to limit the exercise of free speech.

The record shows deliberate and repeated misrepresentation of the truth. They have removed the public forum from their agenda, and from the public record. No longer can a stakeholder speak on the record, except to a pre-approved issue. It makes the public forum meaningless. It ignores the obligations of a “Public Forum”. It is an assault on free speech. It defies reason.

If I am allowed to speak, I will reason that they can not dodge accountability by suppressing free speech; and yet they will anyway. Because, “power shites on the back of reason.”

And nobody will know what they have done, except the people in the room.


Update: I was not allowed to speak at either meeting. I was not allowed to speak despite the board policy requirement to follow Robert's Rules of Order. I was in fact escorted out of both meetings by uniformed members of APS' Praetorian Guard. It was not reported by the media who witnessed the dispute.

The Trib: APS renovation costs going up

The question is not so much whether a new boardroom is worth $625,920; as it is; should we be spending that much money unnecessarily; when there are so many other more important needs?

Lest you worry that your representatives on the board are not on top of things; Gordon Rowe is quoted as saying, “My general feeling is that it was more expensive than it was supposed to be.” And Mary Lee Martin offered, “I have no idea how it got so expensive.” But according to Martin, it is apparently worth the cost because, “Our employees suffered in the old building.” Define “suffered” please.

District officials anticipating irate tax payers, offered that the money didn’t come out of property taxes but from the sale of public property. And that property was originally bought with what exactly, if not with tax dollars? To top it off, Rigo Chavez said the details of the sale are “confidential”.

Let me get this straight; the details of public servants, acting within their public service, and selling public property, are not for the public to know.

Gran did not ask, or she did not report the answer to the follow up question;

What? ??

Explain it to me, like you would explain it to your child.

It’s alright for powerful people to self-except themselves from the rules because, …?

The burden of proof falls reasonably upon whom?

I aver; the leadership of the APS offers no opportunity to be held accountable for their character or their competence. And further that, that is proof of mal, mis, and non feasance as public servants; and as role models for 98,000 of our sons and daughters.

Am I to prove the negative? Am I to produce every sheet of paper that they have printed, to show than not one has on it a system that offers a principled resolution of a complaint made against them? And further that not one of those sheets of paper shows a record of honest accountability to even the student standard of conduct?

Or is the burden of proof upon them to produce that one sheet of paper?

What do I have to do to get them to surrender it? I have been asking for it for fourteen years. I have asked the newspapers to ask to see that proof; or report that it does not exist. I have taken them to court. I have run for the board.

Beyond any reasonable doubt, there is no record that proves honest accountability to any meaningful standard of conduct.

Incontrovertibly established by self evidence; voters have a right to know the truth while there is time enough to participate meaningfully in the decisions that must soon be made.