Please listen to Paula's comments on nepotism, as well as Elaine's "rebuttal" from Monday's school board meeting. The school board meeting video is available here. Paula begins at 1:30:57. Elaine begins at 1:38:33. The clip can be viewed here.
Besides her belligerent demeanor during Comments or Questions from Residents or Taxpayers at the October 9, 2017 school board meeting, I wanted to share a little more background on Elaine Cappucci's bio from the CCRB campaign website.
I was part of the team that negotiated the current Act 93 agreement for our District administrators.That is not something I would be proud of, especially with what has been revealed with Jan Klein's creative accounting in recent days. The Act 93 Agreement can be found here. You can read about Jan Klein's salary adjustment here. Twenty MTLSD administrators received salary increases Please take the time to read the comments in that 2012 post. We were complaining about Jan's sloppy bookkeeping five years ago!
Elaine Cappucci is part of the Million Dollar Heist also known as the Century of Excellence Campaign Committee. Mary Birks likes to refer to it as a 100 year plan. Since Timmy doesn't have an original thought, Elaine has a major role as Timmy's key Key Communicator.
You vote for Elaine Cappucci, it is job security for Janice Klein and Timothy Steinhauer!
We can thank Elaine Cappucci for this as well!
ReplyDelete““In Allegheny County, 35 of the 43 school districts requested and were approved for an exception in the past 10 years. The Mt. Lebanon School District was approved for $17 million in exceptions, the most of any school district in the county. It was followed by the North Allegheny and Pine-Richland school districts. All three are among the state’s 40 wealthiest school districts.
However, those districts also demonstrate the differences between how often the exceptions are actually used.
Even though Pine-Richland was approved to raise property taxes above inflation six times in nine years, it increased its property tax rate three times. Mt. Lebanon increased property taxes at least six times and requested a hike above inflation every year.
Those big salary increases to the administration is one of the reasons they can’t keep up with pension costs!
If Cappucci gets elected the minute see expresses an opinion or tries to influence the board or vote on anything to do with teacher compensation, scheduling, class sizes, sports schedules, benefits or healthcare she will be in immediate violation of state ethics laws.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.psba.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Essentials-for-School-Board-Service-2016.pdf
Page 24) “6:10. What does the concept “conflict of interest” mean and why should school directors try to avoid such conflicts?The term “conflict of interest” in the broader context of school board service refers to any potential clash between the public interest and the private financial interest of an individual director. Both the School Code and the Public Official and Employees Ethics Act prohibit various categories of conflicts of interest that school directors and other public officials must take great care to avoid. A public official must not vote on or otherwise attempt to influence decisions on matters that could result in private financial gain for themselves, their families, or businesses with which they or their families are associated. Violations can result in civil penalties, criminal prosecution and being banned from holding public office or public employment. The Ethics Act also requires school directors to file annual statements of financial interest. The free online Conflicts of Interest course available in PSBA’s LEARN Portal will teach you about the restrictions and requirements you must understand and be able to navigate.”
“Violations can result in civil penalties, criminal prosecution and being banned from holding public office or public employment.”
She should probably by all rights be banned from holding public office... does anyone really believe he didn’t discuss her son’s employment with Steinhauer while she was on the board?
As a JCC member I've also found her to be rude and impatient.
ReplyDeleteYou know it would almost be funny to see Elaine Cappucci get re-elected, to a board that she resigned from...Because she could not be an effective productive member of the board due to her sons employment with the school district. Elaine Cappucci would be a lame duck on this board!! How much fun would that be for her.
ReplyDeleteIt’s only a problem for her if the state enforced its ethics codes.
ReplyDeleteWe’ll will see how it goes for Birks on her ethics violation.
In watching The clip of Paula Bonjorno lined in this post—
ReplyDelete“This board never tolerates impropriety... “ says School Director Lebowitz.
Interesting! Then how is it that President Birks was allowed to vote on the school district’s financial contribution to Outreach if impropriety is not tolerated.
OK, Birks admits she didn’t realize the board vote had anything to do with Outreach money. Surely, some member or members were cognizant that Birks makes a salary from Outreach and therefore was forbidden by ethics laws from voting on approving money to go to that organization.
Solicitor Peterson certainly should have been aware.
Furthermore, the board also seems to be very tolerant of revisions to what should be closed and approved financial statements for the Fundraiser.
These are just two examples of what may be tolerance of impropriety, there are more.