Jessica McBride & Jim Piwowarczyk
State School Superintendent Jill Underly’s executive director, the powerful leftist ex=campaign operative Sachin Chheda, donated to the committee working to push through a $252 million Milwaukee Public Schools referendum at the same time DPI was failing to tell the public that the district had not turned in key financial data as far back as September.
DPI finally came clean with the public in a May 24 scathing letter to Milwaukee Public Schools that outlined a series of missing financial documents, including its annual report and certified budget data, a problem dating back months. The School Board, which was not told by DPI about the missing financial data until May 24, along with the public, met on June 3 to consider the fate of Superintendent Keith Posley, who is, correctly, absorbing a lot of the outrage. Posley ended up resigning.
According to DPI’s letter, MPS “continues to fail to provide key required financial data.” As of May 24, MPS had not submitted required financial reports, “some of which are now more than eight months overdue.”
The fiscal meltdown has significant impact. “Continuing to wait for MPS to submit its missing financial data jeopardizes the timing of the aid reports, negatively impacting every Wisconsin school district,” DPI wrote MPS in the May letter – conveniently about two months after the referendum.
Who knew what and when?
Who knew what and when? Why didn’t those people tell Milwaukee taxpayers before they voted on a $252 million referendum for MPS in April? Was there an active effort to cover up the problems before the referendum?
The state Department of Public Instruction, run by leftist Schools Superintendent Underly, knew for months before the April referendum election that MPS had failed to submit key financial data. We know this from the DPI’s own letter, which admits it.
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Last year, MPS had 11.1% proficiency in math and 17.3% in English language arts. Yet b/c DPI changed the report card in a way that helps MPS schools avoid being held accountable for their failure to educate kids, MPS is in the “meets expectations” category. Totally ridiculous