President of Colorado Springs Education Association Resigns
Face the State Staff Report
COLORADO SPRINGS – Forgery, fraud, and other alleged abuses are part of a scandal surrounding a public fund administered by a local teachers union, according to an official document just released. (Click here to view the school district memo.)
Allegations are swirling around the investigation of a $43,000 fund that pays personal expenses for teachers to attend educational conferences and other professional development activities. Funds are distributed quarterly, and recipients are limited to one reimbursement per year. The Professional Growth and Development program is funded by taxpayer dollars, but administered by the Colorado Springs Education Association, a local teachers' union in Colorado Springs.
According to an investigation by Colorado Springs School District 11, the local union president, Irma Valerio-Garcia, submitted an application with the forged signature of PROGRAD's chairwoman. The identity of the forger has not been publicly released, but Valerio-Garcia and union board member Tom Watson resigned just one day before the school district released its report. Valerio-Garcia denied any connection to the forged application, attributing her early resignation instead on a divided union board. Her resignation is not effective until July 7, 2007.
Valerio-Garcia also serves as PROGRAD's budget manager. The PROGRAD program itself has come under substantial criticism. According to the same investigation, the program approved 18 applications during an unusual "special" time frame, well after the 2005-2006 school year. One of those 18 applications included the forged signature.
Valerio-Garcia will be replaced by Mark Hampson, another union official who has also come under fire for his use of PROGRAD funds. According to the same school district investigation, Hampson used taxpayer money for political purposes by attending a 2006 Baltimore conference in Baltimore. The conference focused on organizational training and not educational improvement as is required under district policy. The investigation concluded that the conference was "of a political nature," and demanded that Hampson reimburse the district $362.27.
Colorado Springs School District 11 launched the investigation following a complaint about PROGRAD, and district Chief Financial Officer Glenn Gustafson released the report on May 16, 2007. The district has demanded that the union refund at least $1,000 in addition to the refund from the incoming union president.
In the past, the teachers' union has overseen PROGRAD, appointed all members, and even advertised the publicly funded program as a union committee. While the district is shutting down the program on June 30th, it had no further comment as of press time.
Here we go again .....
On June 10th, 2007 tallport says:
The bottom line is that it is you cannot lump all unions together no more than you can lump all businesses together. Unions are not anti-business and never have been. We are about empowering people at all levels of society. It is not wise to separate business from labor. Socrates is clearly anti-union and is simply not going to hear anything to change that,so I am not going spend much time in this debate. It is eaier to stand with authority than to challenge it. Your comments painting the entire local with one sweep is typical. Your reasoning is more corrupt than the charges.
Finally
On May 21st, 2007 Socrates says:
The public is beginning to see just how corrupt the teachers' union in Colorado Springs is. After all the fuss and ruckus over them demanding the removal of honest school board members, we now begin to get our first peeks in how it was all to protect their little corrupt rice bowls.
Makes you wonder how many signatures got forged on the recall petitions.