Frankfort Taxpayer Lists Questionable Activities That Have Continued Under L-W 210 Supt. Tingley

Robin Gareiss, a Frankfort parent and business executive, told the Lincoln-Way 210 Board of Education that questionable activities continue under current Superintendent R. Scott Tingley, and suggested it’s time for new leadership at last week's mmeting at Lincoln-Way Central High School.

Gareiss outlined a list of unethical and potentially illegal activities under the Tingley administration, including breaking the law by charging students more than legally allowed for driver’s education, grossly inaccurate budgets, and renting a house to a football coach without a lease.

“This is not a personal attack against Tingley. It’s based on documented facts from his performance,” Gareiss said. “The District 210 leadership wants everyone to think all the unbelievable news that has come out of this district was from former Superintendent Wyllie’s era. Though much of it was, it has continued since his protégé, Scott Tingley, came on board."

"To keep a leader with this list of indiscretions is unconscionable with or without the scandals that have rocked this District," she said. "It will be very difficult to heal this community with the same leadership in place.”

Gareiss read a litany of questionable financial and management decisions under the Tingley’s leadership, in full here:

"Good evening.

One of the biggest things I have learned over my career as a business executive is that leadership—and having the right leaders at the right time—is extremely important to the success of any organization.

At this school district, the leaders would like us all to believe that there is one individual at fault for the inappropriate, unethical, and potentially illegal issues that have emerged in the past year. That person is retired and disgraced Supt. Lawrence Wyllie. Many of the issues happened during his tenure, but not all of them did.

His replacement was his protégé, so it’s frankly not too surprising that business as usual has continued in the past three years since Wyllie retired. This façade of: “We’re ALL victims to the big, bad, evil Wyllie’s ways” is not only insulting, it’s inaccurate.

Several of the board members sitting on the stage right now were Mr. Wyllie’s bosses and supported his negligence. You can say: “This all happened without the board’s knowledge.” But let me ask you: If someone were planning to commit an illegal, inappropriate, or unethical act, do you think he would stand on stage and proclaim it to you? Of course not! That is your JOB as board members….to look at documents, financials, spreadsheets, etc., in great detail and ask questions! Simply put, you failed! To suggest otherwise is fooling yourselves.

Yet, you still haven’t learned! And you have a chance to learn from your mistakes with the current administration. Here is what has happened since 2013 when Wyllie retired:

· Under the leadership of Mr. Tingley with implicit approval from this board (minus our two new members), you rented a house WITHOUT A LEASE to a football coach for 30% of the market value—with rent being collected only sporadically.

· Under that same leadership, you took a full year after community members informed you about exorbitant water bills at LWC to resolve the problem, which cost the taxpayers $580,000 over a three-year period (the high bills started during Wyllie’s tenure, continued after he retired, but took current administrators a year to resolve after being informed). Here’s how Christine Glatz described this little snafu: “We stubbed our toe on that,” she said, during a September 2015 budget hearing. If $580,000 is a “toe-stub,” then maybe we can understand how we’re in this mess.

· Under the leadership of Mr. Tingley and with approval from this board, Lincoln-Way broke the law by charging families 600% more than allowed for driver’s education, resulting in nearly $400,000 in refunds. This happened after Mr. Tingley received a detailed reminder with instructions from the ISBE to renew a driver’s education waiver. (What does he do? He passes the buck to Mr. Sawin because he delegated that responsibility to him. Mr. Tingley: You are the leader of this district. You failed. Yet, you refuse to take responsibility—and that is the hallmark of arrogance and a true failure as a leader. Good leaders take responsibility for anything that happens under their watch.)

· Also under this leadership, you continued to allow a private, for-profit business to use taxpayer-funded property without paying rent.

· Under the same leadership (and stemming back to Wyllie’s tenure, as well), you funneled nearly $1.9 million in no contract, no bid work to a company owned by Christine Glatz’s account executive, Beth Brouwer.

· Under the leadership of Mr. Tingley and with the approval of the board, you continued to issue and approve budgets that were so far from reality, that alone would cause any leader to be fired.

· Under the leadership of Mr. Tingley and with the approval of this board, you continued horrendous accounting practices and miscategorizing spending, according to analysis conducted by CPA Robert Ripp.

· Under the leadership of Mr. Tingley and with the approval of this board, you spent $30K of taxpayer money to reimburse Mr. Sawin for his PhD. Mr. Sawin…who was planning to retire. A degree that would have zero benefit to our district.

· Under the same leadership, you denied multiple, legitimate FOI requests from the community and journalists, resulting in the need to involve the Illinois Attorney General.

· Under the leadership of Mr. Tingley and with the approval of the board, you conducted a private investigation—which clearly indicates you had suspicion of inappropriate—if not illegal—activities by the previous superintendent. But you decided to keep that under wraps until Tribune reporter Greg Pratt dug deeply enough with FOI requests.

I emphasize: ALL of this happened since 2013 when Wyllie retired! A stellar leader does not have such a long list of indiscretions. And if you want to be a leader, you take the responsibility and accountability along with the $215K paycheck. This is nothing personal against Scott Tingley—he seems like a nice man. But he is in over his head.

Board members: you’re ignoring the obvious. The problems of the current administration are right in front of your eyes. And you’re not doing a thing to change the leadership—making you just as complicit as the board that governed over Wyllie.

His protégé, as evidenced by all the points I made, is NOT the leader to pull us out of this mess. Imagine if the board governing Wyllie’s years had a similar list in front of them of all his questionable activities. Would you, as a board member, kept him on staff if you had such a list? I would hope not. You’re in a similar position, except you have a list, right here, of all the issues that have emerged under Tingley—and there are even more being investigated.

I ask you board members to consider these decisions in another way. For example, Mrs. Glatz, you run a business. Would you keep an employee with this record of failure to lead your company to the next level? Mrs. Casey, you were a superintendent. Would you have kept a department head with this record of failure? If this were your record, would you not have resigned in embarrassment?

The bottom line is you made a huge decision—based on a significant lack of financial data—that has affected student opportunities, property values, property taxes, bond ratings, and more. I would love to think that the board, in its current composition, would be rational and think: “We have a lot of new information that we didn’t have nine months ago. Let’s take a step back and re-evaluate.” But, I know better.

You had a golden opportunity. You had a community of volunteers banded together, ready and willing to help solve these monumental problems. Your arrogance in rejecting that help was astounding. Rather than working with the community, you put a wedge through it.

Unfortunately, that wedge will continue to grow wider by keeping on the same administration with the track record described here. You need to clean house, just as any good board (educational or corporate) would do in a similar situation.

Though Lawrence Wyllie is gone, his legacy lives on with a vengeance among the Lincoln-Way leadership."