After School Program May Retain Current Management

Management of the After School Program of South Orange and Maplewood will, most probably, remain as is for the 2011-2012 school year.

However, the Township of Maplewood will be performing audits of the program going back to the beginning of the current contract which began in 2001. The move comes on the heels of a request by Deputy Mayor Fred Profeta, Township Committee liaison to the After School Program (ASP) Board of Governors.

According to Profeta, the ASP has been accumulating cash surpluses of several hundred thousand dollars a year, without any cash reconciliation systems — until recently — and has been depositing that money in non-interest-bearing checking accounts.

Now that audits have been completed for 2008-09 and 2009-10, the Township of Maplewood, which manages the program under the contract signed with the ASP Board of Governors in 2001, has determined that the surplus as of July 31, 2010 is $652,167. Subsequently, the Board of Governors has authorized distribution of $374,466 to the four governing parties — 50% to the Township of Maplewood, 25% to South Orange Village, 25% to the South Mountain YMCA which provides training for staff and 0% to the South Orange-Maplewood School District. (Distributions have not yet been made.)

Profeta speculates that in the 10 months since July 31, the ASP has accumulated another $250,000 in profits, based the program's financial performance in recent years. The actual number will not be known until the 2010-11 audit is completed. It is due on August 1.

However, Profeta did quell some of the concern he caused at the last Township Committee by relating that the Board of Governors would most probably keep the current management of the ASP in place — at least for 2010-11.

At the last meeting of the Board of Governors, said Profeta, there was a "serious suggestion" to keep the current management and programming in place "while the Board of Education, which holds the assets, decides what the program should look like and who should manage it." Profeta said that the Board of Governors will be meeting today, May 20, to discuss the program for next year.

At the May 3 Township Committee meeting, , which serves approximately 600 mostly elementary and middle school children in the South Orange Maplewood School District in nine school buildings throughout the two towns. ASP staffers outlined the program's philosophy and its numerous enrichment programs at the

At the May 17 Township Committee meeting, Profeta ultimately suggested that the Township Committee order an audit of the ASP going back to the beginning of the contract in 2001, as well as review the minutes of the meetings of the ASP Board of Governors to determine what the discussion had been regarding distribution over the years.

Mayor Vic DeLuca, in defense of management of the program, said that a number of start-up nonprofits utilize accountant review — which the ASP did — in lieu of an audit.

But DeLuca agreed that a closer look at the program would be helpful.

"We've been talking about this for 10 years, trying to get a handle it," said DeLuca. "It's a very good service to our community. It hasn't been broken," he added. Nonetheless, DeLuca said, "Maybe the oversight should have been different."

Finally, DeLuca asked Profeta, "What's the endgame?"

Profeta said there were several endgames.

"Transparency" was the first endgame. "You have to provide assurance to the public that everything was regular." Profeta said that, knowing the parties involved, he had not doubt of their integrity, but felt that the "public needs assurances that no abuses were made."

Profeta saw the failure to earn interest on and utilize the surpluses as a missed opportunity to "plow the money" back into the program for the benefit of the children.

He also saw it as a lost opportunity to lower the tax rate further. As Profeta reiterated in an email after the meeting, "If the 2009-2010 audit had been completed on time, more surplus could have been distributed and included in Maplewood's budget, allowing us to achieve an actual tax reduction for 2011. I am happy that we were able to achieve a zero increase budget, but an actual decrease would have been especially helpful in light of today's economy."

Ryan's concern was different. Toward the end of the discussion, he stated, "The important question is not retrospective, but what we are doing for an after school program on September 1." Ryan felt the Board of Governors needed to prioritize getting an arrangement in place for the next school year.

Profeta assured Ryan that the ASP Board of Governors would discuss the program for next year at its Friday meeting and that he would give them "our recommendations."