My response coming soon! --Dr. Louie F. Rodriguez
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Miami Herald
Posted on Wed, Sep. 10, 2008
Rudy Crew gets $368,000 to leave Miami-Dade schools
BY KATHLEEN McGRORY
Miami-Dade Schools Superintendent Rudy Crew and the School Board agreed to part ways Wednesday, ending Crew's tenure at the helm of the nation's fourth largest school district.
To buyout Crew's contract, the board will pay the schools chief a lump sum of $297,000. It will also provide Crew with health, disability and insurance benefits for two years and will contribute to his retirement.
The total severance package will cost the district $368,000, board Chairman Agustín Barrera said.
Said Barrera: ``Do we want to continue to barrage of attacking the administration publicly?''
Voting for the agreement: Barrera, board Vice Chairwoman Perla Tabares Hantman and board members Wilbert ''Tee'' Holloway, Martin Karp and Solomon Stinson.
''Man, if I were him, I'd be so happy,'' said Stinson. ``I'd be packing my clothes, leaving my house and getting the hell out of Dade County.''
Crew, whose final few months in Miami-Dade were riddled with controversy, did not attend the meeting.
Crew's attorney H.T. Smith said Crew was happy with the settlement, but that he had ``mixed emotions.''
''He loves the children, and he's concerned about the progress that's going to be made on his initiatives like the Parent Academy,'' Smith said. ``But he understands that the minority of board members have made him ineffective.''
Smith would not say if Crew had another job lined up. But he added, ``There will be a place for him in public education.''
Today is Crew's 58th birthday, his attorney said.
It's not the first time the Miami-Dade School board has ended its relationship with a schools chief on his birthday.
In 2001, Roger C. Cuevas was fired on a 6-3 vote on his 58th birthday.
Board members said they were happy to see the Crew matter settled and were already considering how to move forward.
Some board members said they believed the board would name Crew's successor later on in the meeting.
The decision to buy out Crew, this year's National Superintendent of the Year, came after only a short discussion at a School Board meeting Wednesday. Crew had said publicly that he was ready to leave the district, and even Crew's supporters said they wanted to move on.
Some board members were reluctant to pay Crew a severance package, given Crew's $325,000 salary.
Board member Marta Pérez called the deal ''overly generous,'' and said the board could not afford it.
''I think this could run into the millions of dollars,'' said Pérez, who has been one of Crew's most vocal critics. ``It seems to me that we are really giving and giving. And we don't have the money to give.''
Board member Renier Diaz de la Portilla asked Crew to resign without taking any severance.
''The district cannot afford this golden parachute,'' he said. ``How many jobs will be lost? How will it affect the classrooms?''
But Murray A. Greenberg, who was hired by the district last week to negotiate the buyout, called the deal ``fair.''
''This was the best we could do under the time constraints,'' he said.
Crew was wooed to Miami in 2004, where he became the highest paid superintendent in the country. Community leaders chipped in to buy him a house.
Crew will leave South Florida with a mixed record.
During his tenure, students posted incremental gains in reading, writing and math on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test.
Crew also helped reduce school overcrowding, and rallied businesses and local municipalities to take part in the school system.
But Crew's management abilities were called into question when the district came in overbudget two years in a row. And critics lambasted him for failing to reach out to Miami's Cuban community.
In June, board member Diaz de la Portilla, led a charge to fire Crew for cause.
While his campaign gained momentum over the summer, it was ultimately defeated in a 5-4 vote in August.
Later that month, Crew lost his majority on the board when incumbent School Board member Evelyn Greer lost her seat to retired principal Larry Feldman. Greer did not attend Wednesday's meeting.
On Thursday, the board hired Greenberg and voted to negotiate a buyout.
Had the board not negotiated a buyout, it could have fired Crew for any reason. But without cause, the board would have had to pay Crew what remains in his contract, or about $700,000.
Showing posts with label rudy crew. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rudy crew. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Monday, September 8, 2008
Miami Schools Chief to Leave Amid Discord (from NY Times)
It is so interesting how the tone of this article in the NY Times differs from those out of south Florida. Dr. Crew's challenges in Miami go far beyond the school board. I have been following the story in Miami for a while now and I have yet to hear that Dr. Crew's departure in New York was somehow connected to a dispute with then Mayor Giuliani (see below). To my knowledge, this has yet to be mentioned in South Florida. I believe that Dr. Crew, as the nation's Superintendent of the Year, is being pushed out and the process seems to have started a long time ago. -Dr. Louie F. Rodriguez
------------------------------------------------------------------------
New York Times
September 9, 2008
Miami Schools Chief to Leave Amid Discord
By DAMIEN CAVE and YOLANNE ALMANZAR
MIAMI — The Miami-Dade County School Board and Rudy Crew, the bold superintendent who came here four years ago promising to overhaul education as he did in New York City, have agreed to part ways.
The board voted Monday to begin negotiations on a severance package, capping more than a year filled with racial recriminations and rising tensions over the school budget.
“Right now we have irreconcilable differences,” the board’s chairman, Agustin J. Barrera, said at a special meeting to discuss Dr. Crew. “There are board members that, no matter what the superintendent does, will never support him.”
Dr. Crew, who did not attend Monday’s meeting, declined to comment. In an interview published Sunday in The Miami Herald, he said, “I feel like I did the best I could.”
The departure brings to a close Dr. Crew’s second stint as a big-city superintendent. He spent four years leading the New York City schools, leaving in 1999 with a mixed record after a dispute with Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani over Mr. Giuliani’s desire to use tax money to send children to private school.
Dr. Crew went on to become director of district reform initiatives at the Stupski Foundation, a private philanthropic organization, and arrived in Miami in 2004. Promising to raise achievement in the nation’s fourth-largest school district, with 353,000 students, he seized control of the worst schools from local administrators and raised salaries for teachers who agreed to work in them.
He had some success. More Miami students now take Advanced Placement courses, a measure of college preparedness, and scores on state achievement tests have increased slightly but steadily in math, reading and writing since 2004.
The district initially seemed pleased. In 2006, Dr. Crew’s contract was extended through 2010, when his salary was to peak at $360,000 plus as much as $80,000 in a bonus. But over the last year, with Miami-Dade schools struggling under the strain of state budget cuts and declining enrollment, he has increasingly come under fire.
A growing mood of racial distrust has also poisoned the debate. In 2006, two members of Dr. Crew’s staff accused Ralph Arza, a white Cuban-American who was then a member of the Florida House, of using racial epithets to describe the superintendent, who is black. The episode ultimately led to Mr. Arza’s resignation from the Legislature.
Dr. Crew, meanwhile, has been accused of discrimination by several former employees, including a white woman who says she was demoted for the sake of diversity. (Dr. Crew has denied any bias.)
The volatile situation peaked at a school board meeting last week when a Hispanic member of the board severely criticized the superintendent’s proposal to balance the district’s $5.5 billion budget by reducing spending on bilingual education, prompting Dr. Crew to respond, “Do not talk to me like a dog!”
Monday’s meeting was quieter with Dr. Crew absent. But several of the board’s nine members maintained that he deserved much of the blame for what is now a $66 million budget shortfall for the 2008-9 school year. One member, Renier Diaz de la Portilla, said Dr. Crew should be fired or resign, without severance.
“I think we have an obligation to seek every possible remedy that does not involve giving Rudy Crew more money,” Mr. Diaz de la Portilla said. “We haven’t explored any other options other than giving Rudy Crew a golden parachute, and I think that’s wrong. That’s not what I was elected to do.”
A settlement seems likely, though. Murray A. Greenberg, outside counsel for the board, pointed out that Dr. Crew’s contract allowed for his firing without severance only if the district could prove “gross insubordination,” a difficult task.
Wilbert Holloway, one of the few members who support Dr. Crew, said the board and the superintendent just wanted to move on.
“I think that today’s effort is a material way of stopping and saying, ‘The time has come that we part,’ ” Dr. Holloway said. “Let’s try to stop the attacks and the charges against this individual and move forward.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
New York Times
September 9, 2008
Miami Schools Chief to Leave Amid Discord
By DAMIEN CAVE and YOLANNE ALMANZAR
MIAMI — The Miami-Dade County School Board and Rudy Crew, the bold superintendent who came here four years ago promising to overhaul education as he did in New York City, have agreed to part ways.
The board voted Monday to begin negotiations on a severance package, capping more than a year filled with racial recriminations and rising tensions over the school budget.
“Right now we have irreconcilable differences,” the board’s chairman, Agustin J. Barrera, said at a special meeting to discuss Dr. Crew. “There are board members that, no matter what the superintendent does, will never support him.”
Dr. Crew, who did not attend Monday’s meeting, declined to comment. In an interview published Sunday in The Miami Herald, he said, “I feel like I did the best I could.”
The departure brings to a close Dr. Crew’s second stint as a big-city superintendent. He spent four years leading the New York City schools, leaving in 1999 with a mixed record after a dispute with Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani over Mr. Giuliani’s desire to use tax money to send children to private school.
Dr. Crew went on to become director of district reform initiatives at the Stupski Foundation, a private philanthropic organization, and arrived in Miami in 2004. Promising to raise achievement in the nation’s fourth-largest school district, with 353,000 students, he seized control of the worst schools from local administrators and raised salaries for teachers who agreed to work in them.
He had some success. More Miami students now take Advanced Placement courses, a measure of college preparedness, and scores on state achievement tests have increased slightly but steadily in math, reading and writing since 2004.
The district initially seemed pleased. In 2006, Dr. Crew’s contract was extended through 2010, when his salary was to peak at $360,000 plus as much as $80,000 in a bonus. But over the last year, with Miami-Dade schools struggling under the strain of state budget cuts and declining enrollment, he has increasingly come under fire.
A growing mood of racial distrust has also poisoned the debate. In 2006, two members of Dr. Crew’s staff accused Ralph Arza, a white Cuban-American who was then a member of the Florida House, of using racial epithets to describe the superintendent, who is black. The episode ultimately led to Mr. Arza’s resignation from the Legislature.
Dr. Crew, meanwhile, has been accused of discrimination by several former employees, including a white woman who says she was demoted for the sake of diversity. (Dr. Crew has denied any bias.)
The volatile situation peaked at a school board meeting last week when a Hispanic member of the board severely criticized the superintendent’s proposal to balance the district’s $5.5 billion budget by reducing spending on bilingual education, prompting Dr. Crew to respond, “Do not talk to me like a dog!”
Monday’s meeting was quieter with Dr. Crew absent. But several of the board’s nine members maintained that he deserved much of the blame for what is now a $66 million budget shortfall for the 2008-9 school year. One member, Renier Diaz de la Portilla, said Dr. Crew should be fired or resign, without severance.
“I think we have an obligation to seek every possible remedy that does not involve giving Rudy Crew more money,” Mr. Diaz de la Portilla said. “We haven’t explored any other options other than giving Rudy Crew a golden parachute, and I think that’s wrong. That’s not what I was elected to do.”
A settlement seems likely, though. Murray A. Greenberg, outside counsel for the board, pointed out that Dr. Crew’s contract allowed for his firing without severance only if the district could prove “gross insubordination,” a difficult task.
Wilbert Holloway, one of the few members who support Dr. Crew, said the board and the superintendent just wanted to move on.
“I think that today’s effort is a material way of stopping and saying, ‘The time has come that we part,’ ” Dr. Holloway said. “Let’s try to stop the attacks and the charges against this individual and move forward.”
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Inadequate coverage of Miami-Dade School Board-Rudy Crew saga (from Miami Herald)
Definitley some questions we should be thinking about as this chapter unfolds.
-Dr. Louie F. Rodriguez
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miami Herald
Posted on Sun, Sep. 07, 2008
Inadequate coverage of Miami-Dade School Board-Rudy Crew saga
BY EDWARD SCHUMACHER-MATOS
No story is more important to you and me as readers of The Miami Herald than the state of our schools. In them lie not just the obvious future of our children, but the less obvious future of our local economy, our home values and our civic culture.
So the shocking fall of Miami-Dade schools superintendent Rudy Crew from being named National Superintendent of the Year by his peers to what even his backers say will be his likely firing or resignation would seem to be grist for crucial stories about just what is happening in the schools.
But those stories have gone missing. Since the saga devolved over the past 10 weeks from School Board grousing to racially tinged charges by Crew, who is African-American, of being ''lynched'' and ''treated like a dog,'' the coverage has been almost exclusively about political in-fighting, with mostly a ''he-said, she-said'' sort of false objectivity.
Manny Garcia, Senior Editor of News, said that The Herald has been planning for some time to do a more analytical step-back but that the daily rush of a fast-evolving story and the changes created by the recent staff cutbacks have interfered. The education editor took a recent buyout, and a new education editor, Heidi Carr, began last week.
''I don't want it to be an excuse,'' Garcia said. ``We have to deliver strong daily copy, but we need also to find the time to give the enterprise and context readers expect from us.''
As I write, an analytical story that Garcia says will ''look at benchmarks of how superintendents are normally measured across the country'' and examines the challenges that await the next superintendent is being prepared and will run elsewhere in the paper today. I have not seen the article, but I question whether even it will be enough.
[Editor's note: The article mentioned above, which was researched and reported over the past three weeks, appears today on Page 1A.]
The article also comes late. Some board members were up for reelection two weeks ago, which resulted in a balance of power shifting to Crew's critics. Whether better coverage would have changed the vote will never be known.
None of my criticism is meant to take sides. Crew often seems to be his own worst enemy. He has been strangely poor at board, media and community relations. His lapses have allowed critics to set the tone of the debate and make even mundane issues a referendum on his performance. This doesn't mean that The Miami Herald should allow itself to be played.
ISSUES THAT MATTER
Two real issues for readers, it seems to me, are whether Crew has been a good educator and a good manager.
On the first, the consensus seems to be that Crew has raised the educational quality of the schools. Yet, not one article over the past 10 weeks explored Crew's educational record. A review of the past six months finds several good features on individual schools and a wonderful back-to-school package. But there is little analytical coverage, and the one story that attempts this is a hatchet job. ''Zone initiative ineffective,'' said the June 27 headline about an internal report ''obtained'' by The Herald. The ''ineffectiveness'' concerned the first year of the new School Improvement Zone program. That year ended two years ago. The story offered almost nothing about the program's development since, making the report near worthless today.
Yet it was treated as a great revelation, critical of a signature Crew innovation. It even quoted Crew critic and board member Ana Rivas Logan saying of the entire program: ''According to this report, it was a total flop.'' I have no idea if the program today is a failure, but that was a dishonest quote about a report that dealt only with the first year. It never should have been allowed to stand alone, if even published.
Crew's management record in going over this and last year's budgets is the source of much criticism. This year's overrun, by my simple calculation from the confusing stories, is less than 1.5 percent. Is that major? Unprecedented? I don't know from The Herald's coverage, which never analyzes the budget.
I do know that news columnist Miriam Marquez was unfair when she blamed Crew for sloppiness because of an unjustified $10,000 moving expense by a school attorney. The executive in charge of a $5.5 billion budget should not be checking employee expense accounts.
One story by reporter Nirvi Shah at least gave an insightful measure by which to judge Crew. Shah compared the more-harmonious board and budget process in Broward County. There, new superintendent Jim Notter, according to Shah, is more solicitous of the board than Crew. He also began last year to make larger cutbacks in anticipation of state cuts.
The implications I derive from the coverage and reader letters is that Crew may have been more focused on pushing educational improvements, despite the new budget realities. ''We're at a crossroads here,'' board chairman Agustín Barrera says in a July 16 story by Kathleen McGrory that nicely lists a lot of the budget and political issues. ``We're being funded for basic education, and that's what we're going to have to provide.''
Wow. If that's true, where are the follow-up stories on the implications of what that means not just for schoolchildren, but for South Florida in a globally competitive information age? School Board members and state legislators can hide from confronting real issues, but The Miami Herald should not.
Another difficult budget issue readers deserved to know more about concerns withholding teacher raises and/or firing hundreds of teachers. What are the implications of Crew's whopping proposal of front-office cuts of 30 percent?
CRITICAL QUESTIONS
Board member Renier Díaz de la Portilla says in one story that Crew was responsible for ''a mistake classifying special-needs students that contributed to a $66 million overage in the 2007-08 budget.'' He says: ''I don't think taxpayers should continue to foot the bill for his incompetence and negligence.'' OK. But I as a reader want the impartial Herald to tell me what the truth is about this mysterious overage. Is this charge demagoguery, or did Crew make an egregious mistake?
The damage to Crew is done by leaving the charge standing and unchallenged.
Many letter writers and online comments say a Cuban-American vendetta is behind the attacks on Crew because of earlier alleged slights. Marquez persuasively reports in a column that the blame is exaggerated, and that Crew was at fault for not winning over those parts of the Cuban community opposed to him. Still, this sensitive issue and the role of Cuban talk radio deserved more reporting.
After Crew barely survived a vote last month on his tenure, reporter Matthew Pinzur brought some needed perspective to what at least Crew's weakened status means. Calling it a ''dark soap opera that has polarized the community and shoved educational issues off stage.'' Pinzur writes: ''The most vital question is whether the heady politics that produced Monday's 5-4 vote will color every future policy debate of Crew's tenure.'' It might be possible, others say, but Pinzur himself concludes: ``Navigating such narrow political waters can be exhaustingly time-consuming and require a level of compromise and tongue-biting that Crew has rarely shown.''
Now that is good analysis. Readers should have had more of that.
http://www.miamiherald.com
-Dr. Louie F. Rodriguez
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miami Herald
Posted on Sun, Sep. 07, 2008
Inadequate coverage of Miami-Dade School Board-Rudy Crew saga
BY EDWARD SCHUMACHER-MATOS
No story is more important to you and me as readers of The Miami Herald than the state of our schools. In them lie not just the obvious future of our children, but the less obvious future of our local economy, our home values and our civic culture.
So the shocking fall of Miami-Dade schools superintendent Rudy Crew from being named National Superintendent of the Year by his peers to what even his backers say will be his likely firing or resignation would seem to be grist for crucial stories about just what is happening in the schools.
But those stories have gone missing. Since the saga devolved over the past 10 weeks from School Board grousing to racially tinged charges by Crew, who is African-American, of being ''lynched'' and ''treated like a dog,'' the coverage has been almost exclusively about political in-fighting, with mostly a ''he-said, she-said'' sort of false objectivity.
Manny Garcia, Senior Editor of News, said that The Herald has been planning for some time to do a more analytical step-back but that the daily rush of a fast-evolving story and the changes created by the recent staff cutbacks have interfered. The education editor took a recent buyout, and a new education editor, Heidi Carr, began last week.
''I don't want it to be an excuse,'' Garcia said. ``We have to deliver strong daily copy, but we need also to find the time to give the enterprise and context readers expect from us.''
As I write, an analytical story that Garcia says will ''look at benchmarks of how superintendents are normally measured across the country'' and examines the challenges that await the next superintendent is being prepared and will run elsewhere in the paper today. I have not seen the article, but I question whether even it will be enough.
[Editor's note: The article mentioned above, which was researched and reported over the past three weeks, appears today on Page 1A.]
The article also comes late. Some board members were up for reelection two weeks ago, which resulted in a balance of power shifting to Crew's critics. Whether better coverage would have changed the vote will never be known.
None of my criticism is meant to take sides. Crew often seems to be his own worst enemy. He has been strangely poor at board, media and community relations. His lapses have allowed critics to set the tone of the debate and make even mundane issues a referendum on his performance. This doesn't mean that The Miami Herald should allow itself to be played.
ISSUES THAT MATTER
Two real issues for readers, it seems to me, are whether Crew has been a good educator and a good manager.
On the first, the consensus seems to be that Crew has raised the educational quality of the schools. Yet, not one article over the past 10 weeks explored Crew's educational record. A review of the past six months finds several good features on individual schools and a wonderful back-to-school package. But there is little analytical coverage, and the one story that attempts this is a hatchet job. ''Zone initiative ineffective,'' said the June 27 headline about an internal report ''obtained'' by The Herald. The ''ineffectiveness'' concerned the first year of the new School Improvement Zone program. That year ended two years ago. The story offered almost nothing about the program's development since, making the report near worthless today.
Yet it was treated as a great revelation, critical of a signature Crew innovation. It even quoted Crew critic and board member Ana Rivas Logan saying of the entire program: ''According to this report, it was a total flop.'' I have no idea if the program today is a failure, but that was a dishonest quote about a report that dealt only with the first year. It never should have been allowed to stand alone, if even published.
Crew's management record in going over this and last year's budgets is the source of much criticism. This year's overrun, by my simple calculation from the confusing stories, is less than 1.5 percent. Is that major? Unprecedented? I don't know from The Herald's coverage, which never analyzes the budget.
I do know that news columnist Miriam Marquez was unfair when she blamed Crew for sloppiness because of an unjustified $10,000 moving expense by a school attorney. The executive in charge of a $5.5 billion budget should not be checking employee expense accounts.
One story by reporter Nirvi Shah at least gave an insightful measure by which to judge Crew. Shah compared the more-harmonious board and budget process in Broward County. There, new superintendent Jim Notter, according to Shah, is more solicitous of the board than Crew. He also began last year to make larger cutbacks in anticipation of state cuts.
The implications I derive from the coverage and reader letters is that Crew may have been more focused on pushing educational improvements, despite the new budget realities. ''We're at a crossroads here,'' board chairman Agustín Barrera says in a July 16 story by Kathleen McGrory that nicely lists a lot of the budget and political issues. ``We're being funded for basic education, and that's what we're going to have to provide.''
Wow. If that's true, where are the follow-up stories on the implications of what that means not just for schoolchildren, but for South Florida in a globally competitive information age? School Board members and state legislators can hide from confronting real issues, but The Miami Herald should not.
Another difficult budget issue readers deserved to know more about concerns withholding teacher raises and/or firing hundreds of teachers. What are the implications of Crew's whopping proposal of front-office cuts of 30 percent?
CRITICAL QUESTIONS
Board member Renier Díaz de la Portilla says in one story that Crew was responsible for ''a mistake classifying special-needs students that contributed to a $66 million overage in the 2007-08 budget.'' He says: ''I don't think taxpayers should continue to foot the bill for his incompetence and negligence.'' OK. But I as a reader want the impartial Herald to tell me what the truth is about this mysterious overage. Is this charge demagoguery, or did Crew make an egregious mistake?
The damage to Crew is done by leaving the charge standing and unchallenged.
Many letter writers and online comments say a Cuban-American vendetta is behind the attacks on Crew because of earlier alleged slights. Marquez persuasively reports in a column that the blame is exaggerated, and that Crew was at fault for not winning over those parts of the Cuban community opposed to him. Still, this sensitive issue and the role of Cuban talk radio deserved more reporting.
After Crew barely survived a vote last month on his tenure, reporter Matthew Pinzur brought some needed perspective to what at least Crew's weakened status means. Calling it a ''dark soap opera that has polarized the community and shoved educational issues off stage.'' Pinzur writes: ''The most vital question is whether the heady politics that produced Monday's 5-4 vote will color every future policy debate of Crew's tenure.'' It might be possible, others say, but Pinzur himself concludes: ``Navigating such narrow political waters can be exhaustingly time-consuming and require a level of compromise and tongue-biting that Crew has rarely shown.''
Now that is good analysis. Readers should have had more of that.
http://www.miamiherald.com
Friday, September 5, 2008
The final act in Crew drama is playing out (from Miami Herald)
With this on-going issue, I still wonder, To what extent has Dr. Crew been given the support and opportunity to excel in this city? Once again, we are talking about one of the most recognized superintendents in the country. I also wonder how the budget issue has become so politicized that any positive strides in the district can easily go unrecognized. --Dr. Louie F. Rodriguez
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miami Herald
Posted on Fri, Sep. 05, 2008
The final act in Crew drama is playing out
MYRIAM MARQUEZ
The writing's on the blackboard. Rudy Crew's a goner.
The Dollar Principal's surprise election to the Miami-Dade School Board has become a symbol of voters' frustration with the superintendent's tin ear, thin skin and oversized ego. And it's a shame, really, because Crew has good ideas on education reform.
But he has been a not-so-good steward of the public's money.
Retired middle-school principal Larry Feldman's populist campaign, backed by more than $90,000 from the teachers' union, signals a mind change on a board that has consistently voted 5-4 to protect the superintendent. Feldman replaces a Crew backer.
On Thursday, the board agreed to hire Murray Greenberg, a retired attorney for Miami-Dade County government, to figure out grounds for dismissal in the superintendent's contract.
CHANGE OF HEART
Until recently, I argued it would be unfair to fire Crew because he has not been derelict in his duty. Then he decided that a meeting called to look into the almost $300 million hole in this year's budget wasn't worth attending.
Crew is ready to go -- with or without legal action. He's had four years of work in the nation's fourth-largest school district, about a year more than the average for big-city superintendents.
The problem has been Crew's refusal to be up front with board members when they have pressed for answers on the budget. He can't blame the governor or the Legislature for Miami-Dade schools' financial mess. Tallahassee, facing dwindling tax revenue in a tanking economy, cut about $74 million from the district's budget.
Where did the rest of the losses come from? The head spins.
In February, a state audit uncovered that the district paid $27.8 million in overtime during the last fiscal year and didn't bother to properly document the spending.
In April, we learned that district officials didn't bother to budget for a $36 million jump in healthcare benefits for teachers and other employees. Teachers balked at having their meager raises eaten up by insurance costs. So Crew gave in, but then he went after their salary increases pegged for this year.
It's been a drama ever since. And for good reason.
In June, the board learned, for the first time, that the district was ending the fiscal year $66 million in the red -- due, in part, to a $22 million gaffe in which the district missed out on state money by misclassifying special-needs students. Last week, Crew floated the outrageous idea of ending bilingual programs to cover losses if needed -- this in a district that's a national model in a city that bills itself a Gateway to the Americas.
And he hit the board with another surprise: The rainy-day fund, raided two years in a row, would be depleted by $22 million more. This leaves only $4.6 million, when a district this size should have at least $150 million on hand.
Budget officials say they have a plan to raise the fund to about
$32 million, but how can they be trusted to do so after so many screw-ups?
MISSING AGAIN
On Thursday, Crew again was missing in action. He snubbed the board's Innovation, Efficiency and Government Relations Committee, which was looking into how to plug that $300 million hole. And it's expected the district will face more than $200 million in losses next year.
Crew isn't responsible for a lousy economy, for rising food and gasoline costs that affect the budget or for dipping tax revenues. But he should be held accountable for lax oversight and misspending.
He has signaled he's ready to go. And on Monday, that could happen. Godspeed.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Miami Herald
Posted on Fri, Sep. 05, 2008
The final act in Crew drama is playing out
MYRIAM MARQUEZ
The writing's on the blackboard. Rudy Crew's a goner.
The Dollar Principal's surprise election to the Miami-Dade School Board has become a symbol of voters' frustration with the superintendent's tin ear, thin skin and oversized ego. And it's a shame, really, because Crew has good ideas on education reform.
But he has been a not-so-good steward of the public's money.
Retired middle-school principal Larry Feldman's populist campaign, backed by more than $90,000 from the teachers' union, signals a mind change on a board that has consistently voted 5-4 to protect the superintendent. Feldman replaces a Crew backer.
On Thursday, the board agreed to hire Murray Greenberg, a retired attorney for Miami-Dade County government, to figure out grounds for dismissal in the superintendent's contract.
CHANGE OF HEART
Until recently, I argued it would be unfair to fire Crew because he has not been derelict in his duty. Then he decided that a meeting called to look into the almost $300 million hole in this year's budget wasn't worth attending.
Crew is ready to go -- with or without legal action. He's had four years of work in the nation's fourth-largest school district, about a year more than the average for big-city superintendents.
The problem has been Crew's refusal to be up front with board members when they have pressed for answers on the budget. He can't blame the governor or the Legislature for Miami-Dade schools' financial mess. Tallahassee, facing dwindling tax revenue in a tanking economy, cut about $74 million from the district's budget.
Where did the rest of the losses come from? The head spins.
In February, a state audit uncovered that the district paid $27.8 million in overtime during the last fiscal year and didn't bother to properly document the spending.
In April, we learned that district officials didn't bother to budget for a $36 million jump in healthcare benefits for teachers and other employees. Teachers balked at having their meager raises eaten up by insurance costs. So Crew gave in, but then he went after their salary increases pegged for this year.
It's been a drama ever since. And for good reason.
In June, the board learned, for the first time, that the district was ending the fiscal year $66 million in the red -- due, in part, to a $22 million gaffe in which the district missed out on state money by misclassifying special-needs students. Last week, Crew floated the outrageous idea of ending bilingual programs to cover losses if needed -- this in a district that's a national model in a city that bills itself a Gateway to the Americas.
And he hit the board with another surprise: The rainy-day fund, raided two years in a row, would be depleted by $22 million more. This leaves only $4.6 million, when a district this size should have at least $150 million on hand.
Budget officials say they have a plan to raise the fund to about
$32 million, but how can they be trusted to do so after so many screw-ups?
MISSING AGAIN
On Thursday, Crew again was missing in action. He snubbed the board's Innovation, Efficiency and Government Relations Committee, which was looking into how to plug that $300 million hole. And it's expected the district will face more than $200 million in losses next year.
Crew isn't responsible for a lousy economy, for rising food and gasoline costs that affect the budget or for dipping tax revenues. But he should be held accountable for lax oversight and misspending.
He has signaled he's ready to go. And on Monday, that could happen. Godspeed.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Board showdown set over Crew's job (Miami Herald)
Is this a distraction from the real issues facing the local public schools? What if similar attention was placed on diminishing dropout and improving graduation rates across the district, particularly in the most marginalized schools and communities? -Dr. Louie F. Rodriguez
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
www.miamiherald.com
Posted on Fri, Jul. 25, 2008
Board showdown set over Crew's job
BY KATHLEEN McGRORY
Miami-Dade Schools Superintendent Rudy Crew may be facing the fight of his career as tensions between him and School Board members appeared to escalate this week.
One board member announced plans Friday to legally challenge whether Crew has lived up to the terms of his contract -- creating a road map to potentially fire Crew from his $315,000-a-year job.
Board member Renier Diaz de la Portilla -- whose unhappiness with Crew is well known -- said he was preparing to present the board's attorney with a list of grievances over the embattled schools chief's performance and ask if they constitute legal grounds for termination.
Board Vice Chairwoman Perla Tabares Hantman, anticipating legal fireworks, filed a motion that the district should hire a ''special counsel'' to advise the board on any action on Crew's contract.
The independent actions of the two board members appear to set the stage for a showdown at a Wednesday budget workshop that all parties are set to attend and, more importantly, for a possible vote to fire Crew as early as the next board meeting on Aug. 4.
Crew's contract runs through 2010, but the board can fire him at any time. Without legal grounds, however, the district will have to pay Crew more than $700,000.
Diaz de la Portilla, an attorney, says the board would be justified to dismiss the superintendent. State law lists possible grounds as misconduct, incompetency, gross insubordination and willful neglect of duties.
Diaz de la Portilla pointed to Crew's ''mismanagement'' of the district's $6 billion budget, his need to dip into the district's rainy-day fund to balance the budget and the 2006 coverup of a sex scandal at Northwestern Senior High.
''It was only a matter of time before this happened,'' Diaz de la Portilla said. ``He's not above scrutiny.''
Diaz de la Portilla will ask his colleagues to vote on the matter at the August meeting.
How the board members will vote is still up in the air, but The Miami Herald on Friday polled eight of the nine.
• Three -- Diaz de la Portilla, Ana Rivas Logan and Marta Pérez -- said they would support terminating Crew's contract at the meeting.
• Three -- Wilbert ''Tee'' Holloway, Evelyn Greer and Martin Karp -- said they would not vote to terminate.
• Two -- Hantman and Chairman Agustín Barrera -- declined to say how they would vote. Solomon Stinson could not be reached for comment.
Logan, for her part, has been vocal for more than a year about firing Crew.
''I don't see how I can work with an employee if I have no faith in what that person says,'' Logan said.
Holloway called Diaz de la Portilla's proposal ''totally inappropriate and unfair'' and accused him of election-time grandstanding.
Diaz de la Portilla has said his proposal has nothing to do with his bid for reelection. He is running against former television journalist Angel Zayón, who wants to oust the superintendent.
Hantman expressed concerns, too, with Diaz de la Portilla's proposal.
''I think this is an action that should be done in a more conscientious manner,'' Hantman said.
While Diaz de la Portilla may not have the votes yet to fire Crew, many board members agreed the situation has come to a boil. Some said they believe the superintendent's days are numbered.
''He doesn't seem interested,'' said Pérez, who has battled Crew publicly. ``I don't think he's engaged in this community.''
Crew declined requests to be interviewed for this article. But district spokeswoman Tammy Reed said that Crew planned ``to continue being the superintendent.''
''Right now, he's focused on his agenda, which is about the children,'' Reed said.
The past six months have been especially trying for the embattled schools chief.
With state revenue streams dwindling, legislators in Tallahassee have dramatically reduced funding to schools. Food and fuel prices have risen.
All the while, the district's budget crisis remains unresolved -- with the district still struggling to balance this year's budget; they already had to dip into reserves for last year's.
The chasm between teachers and administrators has continued to grow. And Crew can no longer count on a solid School Board majority.
To Crew's credit, scores on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test and school grades from the state have risen steadily under his leadership.
The district is also a finalist for the prestigious Broad Prize for Urban Education.
Still, Crew has been unable to manage his relationship with the board.
Last year things got so bad, Pérez sued Crew for failing to include several of her proposals on an agenda. Although Pérez lost the suit, Crew had to turn over several public records he had failed to deliver.
Crew himself has expressed frustrations with the board.
At one point, he said he was already contemplating his next move.
It may come soon.
Experts say the average life span of a superintendent in a large, urban school district is about three years. Crew recently finished up the fourth year of his contract.
''Running a large school district is incredibly difficult,'' said Bill Montford, who runs the Florida Association of District School Superintendents. ``There are extraordinary pressures, not only on the state level, but on the national level.''
Board member Greer, who usually supports Crew, said Miami-Dade is no exception.
''This is certainly an incredibly difficult political environment for anyone -- board members, superintendents and staff -- to function effectively,'' she said.
In addition to the talks about Crew's contract, board members in August will consider another intriguing option: holding a countywide referendum and moving to an elected superintendency.
Logan is bringing the idea, which was first proposed by board candidate Zayón.
If approved, the measure would allow county residents to decide if the next superintendent should be appointed, like Crew, or elected by county residents.
Regardless, elections could bring a new majority.
Besides Zayón, candidates Shawn Beightol and Larry Feldman have said they believe Crew should go.
Still, Barrera, who is pleased with Crew's performance, said he believed the efforts to oust him had little to do with the superintendent's recent performance.
''There's a group of people that have wanted the superintendent out for a long time, and they've seen the first true crack by which to attack him,'' Barrera said. ``This is about politics, not the superintendent.''
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
www.miamiherald.com
Posted on Fri, Jul. 25, 2008
Board showdown set over Crew's job
BY KATHLEEN McGRORY
Miami-Dade Schools Superintendent Rudy Crew may be facing the fight of his career as tensions between him and School Board members appeared to escalate this week.
One board member announced plans Friday to legally challenge whether Crew has lived up to the terms of his contract -- creating a road map to potentially fire Crew from his $315,000-a-year job.
Board member Renier Diaz de la Portilla -- whose unhappiness with Crew is well known -- said he was preparing to present the board's attorney with a list of grievances over the embattled schools chief's performance and ask if they constitute legal grounds for termination.
Board Vice Chairwoman Perla Tabares Hantman, anticipating legal fireworks, filed a motion that the district should hire a ''special counsel'' to advise the board on any action on Crew's contract.
The independent actions of the two board members appear to set the stage for a showdown at a Wednesday budget workshop that all parties are set to attend and, more importantly, for a possible vote to fire Crew as early as the next board meeting on Aug. 4.
Crew's contract runs through 2010, but the board can fire him at any time. Without legal grounds, however, the district will have to pay Crew more than $700,000.
Diaz de la Portilla, an attorney, says the board would be justified to dismiss the superintendent. State law lists possible grounds as misconduct, incompetency, gross insubordination and willful neglect of duties.
Diaz de la Portilla pointed to Crew's ''mismanagement'' of the district's $6 billion budget, his need to dip into the district's rainy-day fund to balance the budget and the 2006 coverup of a sex scandal at Northwestern Senior High.
''It was only a matter of time before this happened,'' Diaz de la Portilla said. ``He's not above scrutiny.''
Diaz de la Portilla will ask his colleagues to vote on the matter at the August meeting.
How the board members will vote is still up in the air, but The Miami Herald on Friday polled eight of the nine.
• Three -- Diaz de la Portilla, Ana Rivas Logan and Marta Pérez -- said they would support terminating Crew's contract at the meeting.
• Three -- Wilbert ''Tee'' Holloway, Evelyn Greer and Martin Karp -- said they would not vote to terminate.
• Two -- Hantman and Chairman Agustín Barrera -- declined to say how they would vote. Solomon Stinson could not be reached for comment.
Logan, for her part, has been vocal for more than a year about firing Crew.
''I don't see how I can work with an employee if I have no faith in what that person says,'' Logan said.
Holloway called Diaz de la Portilla's proposal ''totally inappropriate and unfair'' and accused him of election-time grandstanding.
Diaz de la Portilla has said his proposal has nothing to do with his bid for reelection. He is running against former television journalist Angel Zayón, who wants to oust the superintendent.
Hantman expressed concerns, too, with Diaz de la Portilla's proposal.
''I think this is an action that should be done in a more conscientious manner,'' Hantman said.
While Diaz de la Portilla may not have the votes yet to fire Crew, many board members agreed the situation has come to a boil. Some said they believe the superintendent's days are numbered.
''He doesn't seem interested,'' said Pérez, who has battled Crew publicly. ``I don't think he's engaged in this community.''
Crew declined requests to be interviewed for this article. But district spokeswoman Tammy Reed said that Crew planned ``to continue being the superintendent.''
''Right now, he's focused on his agenda, which is about the children,'' Reed said.
The past six months have been especially trying for the embattled schools chief.
With state revenue streams dwindling, legislators in Tallahassee have dramatically reduced funding to schools. Food and fuel prices have risen.
All the while, the district's budget crisis remains unresolved -- with the district still struggling to balance this year's budget; they already had to dip into reserves for last year's.
The chasm between teachers and administrators has continued to grow. And Crew can no longer count on a solid School Board majority.
To Crew's credit, scores on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test and school grades from the state have risen steadily under his leadership.
The district is also a finalist for the prestigious Broad Prize for Urban Education.
Still, Crew has been unable to manage his relationship with the board.
Last year things got so bad, Pérez sued Crew for failing to include several of her proposals on an agenda. Although Pérez lost the suit, Crew had to turn over several public records he had failed to deliver.
Crew himself has expressed frustrations with the board.
At one point, he said he was already contemplating his next move.
It may come soon.
Experts say the average life span of a superintendent in a large, urban school district is about three years. Crew recently finished up the fourth year of his contract.
''Running a large school district is incredibly difficult,'' said Bill Montford, who runs the Florida Association of District School Superintendents. ``There are extraordinary pressures, not only on the state level, but on the national level.''
Board member Greer, who usually supports Crew, said Miami-Dade is no exception.
''This is certainly an incredibly difficult political environment for anyone -- board members, superintendents and staff -- to function effectively,'' she said.
In addition to the talks about Crew's contract, board members in August will consider another intriguing option: holding a countywide referendum and moving to an elected superintendency.
Logan is bringing the idea, which was first proposed by board candidate Zayón.
If approved, the measure would allow county residents to decide if the next superintendent should be appointed, like Crew, or elected by county residents.
Regardless, elections could bring a new majority.
Besides Zayón, candidates Shawn Beightol and Larry Feldman have said they believe Crew should go.
Still, Barrera, who is pleased with Crew's performance, said he believed the efforts to oust him had little to do with the superintendent's recent performance.
''There's a group of people that have wanted the superintendent out for a long time, and they've seen the first true crack by which to attack him,'' Barrera said. ``This is about politics, not the superintendent.''
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)