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| Ruben Wills and Rushell White |
The job of a principal in New York
City is to be a CEO, a Chief Executive Officer. Unfortunately, there is no Board of Directors to oversee what happens right, or wrong. That is the mistake
that has changed the face of education in America, and certainly New York City.
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| Rushell White |
Principals have too much unchecked power. The Principal's Union, CSA, defends the rights of their members to have total power over their school.
When I reported the $225,000 missing grant money at PS 6 (Carmen Farina was Principal) from the Annenberg Challenge For the Arts, to Annenberg in
or about 2001, their final conclusion after all the grants had been assessed,
was that the money should not have been given to principals without safeguards for its' use. Without safeguards
in place, too many principals did not use the money correctly, as the grant
required.
That's the problem. Principals have unilateral power. And,
without the necessary safeguards for using money within the school, the
possibility that nefarious actions may occur is unsurprisingly high.
In 2004, I published the letters from the UFT on the Special Education Mess, with children not getting the services they needed. Special education remains a mess, and I keep publishing the missing services and money on my blogs and website Parentadvocates.org. I still represent children and their parents at Impartial Hearings. No one at the DOE is fixing anything, and special education teachers are getting hit with 3020-a. Alot of them.
See NYC UFT Gives an Overview of the 'Special Education Mess'
In 2004, I published the letters from the UFT on the Special Education Mess, with children not getting the services they needed. Special education remains a mess, and I keep publishing the missing services and money on my blogs and website Parentadvocates.org. I still represent children and their parents at Impartial Hearings. No one at the DOE is fixing anything, and special education teachers are getting hit with 3020-a. Alot of them.
See NYC UFT Gives an Overview of the 'Special Education Mess'
The Checks
A picture is worth a thousand words.
When you enter MS 226, you quickly see huge pictures of checks on the wall. The checks - the representations of checks - are from District #28 City Council Member Ruben Wills, to MS 226 (the school is in District 27). The checks add up to $500,000, but the real amount given last year was more than $1 million.
For what? Supposedly, technology. Here is where the facts stop and guessing begins. What technology? Where is it? No comment from the school. In the school library, TVs and computers are missing.
A former custodian says that Wills, who makes a visit once a day to the school (wife does not come along) and White stay in the building until very late, and that there is often an officer from the nearby police precinct, NYPD precinct #106, stationed at the door. Students have reported seeing the pair kissing each other in a car early in the morning. Questions about this "affair" have not yet been answered.
There is no doubt at all that Mr. Wills is in alot of trouble right now.
Queens Councilman, Facing Criminal Charges — Doesn't Show up in Court — Or at City Hall
Already indicted City Councilman
Ruben Wills busted again for filing bogus reports to hide finances: officials
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| Ruben Wills arrested |
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS, February 3, 2015,
An already-indicted Queens City
Councilman is in fresh trouble with the law.
Ruben Wills, 46, was arrested
Tuesday morning on charges he filed bogus documents with the city Conflicts of
Interest Board, officials said.
The Jamaica Democrat filed a total
of five bogus financial disclosure reports between 2011 and 2012 in which he
concealed his extracurricular dealings, the state Attorney General’s office
said.
State Attorney General EricSchneiderman said submitting phony documents “is a serious crime” that could
land Wills behind bars for up to four years if convicted.
Wills has been caught in
Schneiderman’s crosshairs before.
He was busted in May for allegedly
stealing public campaign funds and using the cash for a pricey Louis Vuitton
handbag and shopping sprees at Nordstrom and Century 21 and other locales.
He’s also accused of taking a
$33,000 member item from since-convicted Sen. Shirley Huntley for his sham
charity but pocketing most of it. Those charges are pending.
The $112,500-a-year pol hasn’t
exactly been lighting it up at work either - the Daily News reported in
December that he’d missed 27% of the City Council meetings he was supposed to
attend in the year that ended June 30, the worst attendance record on the
Council.
The latest charges were the result
of a joint probe by the AG and the state Controller’s office.
Controller Thomas DiNapoli said
Wills’ “alleged actions reveal a disdain for honest disclosure.”
Wills, 46, was arraigned Tuesday
morning in Manhattan Supreme Court and pleaded not guilty. Justice Laura Ward
released him without bail.
Wills’ lawyer, Randall Unger, said
they’ll fight the charges - as soon as they figure out what exactly it is his
client allegedly did.
“I don’t know what is is they’re
accusing Mr. Wills of doing,” Unger said. "We just got the indictment —
that doesn’t tell us very much. We’ll be filing motions for discovery so we can
find out what it is they’re actually accusing him of.”
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| Ruben Wills |
Queens
councilman implicated by pal in pass-through scheme
A pal of Councilman Ruben Wills implicated the Queens politician
in court Thursday in a scheme to steal thousands of taxpayer dollars by
ordering him to deposit and withdraw funds from a sham company.
Jelani Mills fingered
Wills for the corruption after pleading guilty to one misdemeanor count of
falsifying business records in a case brought by state Attorney General Eric
Schneiderman.
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| Ruben Wills |
The damning plea
statement against Wills capped a bizarre three days that initially centered on
Mills’ mysterious whereabouts.
On Tuesday, Mills was
expected to enter a plea and turn on Wills but he bolted court after noon —
leaving his lawyer in the lurch and Judge Barry Kron fuming.
A bench warrant was
issued for Mills and he showed up in court on Wednesday and was ordered held when
the judge did not buy his explanation that he left because his 9-year-old
daughter had got sick at school.
On Thursday, Mills said
it was Wills who urged him to set up a fictitious language translation company
called Micro Targeting in a pass-through scheme to steal funds from Wills’ 2009
council campaign committee.
Mills said he filed the
paperwork to incorporate Micro Targeting using a false address. He was the sole
proprietor.
“At the direction of Mr.
Wills, I deposited a check in the amount of $11,500 in that account, which was
drawn on an account named, `Ruben Wills for New York.’ This $11,500 was not the
result of money earned by Micro Targeting,” Mills, 29, said.
“I do not speak Spanish
and I have never translated any campaign literature or any other documents for
Micro Targeting or for Ruben Wills or his campaign committee. I have never
submitted an invoice for such services to Ruben Wills or his campaign
committee,” Mills said.
In November 2009, he
said, Wills directed him to withdraw $2,500 from the Micro Targeting account.
“Mr. Wills directed me
to give that cash to him, which I did,” Mills said.
Later, Mills said he
withdrew $2,000 from the bogus firm for his own “personal use.” But the
councilman objected, he said.
“Upon learning of that
$2,000 withdrawal, Mr. Wills told me that the money in the Micro Targeting
Chase account did not belong to me, and that I need to return $2,000 that I had
withdrawn,” he said.
Wills’ attorney Steve
Zissou dismissed Mills’ statement as a desperate “lie.”
“It’s not a surprise
that someone in jail would lie to get out of jail,” he said. “Some people will
say anything to get out of jail — Jelani included,” Zissou said.
The duo was accused of
scamming the city Campaign Finance Board by accepting public matching funds to
pay Micro Targeting for helping with Wills’ failed 2009 City Council bid.
The indictment also
alleged that Wills stole more than $30,000 in state grants sent to a nonprofit
he founded New York 4 Life. He is charged with using the tainted cash for a shameless
shopping spree where he purchase items at Macy’s, Nordstrom’s and Century 21 —
including a $750 Louis Vuitton handbag.
As part of the plea
settlement, Schneiderman’s office is recommending that Mills be sentenced to
one year’s probation and perform 10 days of community service.
Note from Betsy:Rushell White has been seen carrying a Louis Vuitton handbag, but she has told no one where she got it. Everyone is wondering....
Betsy Combier
betsy.combier@gmail.com
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, The NYC Public Voice
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, The NYC Public Voice
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