The NYC Department of Education and The Employment of Investigators at OSI, DOI, SCI, OEO

I am re-posting a very important post written by Francesco Portelos for his blog, Protectportelos.org, on the taxpayer fraud at the DOE.

We are paying for the DOE/DOI/SCI/OEO/OSI investigators to investigate us. And it all starts with asking "where is the money?" Similarly, "where do my tax dollars go?" We, the general public, have no way to counter their rulings except in expensive and time-consuming litigation.

I have posted many times that on May 23, 2000 our current Chancellor, Carmen Farina, called me up at home screaming, cursing, and verbally attacking me after I asked where the money was going that had been given to PS 6 and PS 198 for the Arts. I listened to 20 minutes of horror. It was quite a shock, because at the time I was new to the public school system, and had worked with Carmen for 2 years on setting up a project called the Arts Together Community Partnership, my idea.

No one told me that after I asked where the grant money went, I, my children, and my life would be harassed, investigated, and harmed.

My point is this: if you see something in a school that you think is a violation of law, rights, or theft, report it, in writing and in detail, to a person outside of the ring of thieves DOE/DOI/SCI/OEO/OSI, like a lawyer, the police, the District Attorney. Document everything, who you go to, who you talk to, etc. This is VERY important.

 And if you are told that you must go speak with an investigator, GO!!! but be cautious in answering their questions, as their goal is to charge you with whatever happened. And always assume that everything you say to anyone is being taped.

Betsy Combier

The Special Commissioner of Investigation’s Hand is in the Pocket of the Chancellor?

 SEPTEMBER 26, 2013

SCI Richard Condon is in the Pocket of the DOE Dennis Walcott?

Part 1 of the EducatorFightsBack.org’s  SCI Series

The Special Commissioner of Investigation’s Hand is in the Pocket of the Chancellor?

Relax…it’s a question, not a statement. Notice the “question mark” at the end? Just a quick thank you to my public school teachers for teaching me proper punctuation and grammar. Any mistakes you see with commas and wrong use of capitals are mostly my lack of proofreading. Sorry, but I’m fighting for my career and trying to be a father and husband, so these posts are often written and posted quickly. Never written without thought though.

In any case, back to the question above. The Special Commissioner of Investigation’s Hand is in the Pocket of the Chancellor? I’m simply asking who pays Special Commissioner of Investigation Richard Condon and the rest of the investigators and lawyers of SCI. Not a valid question? I mean two of them, Mr. Martucci and Mr. Romano, paid a visit to my father-in-law this past summer at his job, while my family and I were in Greece. That is three months after the 14 month investigation on me was over (See report here).

More recently, the day before my 3020-a termination hearing was tostart, the two investigators came back and visited my mother-in-law at her apartment where she watches my two boys. That was just two weeks ago today. To make it even more interesting, she told me they were playing with my son. Hmm….I mean I know I have been a big job security for the over 13 investigators, but I don’t think we are at the level where they can come “gaga googoo” with my kids. Apparently there are even more investigations on me and that brings the number up to a whopping 38 . Yes, 38 investigations on me that all started afterI questioned the budget and put in my own complaint about my principal’s alleged financial misconduct. By the way, SCI did not take that case and referred it to the DOE’s Office of Special Investigation (OSI). Yes for over 600 days the DOE has been investigating the DOE.

This brings us to the meat and question of this post. Who investigates what and who is paying for it. You would agree that following the papertrail is important as “Cash is King”, correct?

The DOE has two investigative bodies that are under the jurisdiction of Chancellor Dennis Walcott. That is OSI and OEO (Office of Equal Opportunity. Now OSI typically takes cases of corporal punishment of students and OEO handles discrimination and harassment. I italicized the word typically for a reason. SCI, who works under the NYC Department of Investigation (DOI), takes on “more serious” cases and can defer cases to OEO and OSI, so some cases not involving corporal punishment, harassment and discrimination can be investigated by OSI and OEO if referred.

Are you still following? Maybe this will help:

DOI—->SCI

DOE—-> OSI and OEO

Now seeing this and watching the news when Richard Condon is talking about some higher profile investigation, you would think that SCI is unbiased, a body way above the DOE and therefore impartial, right? They owe no allegiance to the DOE, so why would any SCI investigation and finding be flawed or biased. A United Federation of Teachers (UFT)lawyer once told me “The DOE is scared of SCI and hates them, because SCI investigates them.” <cough>bullsh*t<cough>.

You see, while I was in educator exile I did a little investigating of my own and this is what I found:

By using the website www.seethroughny.net, you are able to put in any city employee and see their salary for the last few years. You can also see their overtime and per-session. What interested me the most is that you can actually also see where the money comes from. Let’s take a look and compare, shall we?

Here is DOE Chancellor Dennis Walcott’s:

Notice the Agency that pays him is the Department of Education?

Next we enter an arbitrary DOE lawyer like David Brodsky

Now let’s pop in the Commissioner of the NYC Department of Investigation, which is above SCI and separate from DOE.

Rose Gill Hearn Payroll

Ok, that makes sense. She is paid from the budget of the Department of Investigation.

Now Let’s just plug in Richard Condon in the search. Should be DOI as well, right?

Ehhh…wrong.

Wait…What the what? Richard Condon get’s paid from the budget of the DOE? The same body he investigates?

There must be some mistake. Let’s enter another SCI employee like Chief Investigator Thomas Fennell. By the way, I know way too many names of investigators for being a mild-mannered tech teacher. Mr. Fennell assigns cases and I believe also refers or even decides not to investigate them.

What? Paid from the DOE as well? I did this for all the investigators I know and all the same. Even the lawyers who were involved in denying my whistleblower complaint.

What? You want more proof that the DOE pays Richard Condon and his office from their $25 billion budget?

Ok, well look what else I found when I looked at my own school’s budget and expenditures from 2010-2011. Looks like we paid about $6,637 to the Special Commissioner of Investigation. Unless I’m reading it wrong. Click Here for School budget link

Finally….I simply asked SCI who pays them.

Response below

———-

From: Ann Ryan <aryan@nycsci.org>
Date: Tue, May 28, 2013 at 4:02 PM
Subject: Request for information
To: “Mr. Portelos” <mrportelos@gmail.com>

Dear Mr. Portelos:

I have been asked to respond to the e-mail request for information you made on May 15, 2013 at 12:58 p.m. to, it appears, www.nyc.gov.  That inquiry was ultimately forwarded to me.  You asked:

“Is the Special Commissioner of Investigation [(“SCI”)] a totally separate entity from the NYC Dept of Education?  Does it receive any funding from the NYC DOE budget?” 

The answers to these questions can be found in the Executive Order which established SCI.  This document can be found on SCI’s website.   

Section 1 of Executive Order No. 11 of 1990 requires the Commissioner of Investigation to appoint a Deputy Commissioner of Investigation for the New York City School District, “who shall be independent from the Board of Education.”

Section 5 requires that “[t]he salary and expenses of the Deputy Commissioner and his or her staff shall be borne by the Board of Education, within a budget allocation mutually agreed upon by the Board of Education and the City, provided however, that such budgetary allocation will be sufficient to ensure the effective and independent performance of the duties and responsibilities of the Deputy Commissioner.”

(Subsequently, Executive Order No. 34 of 1992 changed the title “Deputy Commissioner” to the “Special Commissioner of Investigation.”)

Very truly yours,  Ann Ryan, SCI

————————————-

And there you have it.

Let’s just look at this analogy here. One SCI investigator once said to me “You are always using analogies. It’s probably because you are a teacher.”

Imagine you owned a house and you needed an inspector to check on some violations. You call Jim Bob Inspection and pay Jim Bob to come and investigate for any violations or issues. He investigates and you cut him a check. Once he leaves he sends you a report with his findings and on top of that calls the Department of Buildings who then fines you. Yes, you paid Jim Bob and yes he investigated, but in the end he found thatyou had violations. Not a likely story?

Did you follow that analogy? How impartial is impartial? So is the commissioner’s hand in the pocket of the chancellor? Not physically, but it appears Chief Financial Officer Michael Tragale cuts them a check.

Also check out Betsy Combier’s coverage here: Two Reports, “Investigating The Investigators”, and ‘The Gill Commission Report’ (1990) Dont Improve New York City Public Schools

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