Mr. Bruce Moore
District Attorney’s Office
700 Civic Center Drive West
Santa Ana, CA 92701
Dear Mr. Moore:
As the trustee representing the Irvine area on the South Orange County Community College Board of Trustees, I am taking this opportunity to make you aware of several items your office may wish to further investigate, as you deem appropriate, with respect to events that have transpired in our district.
Campaign Election Violations
A recent investigative team from the California Teachers Association (CTA) noted in a letter to their local chapter, representing the faculty at South Orange County Community College District that in conflict with provisions of their bylaws and without the express directions of their members, the faculty association [i.e., the faculty union] had contributed to several political action committees (PACs)[including] Taxpayers for Responsible Educators [and] and Orange County Citizens for Quality Educators. These PACs provided substantial advertising support to elect a slate of candidates[—]Steven Frogue, John Williams, and Dorothy Fortune[—]in last November’s election. The Taxpayers for Responsible Educators, Form 420…reflects independent expenditures of $4,000 each made on behalf of four candidates, including Frogue, Williams and Fortune. However, a review of the individual candidates statements for this same period shows no corresponding reporting of these same contributions received on Form 490, Schedule C.
Repeated Violations of the Brown Act
On Wednesday, August 27, 1997, Judge McDonald held that certain [provisions] of the Brown Act had not been followed, although Judge McDonald found no misdemeanor violations of the act.
It is interesting to note that none of the minority trustee members [Dave Lang, Joan Heuter, Marcia Milchiker], including myself, were ever deposed with respect to this matter, nor to the best of my knowledge were phone records subpoenaed and reviewed that might have corroborated the contention that several “meetings” occurred among and between the majority board members: Steven Frogue, John Williams Dorothy Fortune, and Teddi Lorch.
At an executive session meeting on July 16, 1997 involving the reorganization of the administration of the district, three trustees (including myself) left the meeting, because they felt the subject of the meeting was a violation of the Brown Act. Prior to the meeting, on July 11, 1997, Trustee Williams faxed to all members of the board and the chancellor a memo regarding his views of the administrative model at one of the colleges. Since the Brown Act is very specific about matters that may be discussed in closed session, and this topic is certainly not one of them, this communication would appear to have constituted a violation of Brown Act. Although Mr. Williams preceded his further discussion of the district and colleges administrative model by naming certain personnel for reassignment effectively eliminating the chair model that was in effect at one of the district’s colleges and transferring personnel within the district and at each college, I believe this action was a thinly veiled attempt to skirt the Brown Act under the guise of a personnel decision. None of the appointed administrators nor other shared governance groups were apparently consulted before actions were taken, resulting in reassignments and newly delegated responsibilities that made no rational sense.
Further violations of the Brown Act include discussion of specific agenda items in closed session that are on the open session calendar and the permanent appointment of the president at Irvine Valley College, more fully described in the paragraphs which follow.
Selection Process and Permanent Appointment of Irvine Valley college President
A national search was conducted by the board for a new President of Irvine Valley College. Several internal candidates (including Mr. Raghu Mathur, illegally appointed interim president on April 28, 1997, according to Judge McDonald…) applied for the position along with more than 30 others comprising the initial pool of candidates. In establishing the selection process, the historical method was completely discarded, whereby a screening committee was appointed consisting mainly of the shared governance groups at Irvine Valley College to interview and present to the board the top handful of candidates, with their ratings and recommendations. The current process is a complete “white-wash” since the screening committee neither rates the candidates nor eliminates any candidates, and the entire remaining pool (several applicants voluntary dropped out of the process) of 18 candidates were reinterviewed by the full board of trustees, with no consideration of the committee’s input. The reason the majority of the board prevailed upon the chancellor to adopt the revised process, in my view, was so Mr. Mathur would not be eliminated from the pool. Since I am writing this letter prior to the final candidate interviews, I am predicting that Mr. Mathur will be selected on a 4 - 3 trustee vote to be the next president at Irvine Valley College. It should be noted that during the initial interviews the board majority—consisting of the trustees Frogue, Williams, Fortune, and Lorch—purposely upgraded Mr. Mathur’s raw interview scores while downgrading those of the other candidates to insure his position in the final round. It should be further noted that although my disclosure of same would ordinarily be a closed session matter that I would not be permitted to discuss, both initial trustee interview sessions were also illegal under the Brown Act, due to the fact that the board president failed to open these sessions as public meetings and request public comment before adjourning these meetings to executive session.
In summary, the entire appointment process was a complete sham, wasting the time of the entire board and, more importantly, all of the interview candidates.
Violation of Education Code
Our college district recently invited great controversy when the board majority voted on August 18, 1997 to allow Mr. Frogue, the board president, to hold a seminar on the JFK Assassination and invited several conspiracy theorists, some of whom the community felt ascribed to anti-Semitic view points. This program was to be conducted under the auspices of the Saddleback Community College Adult education program, on a nonaccredited, participant fee breakeven basis.
It should be noted that this seminar evolved from a single course that Mr. Frogue would offer on the Warren commission, approved on a 5 - 2 trustee vote at our June 16, 1997 meeting. As one of the opposing votes at this, and the August 18, 1997 meetings, one of the many grounds for my objection to these courses was the blatant conflict of interest problem it presented with Mr. Frogue, a trustee of the board, offering a course, even on an unpaid basis.
Despite district counsel opinion to the contrary, I believe the original action approving the initial session by Frogue was a violation of Education Code Section 72103(b) prohibiting an employee of the district employed as a teacher to offer this kind of course, where such individual serves as a trustee of the district.
Although this issue may now be moot, due to Trustee Frogue’s withdrawal of the course from under the auspices of the College’s adult education program, this is not an isolated instance of this kind of blatant conflict of interest and possible education code violation.
Other Internal Personnel and Miscellaneous Matters
In my unsubstantiated opinion, since the board majority has been in control, employees that supported opposing viewpoints have been systematically criticized, reprimanded, and/or reassigned.
Kathleen Duranty [sic; Dorantes], a part-time instructor and the faculty advisor to the Lariat, the Saddleback Community College student newspaper, was replaced by another full-time faculty member. This apparently is permitted under the current faculty contract with the district that provides seniority to full-time over part-time faculty members in such circumstances. It should be noted, however, that in my view this action was precipitate[d] by individuals who objected to the newspaper coverage of the last election and felt the replacement of Ms. Duranty would afford the board majority more favorable student press.
At Irvine Valley College, the removal of Wendy Phillips [Wendy Gabriella], as humanities [sic] chair (prior to the reorganization) and reprimands by Interim President Mathur of several employees including Vice-President Terry Burgess, Pamela Hewitt, and others speaks to the kind of repressive attitudes and divisiveness that exists at the campus.
Under State Law AB 1725, the board is required to consult with other constituency groups within the district, including faculty senates, classified staff, student government[,] representatives of the faculty, and classified staff associations (collective bargaining units) and others with respect to decisions that affect these constituencies. In my view, the board majority is not following AB 1725, resulting in a feeling of disenfranchisement among these groups.
To the extent you find the foregoing comments and observations interesting and/or actionable and wish to pursue any of these subjects further, please contact me at your earliest convenience.
As a further footnote, I have also raised certain financial concerns, the subject of a separate letter, with the State Vice-Chancellor for fiscal affairs, since I believe the significant turmoil created by many of the above-noted incidents will have a detrimental financial impact on our college district.
Very truly yours,
David B. Lang
Trustee
cc: Dr. Thomas Nussbaum
Dr. John Dean, Orange County Department of Education
Spencer Covert
Dorothy Fortune
Steven Frogue
Joan Heuter
Teddi Lorch
Marcia Milchiker
John S. Williams
Dr. Robert Lombardi, Chancellor
Anthony Carcamo, Vice Chancellor
Rich Travis
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