Seven New Orleans private schools that participated in the state’s private school voucher program for the 2010-2011 school year were overpaid a combined $25,000 by the state, according to the most recent independent audit on nonpublic school allocations. But the overpayments to private schools could be higher than what the audit reports, as the auditing firm was not instructed by the state to verify the attendance of all students in the program.
The state-run voucher program, which funded private school tuitions for more than 1,600 low-income students in New Orleans last year, has come under the limelight in recent weeks as Gov. Bobby Jindal pushes for a statewide expansion that would make 380,000 students eligible to attend private schools with public money.
As The Independent reports in this week’s cover story, “Incomplete,” a review of the program reveals problems with the program’s monitoring practices for the students it serves and also confirms that much of the data related to program enrollment and standardized testing for the voucher students are inaccurate.
Two weeks into a public records battle with the state Department of Education, The Independent learned that the payments to private schools are tracked through an independent audit, which verifies attendance records at each of the private schools and determines whether the schools are receiving what they are owed.
When The Ind asked for a copy, state Department of Education spokeswoman Rene Greer sent The Independent a partial document titled “Monitoring Procedures,” a four-page attachment that included pages 4, 5, 6 and 7 of the audit. The missing pages were sent to The Ind two days later and only after the newspaper specified that the entire document should be sent. The audit was not listed among the list of other DOE audit reports found on the Legislative Auditor’s website.
The report, prepared by accounting firm Provost, Salter, Harper and Alford, points out (in the missing pages) that the findings do not represent a complete audit of the program’s finances. The audit is narrow in scope and only details a random selection of the students for which private schools are billing the state.
“Had we performed additional procedures, other matters might have come to our attention that would have been reported to you,” the audit report states.
If a private school in New Orleans enrolled more than five students, the state instructed the auditor to select a random sample of 10 percent of total enrollment or a minimum of five students, whichever is higher. It’s worth noting that two private schools in the program last year accepted more than 100 students, with two others taking more than 150 students and one enrolling a whopping 294 voucher students.
Of the random students selected, the latest audit finds that the state was overbilled more than $25,000 from seven schools. Greer says the schools are required to repay the money to the state.
The report also reveals that out of more than 1,600 students in the program last year, only four were special education students, which further supports a Feb. 4 analysis from The Times-Picayune noting that the two private schools in New Orleans with the highest test scores do not enroll children with special needs, “nor are they required to” as public schools are. State Superintendent John White has repeatedly said that private schools accepting voucher money cannot be selective in their admissions.
Click here for the full Times-Pic report.
Read The Independent’s cover story and accompanying editorial on the voucher program here.
MAY 24 Blogger Robert Mann posts this entry about the Baton Rouge Chamber's recent report on Louisiana's higher education system. It's critical to economic development, and yet our system is facing a "funding crisis" with no way to resolve it, the report says. The Chamber says control of tuition and fees must be returned to the higher ed governing boards.
MAY 24 Here's a NBC33 story about Tyrann Mathieu. He has signed with the Arizona Cardinals, inking a $3 million, four-year deal. He gets a signing bonus of $265K, but gets another, larger bonus if he doesn't get cut from the team for doing drugs. The deal reportedly includes mandatory tests and meetings for the player.
MAY 24 Jarvis DeBerry posts here about the redonkulus rhetoric that would have us believe NOLA is a safe city with a murder problem. Maybe the city's crime stats don't compare with its murder stats because you can't manipulate a murder, he says: a dead body's a dead body. It just doesn't make sense, he says, and his readers agree: a poll asks if they believe the city is safe, and more than 90 percent say no.
MAY 24 Jindal administration officials announced Thursday that the privatization of public health care is going to cost a lot more than they budgeted for, the Advocate reports here. "I'm so surprised," said no one. Anywhere. The cost they're projecting now is more than $1 billion - a lot more than the $626 million budgeted for it. And, it's more than it cost the state to operate those hospitals. So why are we doing this again?
MAY 24 Blogger CB Forgotston ridicules the recent PR campaign by the state GOP in the wake of a legislative auditor's request to both major parties. The GOP (apparently unaware that the Dems got the same request) started yammering about being targeted because it had "killed" a tax increase. CB finds that laughable, but it's also pretty funny that the GOP was comparing this episode to the IRS scandal (Because the President has so much to do with our state auditor. Right?).
MAY 24 Politico details some recent fund-raising efforts by Sen. David Vitter, which have raised the question of his future political plans. This time, it is a $5,000 per head "bayou weekend" that includes "Cajun cooking" and an all-caps "alligator hunt," the story reports. Funds raised go to a super PAC that can spend money to support Vitter in federal or state races, the story points out.
MAY 24 The pink building on Royal in the quarter was sold at a sheriff's sale Thursday, this Picayune story reports. An injunction that would have halted the sale wasn't enforced because the family failed to post a $150,000 bond, the story reports. So the owner of the mortgages on the building bought it, for nearly $7 million. Now the feuding family will have to negotiate with that company to get a lease on the building that has housed their business for close to 60 years.
MAY 23 This post in Louisiana Voice tells us about a bill by a Winnsboro lege that would require all public high school students to take at least one Course Choice online class in order to graduate. (What?) Blogger Tom Aswell says it's a monument to "waste and corruption," especially in light of the problems he's exposed with the program in recent weeks. Idaho had a similar program, but voters removed it by a 2-1 margin, Aswell says.
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