Alameda County Grand jury: Peralta college district irresponsible, wastes tax dollars

By Matt Krupnick
Contra Costa Times
Posted: 07/07/2010 10:00:04 AM PDT
Updated: 07/07/2010 05:25:45 PM PDT

OAKLAND — A grand jury slammed the Peralta Community College District for lax oversight and wasting taxpayer dollars in a highly critical report released Wednesday.

The district is marked by a lack of transparency and accountability, the Alameda County civil grand jury wrote in its annual report. Spending on travel and dining have run rampant in the four-college district, jurors found, and trustees have shown little responsibility in their oversight.

"Transparency of all spending should be mandatory," jurors wrote. "The public has a right to know how its tax dollars are being spent."

The grand jury's nine-month investigation was prompted by a series of stories published by Bay Area News Group in July 2009, the report noted.

The president of Peralta's board, Abel Guillen, declined to answer questions about the grand jury's report. The other six trustees did not return phone messages.

The jury specifically criticized Peralta trustees for their silence on important issues.

"Their willingness to remain individually silent on multiple issues, such as the chancellor's performance, has led the board to questionable decision-making," the jury concluded. "The board as a whole has failed to provide the leadership for the district to which they were elected."

Among trustees' transgressions were "double-dipping" on meals during trips: receiving a daily stipend for food while also including the same meals on hotel bills
Quantcast paid with tax dollars. Board members also spent hundreds of public dollars per month on home offices, the jury found, but the district provided no oversight of that spending and had little documentation.

Peralta's policies on trustee spending were "inadequate, vague, redundant and loosely written," the jury said.

"Most members of the board," jurors wrote, "were unfamiliar with district policies and the grand jury found the board, as a consequence, often did not follow policies and in some cases ignored them altogether, especially in financial situations and when using credit cards or traveling."

Bay Area News Group reported last year that trustee Marcie Hodge, for example, routinely spent thousands of dollars on trips and other personal expenses using her taxpayer-funded credit card and would later reimburse the district for the charges.

"The district must establish a disciplinary plan, including zero tolerance for the misuse of district funds," the jury wrote.

Among the panel's 16 recommendations was that the district stop issuing credit cards to the chancellor and trustees. The district did just that after last year's news coverage, said Peralta spokesman Jeff Heyman, and also has fixed several other problems raised by the grand jury.

"A lot of action has taken place," he said.

The district is required to respond to each recommendation within three months, explaining how it plans to fix the problems, but the grand jury has no other enforcement power.

Wednesday's report "forces the agency to commit on a certain issue," said Jeff Stark, the deputy district attorney who is the grand jury's legal adviser.

Jurors also criticized Peralta's recently departed chancellor, Elihu Harris, for failing to disclose his friendship and business partnership with a contractor who was eventually paid $940,000 by the district. Harris, whose contract was not renewed after the news reports, owned a radio station and land with the contractor, Mark Lindquist, who was given a no-bid contract to oversee construction at Oakland's Laney College.

The panel also took issue with Harris' unilateral decision to grant raises to dozens of administrators without board approval, and with the board's refusal to reverse the improper raises.

And jurors called on the district to be much more transparent about the chancellor's pay. With incentives, Harris' total annual pay was more than $300,000, or about $55,000 more than his base salary of approximately $247,000.

Peralta trustees are in the process of hiring Harris' replacement.

The district includes four campuses: Laney and Merritt Colleges in Oakland, Berkeley City College and College of Alameda.

Matt Krupnick covers higher education. Contact him at 925-943-8246. Follow him at Twitter.com/mattkrupnick.
Grand jury details
# The Alameda County civil grand jury criticized the operations of the Peralta Community College District in a report released Wednesday. Among the grand jury's recommendations: Trustees must enforce travel and food policies and preapprove all out-of-district travel.
# Peralta must not give taxpayer-funded credit cards to the chancellor and trustees.
# Salary raises must be approved by the Board of Trustees.
# Peralta must provide office space for trustees to avoid paying stipends for cell phones and home-office equipment.
# Trustees must establish penalties for breaking district policies.

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