June
23, 2014
By
Rebecca Parr
San
Jose Mercury News
The
Daily Review
FREMONT -- Washington Hospital
Healthcare System gives the impression of secrecy, often meeting in closed
session, not making its reports public and giving poor responses to public
records requests, the Alameda County grand jury has concluded.
The district also violated the
Brown Act, the state's open-meeting law, on at least one occasion, the jury
said in its report released Monday.
"The lack of transparency
has invited criticism that the district has strayed from the standards expected
of a public agency," the report said.
In its report, the grand jury
also faulted Oakland schools' record-keeping, the East Bay Municipal Utility
District's rate hike and the Oakland Fire Department's collection of inspection
fees.
Washington Hospital's board has
four to five meetings a month, but only one is videotaped and posted online,
and the jury questioned the amount of time given over to closed sessions.
"The grand jury finds it
odd that the district spends so much time meeting in closed session and yet
rarely has anything to report" on actions taken there, the jury said.
It called the directors, who
have served on the board for years, complacent and recommended term limits.
In a written response, district
board President Dr. Bernard Steward said that the board "will seriously
consider the findings and recommendations in the report." The board will
file a formal response within 90 days.
The grand jury did say that for
more than 50 years, the hospital has provided state-of-the-art medical care.
In June 2013, a resident asked
for 2012 income and expense documents for district-owned retail properties, the
report said. After repeated requests for more than two months, the district
revealed only total revenue, total expenses and net operating income, the
resident told the grand jury.
"If this was the only
documentation provided, ... the grand jury could understand the public
frustration about the transparency of the district," the report said.
"The grand jury questions the district's commitment to the Public Records
Act and overall transparency as a public agency."
The grand jury also found that
the district did not share meeting documents with the public and at one meeting
told some grand jury members to sign in, a request that violates the state open
meeting law.
The district's CEO, Nancy
Farber, also was criticized by the grand jury.
Farber, one of the state's
highest-paid public officials, with more than $1 million in annual
compensation, was reimbursed by the district for personal donations to several
charities.
"This practice was
misleading in that it gave the public a perception that the CEO was being
philanthropic, when in fact the money was being used to bolster the CEO's
image," the report said.
Farber did not respond to a
request for comment Monday.
The grand jury investigated
allegations Farber violated conflict of interest laws when she recommended
donations to a pediatric care facility that employed her husband.
The jury wrote that,
technically, Farber followed the law because she notified the district's board
of a possible conflict before her husband was hired and offered to step back if
he took the job. But her actions created a perception of conflict of interest,
the jury said.
In other grand jury findings,
the Oakland Unified School District was faulted for auditing mistakes and poor
record-keeping that have contributed to a "monumental" financial
burden that harms students. The district's failure to properly complete
financial audits is costing money that could have been spent on teachers and
books, the jury said. Compounding the problems is high staff turnover and a
glut of charter schools resulting in too many under-enrolled classrooms.
Oakland Unified School District
Superintendent Gary Yee said the grand jury's findings are a year old and the
district "has made big changes in the budgeting and auditing in the management
system for school attendance."
He agreed the district has too
many schools for too few students, a situation that costs the district a lot of
money in labor and building upkeep.
"The political will to
close schools is really difficult," Yee said.
The jury also found that lax
billing and collection of commercial inspection fees is costing the Oakland
Fire Department, leaving fire inspectors fewer resources to identify and remove
vegetation and other hazards.
The jury criticized the East
Bay Municipal Utility District for significantly increasing rates last year
without sufficiently explaining the need to the public.
Contact
Rebecca Parr at 510-293-2473 or follow her at Twitter.com/rdparr1.
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