April 11, 2024 - 1pm Charter School Committee

001e e e presentation the status update on Prop uh Proposition 39 cycle for the next year upcoming year Mr Jose kerz thank you and also miss Janette bden thank you great to be with you we'll be we'll get right to the point uh we'll start with the prop 39 update I'll come back and make some introductory comments before the website update uh if You' like we can answer any questions you might have after each presentation before you go to the third item okay so without further Ado to keep us moving forward Miss bordon we'll run through the slides and then we'll prepare for any questions you might have Miss bordon thank you good afternoon thank you for the opportunity to present today um so we have an update for you on the Proposition 39 cycle

002for the 2425 school year um and so this is a slide you've seen before it's just our timeline of the regulatory process um we're just showing you here that we have passed the April 1st Milestone which is when the district sends final offers to Charter Schools um next up will be in May when Charter Schools either accept or decline those uh final offers um so now we'll break down um the status a little bit further for you um so as a reminder there were 46 charter schools that submitted facilities requests this year and this slide breaks down the status of those 46 um and so first we have the 27 final offers that were issued on April 1st we have 14 charter schools that have alternative agreements executed for the next school year and there

003are five charter schools that have withdrawn their facilities requests and so that uh makes up the 46 total and um within within this group um as a result of the alternative agreements and the withdrawals um there are 14 District school sites that were at one point in the process contemplated to possibly be collocated that will not be um so that is a result of the alternative agreements and the withdrawals um so next this slide uh is showing us the status um of the potential collocations as opposed to the number of charter schools which is 41 that are currently still potentially collocated there are 48 sites that are potentially um or I'm sorry 48 potential collocations um and that's a result of uh a few charter schools that have a multi-site offer or an alternative agreement

004for multi- sites um and so the number 48 represents the potential collocations uh for the 2425 school year and uh of those 48 two of them are potential new uh 15 would be no change 19 projected to have growth eight Pro projected to be a reduction and four or are projected to be a reconfiguration when the overall number of spaces may be the same but they might be in different spaces on the campus or the um the the categories of the space may have slightly changed or been reconfigured um the staff continues to assess potential alternative agreements as they are proposed and come in and um and those will continue to be uh evaluated as appropriate through the processes and um and yes as I mentioned the seven Charter schools that are identified um as

005potential multi- sites other ones um would be single sites um for those and um just as a point of comparison uh in January 2024 at the multi-site um the the findings board report had 13 possible multi-sites so just for your awareness that's now down to seven um and and this year in the 23 24 school year there are eight so overall we're looking at fewer um next year um this slide is also a preview of sorts of the uh coming board item in May um which has to do with the facility's renovation effort um to make space ready for charter schools for the 2425 school year um staff will be presenting at the April Bond oversight committee meeting and then um this item will be coming to the Board of Education in May um and

006these are the different uh categories of the projects that that you'll see at that meeting okay and and we also have presented the the 41 Charter Schools again um of the 41 charter schools that are that still have active facilities requests we've gone ahead and broken down for you um both uh the the the number of final offers by region and Board District um and also the alternative agreements so that you can have an idea of what the distribution is um both across the regions and by Board District so again that's uh as we mentioned at the beginning 46 facilities requests came in five have withdrawn leaving 41 remaining and the 41 are then broken down either into an alternative agreement fully executed or having received a final offer and that's that's what you're seeing

007summarized here um so that is our update for prop 39 um happy to address any questions that you may have um otherwise we can continue on to the next part of the presentation um I I saw that you the five withdrawals resulting in seven collocations being cancelled how many of these were going to be new collocations and how many were already existing of the cancels of the withdrawals there were I believe two that were existing um schools that were withdrawn if I'm remembering correctly and then the other ones would have been potentially new uh is this a typical number of withdrawals about five um it varies it just depends on the specific circumstances that might be impacting Charter Schools facilities decisions are there common reasons for withdrawing or there each ones different and unique I

008would say different and unique okay um what are the plan collocations that will not happen due to these withdrawals of say that again please what are the planned collocations that will not happen due to these withdrawals the specific School sites um let's see so we would that would include uh Perry Middle School um I believe then we've got um Pacific Boulevard School those were both withdrawals and then there were several sites in um in region north that were eliminated by withdrawals um and that included Portola um sherley Woodland Hills well Woodland Hills Academy is in an alternative agreement um but the uh the withdrawal also led to Shirley Lauren um and um well I can get you the fullest I'm blanking right now on which very well from memory I'm very impressed very impressed um

009I'm just curious because uh I want to know whether or not they show up then next year as potentials because they didn't get hit this year okay uh and how many alternative agreements have been signed and how many are we are uh are we still pursuing so there are 14 fully executed alternative agreements as of today um there are other requests that have come in that are being you know vetted and evaluated for um you know whether or not they're recommended by the the district about how many um there there have been quite a number of requests um but but there are probably only a handful that are are really being um you know that are still in the mix as of today um as a reminder alternative agreements can can take place at any

010time during the process right so once we get into the summer trying to figure out where we are so you've got most of them done and you've got about six you think or so that might get done soon perhaps in the next couple months and then after that as we get closer to the beginning in the next school year it's there's a potential that there could be additional ones that's all my questions thank you very much no questions for me thank you so much this is I I appreciate the detail all Absol information thank you so much so moving on to the second presentation the website update thank you very much thank you for those questions as well as part of the board's collocation resolution is September an aspect was for the charter schools division

011website to go undergo uh an updating and so this is uh the latest update that we'll provide the committee and the public as to that effort I'd like to begin by first acknowledging and appreciating our collaboration with our colleagues in its our um Information Technology Services Department from Mr Catal Mr Lee and their entire team Mr tenas who's been the the lead with the the details really appreciate all of their support Mr Suliman uh and their whole team so uh a credit to their efforts U really the technical backbone and expertise and we've learned a good deal from them before I pass it on to Mr Christian Mendes who will walk through the the slides um they've also as part of their efforts in addition to our own also researched other sites uh besides the

012site the board president had noted before of unified other District sites across this state and other parts of the country to inform the work secondly obviously are are conforming to the district's branding thirdly uh utilizing technology tools for translation in multiple languages um fourthly and this is responsive to feedback from the chair uh Dr Rivas you know an alternative to e- library for more direct accessible information so use of a Google Drive um as well as as making sure that the site is ADA Compliant for accessibility uh and other security measures and so we'll highlight some of those um updates now but I wanted to give you that context again with appreciation for the support of our colleagues in its and Miss Arin for her leadership in the process uh Mr Mendes is a senior

013coordinator in our department uh apart from helping us with this project which I appreciate uh in addition to the team members uh Mr Wick manowski uh Miss petito and our office office and others just want to give acknowledgement to the extra duties that that are folks are helping with um he also oversees one of our oversight teams and so down the line should we want to have a further discussion about our oversight efforts the senior coordinators our team leads along with our fiscal leads uh helping to uh support the teams in the field doing the work okay Chris uh thank you Jose good afternoon board members um uh as as Jose mentioned my name is Christian Mendes and uh I would also like to express uh gratitude to the its team for their support and

014collaboration uh with this project so thank you very much um it is my pleasure today to share some updates and highlight some of the features that the new website uh will will have which is currently being developed um the revised o is this can I get the PowerPoint please pleas need there ah thank you so much and uh very good thank you very good so um the revised website uh includes an updated user interface as Jose mentioned it is aligned to District branding and stylistic guidelines the website has a new New Look which um includes quick links on the right hand side and a reorganized menu system to allow users to more quickly get to the information they're looking for additionally the new website has new content and features the first feature I'd like to

015highlight is the charter school Clearing House which provides the public with direct access to documents and information about the charter schools authorized by LUSD including the approved Charter petitions prop 39 cllocation requests and offers lcaps and other information as called for by the board resolution the Clearing House is easily accessible from the homepage or quick links the user will see large buttons uh labeled with spe specific information uh that will be found after clicking that button for example if a user wanted to review the current uh Charter petition for any one of the uh authorized schools they would simply click on the button labeled approved Charter petitions that would take the user to a list of folders one for each School presented in Alpha order the user would simply select the folder for the school

016they were interested in and click to open that folder inside of that folder they will find the current uh or the I would say the uh operative Charter for the current term as well as any material revisions that may have occurred during that term I'd like to note that uh in response to feedback from board members and other stakeholders um the project has moved away from using El library for this feature instead it leverages Google Drive in collaboration with our its uh Partners Google Drive was selected uh due to its ease of use for end users as well as its security features so Google Drive is the tool that um houses and really uh runs the not runs but houses the documents in the Clearing House another feature of the redesign website provides performance data

017and information about each LUSD authorized Charter School via direct links clicking on the charter schools data and information link found on the homepage takes the user to a search function where the user can choose to see a list of all LUSD authorized Charter Schools or use the search feature to find a specific School using any part of the Charter School's name once the school has been selected the user is presented with direct links to public information and data for that specific school as we see on the slide the first link that the user sees is a link to the school's website next the user will see a link to the California Department of Education directory web page which contains useful information including um the charter school Charter School's address as well as contact information amongst

018other information there the next link will lead the user to the California School dashboard now when the user clicks on that link they will be taken directly to that school's um dashboard page where they can review performance outcomes for all of the applicable dashboard indicators such as Ela and math additionally on the page the user will be presented with the 2023 CDE performance category of high middle or low as well as the type of Charter School uh independent uh or Affiliated now here I want to note that the team made sure that these links go directly to the information for the school that was selected so that the end user would not have to re do a do another search to find that particular School these links go straight to the information for the school

019that was selected by the user well we are happy to report that the redesigned CSD website is on track to be completed and launched by the fall of 2024 our next steps include Gathering organizing and finalizing the documents that will go into the Clearing House um reviewing and updating the content on our current website which will be moved over to the new website and conducting a test for quality assurance and then lastly in collaboration with our its Partners um we are ensuring that the website will be fully compatible and easily migrate over to the edlio site that the district will be using for its web pages once it's ready to do that or once it's time to do that so in conclusion I want to thank you for the opportunity to provide you updates on

020this website project and we would be happy to answer any questions that we can let's make one note about uh being beta just to be clear yes so uh just to be clear what we have shown uh today these are all under development they're on U uh an internal website that is a beta this is not publicly available as of yet these do not represent our current CSD website but the in development version of it the beta version of it thank you thank that helps M no questions for me I just wanted to thank the team for previewing this website with us uh last week this week um and taking our feedback I uh think it's really helpful when getting direction from the board looping Us in in the process can kind of help make

021the final product a bit better so just thank you for that time and we look forward to seeing the final version little to ask but one of them is is that what is the plan for updating it after it's open and I say that because I go to many places in our website and the information is very very very old and out of date and I think that this one has a particular need to be kept up to date so do you have a plan for how to do that thank you for that great question I would say two things one in our current processing we're going to be looking where we can streamline information okay separate the wheat from the shaff if you will because some may be extraneous may be very static and

022not ongoing so we would look to co some information first so proactively thinking about that in the planning secondly and very candidly right now we're utilizing existing resources and to the to the maximum extent possible um however should there be a need to to be thoughtful about additional resources to do that we we'll assess that but right now with in working with its and the charter schools division team we will have in a sense a small group that would have that ongoing refresh um I think also uh as we've learned from it there's sometimes uh periodic releases as appropriate for updates right uh to try to manage that Cadence um so don't want to overpromise there but we're trying to be thoughtful about how we uh do ongoing maintenance also uh as I saw all

023of this yes yesterday but after I I finished I realized that um there might be a need or not a need a a desire to have some historical information on the website um for example not just the current lcap Ada reports in prop 39 but maybe information about one or two prior years because that helps people see change or not change or growth or not growth but I didn't know whether you have it we're thinking about putting more historical data on or just the current and previous year great we have thought about that we were thinking of potentially starting when it's live with that year moving forward maybe having a couple years we'll take back around maybe having one year prior it's also the resource piece of all the documents loing I do get but

024I do know that if you can see for example let's take a school which was two years ago listed as low but is now listed as a m medium I think families would like to see that it made progress that that it didn't stay where it was that's all I'm thinking thank you for that we'll take that back because I think when people go there they're looking for shall I do this right and when they say shall I do this they don't want to know just what's happening now but H what's where's their trend has their Trend been upward well I'm more likely to take a chance on that right understood we'll take that back thank you I think that's all except to agree with my colleagues that we're very appreciative of having a chance

025to have some input on the beta version and uh I think it's very exciting I think it's going to make a a lot of people very able to find out what they're looking for in terms of whether they want to go to a charter school thank you thank you thank you all wait I'm I'm next forget about me um no I I I mentioned um when we were previewing this if you're maybe thinking of adding on um maybe a link of the charter schools that are um authorized by the county or the state just so we you know because you know these are I know from the there's also a map that that um you didn't feature here but there's a map but at least adding a link to the county um authorized Charters yes

026we we are looking at that uh on that map feature using the Google Maps uh as a potential addition there from at least the county potent we have a couple from the state um that we're looking at as well and then lastly I know on um slide nine I know you just went over those the clearing house but on top you had general information Charter authorization Charter over site prop 39 and resources so those are additional right so this it it's not just this so there's additional sort of menus that right thank you for noting that and let me highlight one under additional resources there's a a section there for parents uh and Guardians for example members of the public uh and so they can have some basic information apart from the other you know

027how to contact the charter school you know what are some of their uh rights uh Etc because that's often times some of the questions our team receives uh from parents is I have this situation what are my options well we can provide some basic uh information there as to some steps to take so that's one uh feature for example and under the prop 39 and Facilities it'll not just be information in regards to applications and how Charter Schools can apply for prop 39 but also a list of the C schools that are currently collocated um and information for families there as well right there'll be some information the Clearing House will have uh the most of it with the actual you know uh for example requests uh the final offers alternative agreements Etc we're still

028assessing what ought to put in that section um but you know certainly some some additional information such as you noted would be will be considered for sure and just quickly if you can just let us one more Let the public know where it says approved Charter petitions right it's going to be a Google drive but what in that Google Drive will what documents will be in there I know the petition will be there but what other um documents will be there just quickly if you can thank you for that question yes just to clarify once you go into that folder there will be PDF versions of the actual Charter petition all of the elements right within that one document as well as any material revisions that occur during the term that apply to well you

029know any revisions to that Charter so the public would be able to have the most current version of that Charter scho is collocated it'll have the alt agreement and their shared use agreement right and all those other documents just to to to make sure I'm capturing the the feedback um right now the short answer is the website has that information right now in the petition folder it's contemplated just as Mr Mendes said to have the petition and the Amendments then you have a prop 39 uh folder that then has uh the final offers the alter agreements and where those uh collocations will be so they'll be in separate you know uh folders um we still will have our Charter School directory online and that is a One-Stop kind of a a simple summary the charter

030school and across the board there it has Board District Region contact information if they're collocated what district site that is still a go-to resource apart from the Clearing House which has documents so that information will still be synthesized on the directory and then once it's ready and live to go we be received hopefully another um presentation just so we can show all of the features because this is just a preview this is just to let us you know let us know what's up been what's been you've been working on and what's to come but once it's fully live it would be great just to have another rundown on on everything all the other features that you didn't you know show us today sure happy to work with your office at an appropriate down the line

031if you wanted at a committee meeting um to do something like that happy to do that yeah it would be wonderful to preview again for us and then you know show it to the public just to see all the features there so thank you so much and yes I reiterate what's been mentioned here the hard work and the thinking and it and everyone that's been working on I think it's going to be a very uh user friendly all the information is going to be there and it's you know it's going to look great thank you for your support thank you wonderful well now we will um move on to our final uh presentation by Mr uh Donald Cohen executive director of in the public interest and he will give us there were any um presentations

032he's just going to let us know um some some information on his research and what he uh he can he is going to let us know about real estate and charter school so welcome Mr thank you so I have distance classes and then I don't so and I'm getting you and I have reading glasses in my pocket so I may be moving around so I just I want to thank you for the opportunity to talk um I want to start with some caveats put these on um when you asked me to talk about uh uh charter schools in real estate that's kind of like saying could you talk about air and water like there's a lot to talk about so I'm going to be focused on something very specific I'm going to tell you what

033I and what I'm not and I'm going to tell you what I'm not going to talk about I'm not going to talk about collocation I'm not going to talk about educational outcomes um I am not up to the minute on state statutes right now I my organization Works around the country on on Charter Schools and education uh broadly we're spending a lot of time in other states on school voucher policies so I'm a little bit Rusty on California statute um and I've done no comprehensive study of what's going on here in La even though I live here I I pretty much read the LA Times so um what I am going to talk about is two things two related things the first is the public use of the use of public money to purchase private

034facilities uh some require some there are facility there are different streams of money I'll talk about uh some facilities uh some some Charters facilities funds require that the charter revert back to public ownership or stay in public ownership others do not I'll get into that um and then it's just important to note that every money we every dollar we use for facilities is money that were not used in some cases that could be used for educational purposes so there's always choices to make again in some of these in some of these funds second thing I'll talk about kind of briefly is the potential for conflict of interest for other interest for real estate interest for financial interest to involve themselves in educational policy and practice and decisions um now I am not nothing I'm saying

035implies any illegality or any wrong Behavior or anything like that I'm just my job and often when I do these things around the country whether it's schools or roads and bridges is often to talk about the problems and then always everyone says but what about the good stuff so I'm just raising the problems that we see so that you can take action and kind of think deep more deeply about this so you have been involved in this for many many years um so and then I will make some recommendations the end many of which will Jose will really like a lot because it's I want to load up that website with all kinds of information so I don't know if he's still here uh oh um so we I'll give you our in the itpi

036is how we say organization name for short if I repeat that we've done three things that relate to this issue o overall first about 10 years ago we started to see issues around the country of of you know related party transactions profiteering that was happening in the school uh all kinds of weird stuff that was going on in Charter School real estate around the country so I commissioned a kind of a brief an overview brief by a couple of professors one at Western uh Western Michigan University and one at ruter who finance School Finance experts to just kind of give an overview of what they were seeing around the country I remember every State's different every county is different so this is just overview of the issues and the Three core findings there were there

037was a sub and this you know nearly 10 years ago a substantial share of public a expenditures were being diverted intentionally or and or inadvertently for personal and and and business financial gain public assets were being transferred to private hands private ownership and that the lack of robust robust disclosure and transparency requirements made it difficult to uncover conflicts of interest in some of these issues I often had to rely on investigative journalists so that was in maybe say 10 years ago in 2017 we actually did a deep dive we we we um commissioned a study with a professor Gordon leer he may have even spoken when it came out before the board previous board a study called spending blind where we did a deep dive into the seven primary seven primary um facilities funding mechanisms

038in California um the study I I don't have copies of anything but it's all on our website it we published in 2017 it found that California Charters had received $2.5 billion in tax dollars or taxpayer subsidized funds to lease build or buy school buildings some sources had restrictions on buildings and land ownership others didn't our most important finding for that study was that there was no coordination between those different streams between the streams around facilities needs but also between the streams facilities discussions and education policy that's why it's called spending blind the study there were seven primary sources the California Charter facilities grant program s740 which you're familiar with federal grants conduit bonds bonds New Market tax credits loan funds G General obligation bonds and District level bonds those were the ones we studied in

039that so that was kind of the next sort of Deep dive into more into the California we we I'll talk a lot more about s740 and conduit in a bit and then more recently we published a brief that some again this is for National just a five or 10 p brief I can't recall about the issues that we're continuing to see around the country um I don't have copies again so again still these are some of the issues Charters leasing privately owned facilities with related parties you know related party transactions in some cases with very high lease payments including some with trip net lease leases where the the school is still paying for all the O and the operations maintenance conflicts of interest with Charter board members and staff CMOS Real Estate llc's Investors major

040vendors and other related parties now I'm I'm aware there are thousands of charter schools so we're just these are we're still finding these things we're still the things to be done um in some and then in cases where charter schools in privately owned buildings are closed or non-renewed districts are not able to take over the school they don't own it right they can't convert it to a public school they have to start they would have to start over um and then in some cases I don't I doubt this is true in California but perhaps that we've seen real estate developers build uh get Charters authorized and build charter schools in order to sell homes in a new planned Community there's even a mortgage company that started in North Carolina that Charter started a charter school

041chain so that's some of the stuff again we're seeing nationally so I'll focus a little bit more on California this um just ask a question on this timer I don't know what this all it says is two minutes and it still says two minutes um so s sp7 you you we all know s sp7 and conduit bonds bonds allow for public ownership now we use public money we give them 740 money they get to keep the building no matter what happens we um I can't remember it was pre-co I testified before the Senate excuse me this the State Assembly Ed committee and we were focused on the tri valley Learning Center up in Livermore that was a scandal it hit the press the SEC was involved it got you know I think there have even

042been charges there might even be criminal charges filed um and it what was doing one of the things it was doing is they were charging triple market rate to a charter school and paying back the related entity that they owned I mean it was scandalous it was a horrible situation but it had a real impact on policy going forward um so but it basically but it was legal right public money used for private ownership so the charter school facility grant program must be 740 money administered by csfa charter school facilities Authority has seen an increase to get some facts of funding to Charters from 47 million in 2012 to 184 million in uh 2223 now SB 740 is automatically Cola every year it's expanded has a cola and so in 2324 it looks like it's

043194 million bill yeah million excuse me now this is part of the State education budget so many many of these funds can be used for for K12 purposes so it's again important to know that that there are choices to make in the pass before Tri Valley uh markets leasing rates were not capped they're now capped right and um the um because because of you know the scandals so the 740 money is not intended for the purchase of private property but for rents and leases of charter school facilities right related party transactions that that are happening under 740 SP 740 should not be allowed under CFA definitions to to to for to be purchased by a related party transaction into private hands but they are they are being allowed so now it has become kind of

044an industry standard operating because it's the CFA csfa practice um they do now csfa does now review rental arrangements to check for above Market rents receiving that so it is part of their process I what I can't evaluate is how robust how much they do this is all work you know by St by usually departments that are over underst staffed but it's important to note that sp sp 740 only covers up to 75% of rental costs and so many and many Chargers don't even qualify so they may be portions of their rent that are covered by lcff uh uh funding that are being used that are not being tracked and not being regulated in the same fashion so a couple of La specifics again mention much of this from the Press um so Alliance College

045ready network has received about 7 about 90 million in 740 money since 2011 and they've received significant conduit Bond Bond financing New Market tax credits um they received 9.5 million in Sp 740 last year alone according to their 2022 financials that I did look at um they're the alliance facilities corporations Network because they have a a network of related party llc's private corporations um they uh have assets of $237 million in assets this was their 2022 financials it's private at Capital that they can do whatever they want with um last year they received $15 million in rent from La USD in all of those related part you all those LLCs combined so a few kind of specific you know things to Worth to to note schools and privately operated building privately owned buildings that are

046collecting rent can continue to con collect the rent even after they're paid off right so um Cindy and Bill Simon bought for a mill a CH School bought for a million has received 3.4 million in public money from s740 for leasing money all legit and legal now and I don't know in that case whether they have a triple net lease or not in terms of what the f you know the full impact is and then I I think as I mentioned that um bought it for a million I don't have the dates here but and then uh they've so far received three . 4 million in this in this kind of money and the question I asked was would do they also have triple net lease which would you know terms of who has the

047responsibility for the O and the m and the major maintenance um a second thing to think about is Charters can close and sell buildings and the purchase of public dollars I've mentioned so Alice bter Baxter excuse me bought at their school for 3.5 million they received 1.6 million in 740 funds and is now selling their building for 7.5 million um and I think the I believe the rest of the funds I could be wrong about this came out of lcff so it's a public we bought them a building they're selling the building but it's their building so that's and that's legal when I was and I said before I testified before the assembly Ed committee I didn't give that example but I said I gave that fact to the chair in the committee and he

048said so how is that possible my answer was it's the law so and he was in the assemblyman so I said tag you're it but I I don't think not sure I understand you're saying a private building correct bought with public funds correct is owned by the private owner correct and that if the school were to close there they could sell that property and keep the proceeds put a hotel there even though it was bought by public funds exactly so now we're in a business routine perhaps I think it's I thought it was illegal to keep property that was purchased with public money and with s740 money and I believe in conduct bonds as well certainly s740 it is legal I mean that's when I started this talking about this seven eight years ago I

049said the same thing Jackie it's unbelievable I can't believe it hasn't been fixed yet um so um there now there's a number of schools just a little bit more number of schools um in La that are coming up for Renewal over the next few years that are receiving s740 and are received and are and are identified as low performing by CDE and therefore likely to be denied renewal I have a list in some of my notes each are paying re rent to related party entities for example between 2015 and 20156 and 2223 Academia modna if I'm saying that right received $3.3 million from n740 money say so the question is what's going to happen to that building who owns it what happens to it um is it ours is it theirs let's find out if

050it's theirs we got to fix dat law um now I want to mention just a few things about conflict of interest just before I go on so it's um LAUSD informs charter schools of their requirement to file seven form 700s in contract interest but the district doesn't collect them the County Board of Supervisors does it's the count that that agency um the district can require copies Jose you'll correct me if I'm got this wrong um now I believe there are charter schools with real estate and financial interest on their boards in the in the state I haven't done research I believe that's true right so that should all be in the 7 700s I I assume in the form 700s um but I don't know if anyone if there's any comprehensive looking at those things

051I mean I just practically speaking if they're being filed to the County Board of Supervisors they've got their hands full uh and you're not looking at them you're not able to manage your District right so uh if no one's looking at them there's no oversight regardless of what the law says and I'm not an expert on Co you know 10 uh uncont interest laws in the state oversight specifically on what on on form 700s conflict you know the you know what they're called um on this conflict of interest whether there's related party interests involved in charter schools in lending in financing in governance and all of that and let me just be clear there's nothing wrong with their interests there's nothing wrong with they may be good people serving on boards and all that but

052I think as educ you know as those that care about education we need to make sure that our interest and the kids the kids are first and other interests can infect decisions that's just human um so and especially you know enrollment is declining overall you don't want other interest we deal with this in all of our other work in other sectors in water and roads and bridges when in prisons if if use is declining you don't want interest that whose interest it is to keep the money flowing you know just to take that out of there somehow so I'll make a few recommendations and I think these related party transactions are kind of a real problem whether they're related party and you have control over it or related party and they and we're giving away

053public money basically so my recommendations are based May on based on how LUSD can be more aggressive some of this has to happen at the state level about but you can scrutinize these relationships you do I believe have the authority to do that to understand them comprehensively and to scrutinize them and then to advocate in in you know in Sacramento where where things need to change um since no body's looking at the whole right now it looks to me no one's looking at the hole there's the county there's the state there's the county Board of Supervisors there's La USD there's C cfsa there's CDE so no one's looking at this as a whole which of course is a problem in general for governance of any of any kind and you could take the lead in

054getting the full picture so here's a few specifics that you could look for um you currently as I understand you C Charter petitions currently have a mandatory section related to the plans if the school closes um but it doesn't require a clear plan for what happens to the facility in new petitions and renewals right you could be asking more specifically going forward what's going to happen with this building who's going to own it it should be it should be part of that process um for charter schools and private facilities we should know the following do they own it do they own it through a related party um what's the rent who's in charge of the LLC what's their role in the charter uh is the facility paid off how much is left to be paid

055off off on the mortgage and I'm talking about facilities here but there are other related party relationships vendors backend stuff and all that so you could kind of think about those things in the same context um um for related party I wrote These I'm just going to read them now for related party LLC owned properties Charter Schools should regularly report to the authorizer on the financials of the LLC that owns the property what improvements have been made at what cost basic you're you know you're trying to basically evaluate are they paying the right amount it's hard to get comps for schools I mean that's just in generally a um you should routinely review the 990s and somehow you know I don't want to put on Jose staff going to get every 700 but they really

056ought to be here and you can go get every 700 and maybe you can even require that it be submitted here as well that I don't know that's a question for for your Council you should track all the rental agreements with related parties and what the you know what additional facilities costs that the charter must pay are they triple n Le or not right are they paying for that plus they're paying their lease payments uh collect all copies of related party facility acquisition Bond approvement facilities just have to know you know you have to know what the deal is you have to know what's what what's embodied in that piece of land and building and then of course advocate for state law um and you know if every District around the state said what Jackie

057said earlier is I can't believe this is possible maybe there would be change because it just should not be possible I believe you know I started thinking about this that when when I commissioned that first study you know overview in 2015 around the country I still think it's an enormous problem there's lots of public money being used for private gain I'm not this is not a proart or anti-art has nothing to do with that but public facilities are public facilities public assets are public assets and we ought to do everything we can to make sure that that continues to be true thank you very much any questions you have any questions I do and I'm still Gathering my thoughts but um sorry we sort of missed an introduction I was hoping you could share a

058bit about background uh you know just to give us a bit more context um to what we heard today somehow I didn't get on the notes so that's kind of obvious I apologize uh my name is Donald Cohen I'm the executive director of an organization that I started I think about 15 years ago in um called in the public interest we study public procurement uh privatization of all sorts of public things like prisons and Roads and buildings and schools and all that as well as have a whole um package of procurement reforms how to do good Contracting very broad so we work on all kinds of things public things everything from Social Services to roads and buildings to to public education we work primarily around the country um my background is I've been an organizer

059for many years I've led a couple of nonprofits over the years um I raise money to do this because that's the DD's job is to raise the money thanks for that and how big is the team and are you um prom Nally um sharing presentations like this are you commissioned to do research um sort of how do you operate we're pretty small um we now we've had different sizes but we're now down to about four full-time and about four Consultants who are working and then lots of Partnerships with research organizations and others like the commit the studies I mentioned were all commission studies you know with either University or other organizations um so we sort of do all Soup To Nuts but you know we think that you know there's organizations in uh you know

060there's 50 states 30 you know gazillion districts and water boards and counties and all that so it's our role primarily as I see it is to help people figure out what kind of questions to ask so you know next week I could be in Miami talking about water okay that's helpful I I'll pause there thank you I had followed that legislation and I was pretty sure that once public money was invol olved it became a public building even it w even if it was um so-called owned by a third party LLC and that's not true you're telling me it's everything I've heard when I and I said to the camera who the chair of the committee was the assembly committee and I mean all right and I asked like this because I had nothing but

061involved in California I asked has there been a change and I asked a few folks who were involved and they said no the reason I thought it had changed was because there was some scandal in New York where somebody bought some very expensive Manhattan property for a charter school and in three years closed it and sold it for a gazillion dollars and I remember that story because I thought that that was taken up here in California to prevent it and you're saying you don't believe that well Tri Val which was in Livermore you can Google that it's like the sec's involved now similar things I don't I I double checked this week Pi for that very reason to see if some change had made well that that's that's news to me I I did and

062I'll find out and I'll ask again and get back in touch with folks with you yeah or you know you can ask I mean well I anything else um you mentioned some recommendations and you know provided um a lot us with a lot of you know food for thought and things that we want to um follow up on not only at the State Assembly but also here with our Charter School Division but in your recommendations you may have mentioned um based on you know your your um your expertise how can we ensure or at least the research that you've done how can we ensure that public funds used for Charter Schools um Charter School real estate deals are managed responsibly and transparently you mentioned the form 700 and reaching all of that but should in

063your opinion should there be stricter oversight of to prevent conflict of interest and ensure facility remain dedicated to public education purposes well yes no absolutely so first what whatever state law right now allows that it shouldn't there has to be changed there that's obviously the first step whatever state law exists that you have authority over oversight there should be as robust Authority as you oversight as you you know as you have the capacity to do and I understand how difficult it is La has a very you know when we were doing this work a number of years ago La was you know seen as a model Jose's Department he was back he was there back then as well some one of the models in the state they're really good but there're still limited resources so

064the first thing is that you know principles we should know we should know everything that you could know about that piece of property that you would know about this piece of property who owns it who the investors are what the bank what the mortgage rate is what the lease payment is you know there it's just that's you know transparency is transparency right you should just be able to know everything and certainly who who in what interest are they National are they Global are they related are they not you know Cosmos that have some of these related party interests and they set up I mean um not Aspire the one that I mentioned Alliance they have like 20 related party llc's they set up a corporate structure to be able to manage real estate now maybe

065that's a legitimate thing but those are private entities so that that's I mean so know and follow up on what you can I don't know if that's helpful and Al along that line um what role can independent audits play in ensuring transparency and accountability in Charter School real estate um transactions like oig um office of um Inspector General or yeah I mean I would again I I don't have expertise but I can only imagine it you know to do what needs to be done for every school oversight for Contracting of any kind this is a contract fundamentally is a lot of work right and to be able to do it really what you would do if it was you know paint in your house that that level of scrutiny you have to have a lot

066of Staff you have to have a lot of resources so which means you're not going to get it all done so um you have what the crucial role of Investigations and audits to drill down in cases to illustrate the kinds of things that do happen and to show that there is a cup on the beat thank you for that yeah thank and do you know off hand of if if there's any um readily available data on financial arrangements and property ownership of schools I don't know I don't that's I'm not I don't know that I assume they're on the property roles but I you know I'm not a researcher and that's I'm not a real estate researcher yeah okay so we need to that but that's what we need to know I mean that's I

067mean there schools that you're paying for and um you know another I don't know if you this could be um you touched on in your recommendations what are potential solutions that benefit students and address concerns about um this profiteering well in in general I say again in my work um every dollar is precious it's it's tax dollars it's it's whatever it is every dollar is precious number one number two is we have needs that we can't meet in educating in the in carrying out the purpose the public purpose of education and public things so every dollar that's not being used for that is a dollar wasted so that's really what I think can is there money that you know let's say in that case where the school can you know they're going to sell the

068school which you know the one I mentioned and they're going to have $7 million in their hand that's $7 million that should go in classrooms that's my belief and um two more questions how could Al alternative F uh financing models such as long-term leases provide a more sustainable and responsible approach well um the if I if I'm answering correctly if you all own the buildings we're in better shape if a school closes you can put your own students in you can do that if a school closes no somebody doesn't take the money and run you can you could sell a school for a park or for for for whatever reason you want so I think keeping it in whatever you need right so but keeping it in public hands is crucial and and um how

069can Charter Schools demonstrate a commitment to responsible use of public funds and real estate transactions fostering greater public trust and support overall um I I in general I think it's full disclosure because again they're going to follow the law so if the law allows them to sell a building they're going to sell a building and I'm not even going to say they're doing something wrong because the law is the law right you have to change the structures so but that could be your partner but I you know there there will be I mean listen Charter Schools there's you can't say there's one thing called Charter Schools right um I get asked that question all the time are you for Charters or against Charter I said that's an incredibly stupid question like am I for air

070or am I against air there's good and there's bad it's not relevant right so I think the key is that you find folks in the charter world that's you know that're doing good and I visited a few Charters and we were doing this this work with David at the CH chamber doing some great work in in in the city in the the district okay work with them to to clean it up that's I think you know we need a reform agenda not a removal agenda um any other questions you I'm not I'm not chairing so go ahead I have one more question this could probably be for Jose as well but um did you want did you want have one for Donald sure I do yeah Mr Cohen um you mentioned SB 740 a couple

071times it was just curious if you knew if there was an audit of that or any sort of independent review view of the impact of how that's been going so far there there probably has the um fmat what is fmat stand for oh we learned that it's Financial yeah it's a state agency I bet there are more than one I can help dig up what there are yes I don't know for a fact but I do the researchers and the people that are on the ground doing this work will know that there's some good investigations that have happened yeah I think that might be helpful for us as a followup I don't know if it would come from your organization or from internally but um yeah yeah actually there was an audit um it was

072done on February 2023 um by the U treasury um so it's charger school facility grant program and contract financing program so I can share that with you but yeah there was an audit that was that was done at the request of assembly member Mia B okay yeah and my question um is you know is there a conf for the for L USD is there a conflict of interest in involving a charter board opening in L USD and how would we no I'm sorry Charter board um is there a a conflict of interest involving a charter board of directors opening La L USD and if there would be how would you know if there is a conflict of interest thank you Dr R let me take this opportunity to just make a few brief remarks and

073I'll address that briefly I I certainly um don't want to do short shrift to a response in terms of our oversight but I want to make a few brief comments uh to Mr some of the notes that Mr Cohen made and address your question uh first I think it's important to to set as a foundation for the committee for the board the public uh the district is uh has requirements for oversight to to fulfill for a variety of reasons above all students and the public trust I would say the district fulfills those obligations and then some we're happy to also come back to a committee to give a full presentation about all of our oversight including our fiscal oversight but a few brief points first in terms of conflicts of interest even before some recent

074changes in law it's in the record that this District you know to the credit of a board Boards of Education over time has been a leader in requiring public reporting in terms of conflicts of interest whether it's form 700 government code 1090 for over a decade um and so yes until 2021 when there was a change in law and guidance from the fair uh political practices commission this District collected the form 700s the statement of economic interest for all reportable officials as required uh and conducted a variety of due diligence including reporting more necessary to the fppc if there were violations Etc the law changed the County Board of Supervisors is now that collection agency we are not duplicating those governmental efforts how however in addition to as noted by Mr Cohen we do reiterate

075to Charter Schools their requirement to fulfill that aspect of law secondly we're in touch with the county to ensure they fulfill that and that they're doing their part of reviewing and we're a prize if there are any concerns uh we always reserve the right and we share this with Charter Schools to make requests of those public documents and I think we State we would expect those within two business days um but that's also a resource function uh to complement that we do to your question about conflicts of interest with new petitioners board Etc there are due diligence checks uh there are additional analyses that are conducted questionnaires to try to assess uh not only uh related party relationships with a variety of of aspects uh unrelated parties our team does significant analysis regarding related party

076analysis A there are audit guidelines in terms of related party reportings we often times do a lot of follow-up questions when we see a related party we ask for the financials of those related parties sometimes those requests are met with great efficiency and sometimes not and we still follow up so we are assessing what those nature of those relationships are the transaction of the public dollars Etc doesn't mean we can we're we're not learning every day we are and there are certainly resource constraints but we are following what the data show um and that would include vendors and the like and the last note uh I will make is that recently our off members of the district have been a part of anti- fraud efforts uh throughout the state with other authorizers and other stakeholder

077groups that was a recent report sh shared uh there's another effort uh from the County of Los Angeles given another unfortunate case on County of San Diego and others uh from the legislative analyst office I believe anti fraud efforts to try to be proactive and share with districts throughout the state uh and with schools uh Etc measures that can be taken to prevent uh fraudulent activities so we just want to underscore for the board um there are a variety of efforts we're always learning especially with our scale I like to submit respectfully that I feel we have very rigorous oversight doesn't mean we're not still learning uh but hopefully some of these brief comments will um answer some preliminary questions for you and the public and we're happy to go more into depth at a

078future committee meeting including our financial oversight thank you let me add um we were working closely with this department I don't know eight years ago and we're sending and other districts around the country and we're always sending other districts to your department so nothing that I said had was in any way directly related to the actual work of this department um that's what I said at the beginning these are Big the issues we see you need to investigate but we have a great deal of respect and and U and quite impressed with the Department here any other questions Miss fran did you want to mention something just a quick one I know you mentioned s740 as one area of funding and I looked at your website I'm not sure if there's any other lists the

079con any other lists so other um types of funding available for uh charter schools to um use for for example yeah well there there's there the one study called spending blind is the name of it if you want to search for it right in the executive summ there's a chart there's SE there's a it's you know it's it's the seven that I mentioned but a few of them are broken out you know School District bonds there a San Diego there's an LA so it's those seven it was the 740 that allows private ownership and then some of the conduit bonds got it thank you when did 740 pass a good question I don't know the answer a while ago po before covid that's all I know before Co after covid yeah around maybe 2,000 yeah

080okay thank you so much I appreciate it thank you so much for your um I just want to mention that I mentioned uh M and assembly member m attempted to address um sort of the the issues that were that um Mr Cohen um mention mentioned um it was AB 2484 it was Charter School closure accountability Act of 2022 and it did pass uh through the Senate but unfortunately it um it was in the Appropriations Committee and it didn't it didn't move any forward from there but the reason that Miss bant um assembly member bont brought this um this bill forward was because you know I'll just read here some of the um the problems that she was trying to address over the last 20 years the usage of the charter school facility grant program has

081strayed from the program's original intent Charter management organizations CMOS have created limited liability companies llc's to use the program funds to pay off private mortgages or conduit Revenue Bond obligations and acquire property without public oversight or public claims to ownership and according to the spending blind which is the the um the research that was mentioned earlier while CMO chains account for 28.5% of all charter schools in California they have received nearly half of the funding under s SP 740 um further on as a result CMOS have been able to acquire large amounts of real estate at the taxpayers expense though these properties are held for private corpor by private corporations they are purchased with proposition $98 the private corporations have no obligation to use these facilities for public noxxarian educational purpose when a charter school

082closes instead they can sell these taxpayer finance properties or lease them to private schools but simply put uh s740 program currently allows taxpayer dollars to finance the private purchase of real estate and um and also this was supported by the California labor Federation that states for two long gaps in the law have enabled charter schools and their affiliates to grow uh private real estate holdings at the taxpayer's expense taxpayer dollars have funded the acquisition and maintenance of charter school facilities which are ultimately held privately by CMOS um and so you know this is something that us as tax payers and the largest uh Charter School authorizer in LUSD we have to very be very cognizant of this and I know it was mentioned that there is strong oversight over this but overall in the state

083this is an issue that um must continue to be addressed so um so we will end it there um and so I want to thank again Mr um Donald Cohen for being here and um providing us with this information and will more soon to come um so now we will move on to public comment okay here we go public comment we have a full boat at 2 minutes a piece for each person who is making public comment I'll call in the folks who listed themselves as appearing in person first and then go to the people who are speaking remotely uh Hazel tereso are you here tereso Hazel come on up you have two minutes to speak once you begin and then as uh Miss Tero is coming down could Mr Keith Delila Rosio Kio and

084Dr Christine saraga please also line up to the right of the room so that we can keep things efficient and um your microphone's on and 2 minutes is yours great good afternoon board members my name is hazo Tero and I am the director of health for Vonex Century Learning Center um van is a charter school with five campuses of serving students from prek through 12th in the Paka area of the San fro Valley so today I will use my time to briefly talk about our intentional effort to create a streamlined Data Tracking and management process across our five campuses um prior to the pandemic Von had about 12 mental health team members and did not have a director of mental health um with the increase in mental health related concerns in Co funds van prioritized

085hiring a director and the following we were able to double the team to mental health of mental health professionals at our sites to about 22 members while the team doubled we did not have a universal and streamlined process to capture and showcase the same data across our sites and used it to and use it to make inform data informed decisions so over the last two years we've been very intentional about improving our Data Tracking to not only capture the number of students served but also the number and types of multi-tiered Services of the team members provide including our critical incidents which are mostly safety related concerns this is important because over the last two years we've seen an increase in safety related concerns such as suicide risk assessments and threat assessments and the data allows

086us to see the severity of the concerns time spent and number of incidents by site um board members I did bring a copy of what the data dashboard looks like if you have opportunity to look at it um and this data dashboard was created using Google data studio um and it allows you to look at the different data sets to link it to One dashboard and then disaggregate it by school sites um and this data dashboard is a summary of the data from the 22 23 school year and was shared with our own board administrators and mental health Team and it allows the data um again to be viewed from a Von wide but also sight by sight perspective so it allows um our staff to be informed and make data informed decisions based on

087the types of needs that we are seeing thank you thank you for your time Keith Delila come on up Keith [Applause] Dela good morning board or good afternoon board members thank you for the opportunity I'm Keith Delila with the California Charter Schools Association um a lot came up today I would just say on the area of facilities um rather than bringing Mr Cohen here to talk about a report that was 10 years old in legislation that was multiple years old uh we should stick to what's actually uh the law today um there is no no debate and no dispute that public dollar should absolutely stay and support public school students but there were lots of implications today that the way the uh the world Works in California does not let that be possible that that

088is not true we have robust oversight there was a an audit a state audit of the s740 program last year that Dr Ras mentioned I'd like to read for you a portion of that report that said the charter schools facility grant program provides State funding to subsidize Charter Schools facilities rent and lease costs and most of the recipient schools enroll a sizable percentage of students from lowincome households we found that charter schools that received program funding closed less frequently than other charter schools and the schools we selected for reviewed were often located in areas needing additional classroom space in short we saw uh the audit also included there were no findings of uh waste fraud or abuse through the program um there were some technical amendments that were uh recommended that should be and can

089be pursued through the regulatory process but the end result of that audit found that this is a an important program to support providing classrooms in areas of the state that are serving low-income students and overcrowded uh communities in La unifed it's very challenging for us to find facilities because at the same time as you're making it harder to access facilities through propop 39 you're turning away the opportunity to partner on District owned property it's the bright star vote Miss Ras or Dr Ras there is a facility behind this building that is set empty for three years it is exactly the type of partnership we're talking about bringing more of District owned facilities and long-term Partnerships with Charter Schools we need more of that but this board has continually said no no no to those options

090so let's come back to the table long-term facility Solutions are there and they are uh there are win-win solutions for all of us thank you for your time thank you for your time Rosio CIO Rosio CIO come on up you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin thank you good afternoon esteem board members I'm Rosio Kio the Community Schools director at Aspire fire Academy and I'm privileged to have served the organization for 9 years now today I'm thrilled to present some of our notable student events and parent engagements from recent years last year marked the milestone for our inaugural annual aelia community Fair a vibrant Gathering that welcome over 200 of our families to our school grounds our dedicated staff man the booths fostering interactions with families while thrilling carnival games added to the

091excitement special guests from the south Gap PD joined us enhancing the community spirit with free face painting snow cones popcorn and pizza alongside support from organizations like the Department of Mental Health and Southgate parks and wck among many others it was a joyous Saturday symbolizing Community unity in November AR Los moros event captivated audiences with live performances by Mariachi Astic dancers and solo singers all graciously supported by local businesses like monara Bakery who provide provided free coffee and Conchas children immersed themselves in the Arts and Crafts enjoying face painting while families reveled in the shared celebration a testament to the power of collaboration that we value so deeply at Firestone Academy our special pada brought families together 2 years ago for an evening of warmth and camaraderie board games sweet bread and hot chocolate greeted

092guests while the generosity Fiesta Max brought the joy of pinatas to all ages the night glowed with a spirited dance contest where laughter filled the air and prices added to the festive atmosphere creating a sense of family and belonging that is the heart of our school Community we extend a heartfelt invitation to each and every one of you to visit Firestone Academy witness firsthand a transformative experiences we offer our Scholars and join us in our commitment to community engagement and excellence in education thank you for your time thank you for your time Dr Christine Saga good afternoon LUSD Charter committee board members my name is Dr Christine sarda and I am director of clinical counseling at Puck schools I am here to share some comments and support of lausd's strategic plan that is focused on

093Joy and wellness I'd like to share some Innovative practices that we are engaging in the data according to the Census Bureau the percentage of people experiencing anxiety or depression remains double that of pre-pandemic levels for over 20 years Puck has been providing full service mental health support to our schools we enlist graduate students to provide services to our students families and teachers we started with Puck schools now we are partnering with over 25 additional Charter Schools providing mental health we recruit 80 clinical counselors who Provide support on campus during home visits and over tella Health in the summer we provide family success meetings where we address the transition to a new school environment we give students and their parents a chance to talk about starting Kinder Middle or high school and identify goals and concerns

094for the year during the year we provide counseling that supports the lgbtqia plus community and offer groups on Grief and loss and other clinical Trends in the classrooms we have presented on Bully prevention and other clinical topics for students who are failing or struggling with absentee we offer Student Success meetings to address their obstacles to learning when we provide therapy we incorporate creative modalities such as art therapy music therapy play therapy Cinema therapy and santree to engage students to process their psychosocial emotional barriers lastly last year we supported 12% of our elementary students 40% of our high schoolers and 49% of our middle schoolers Serv as seen 1,79 students from our Puck School schols we see similar numbers from our contract schools in total we support for 3,000 students each year more students are referred

095to counseling with your assistance we hope to continue our Mental Health Services and help more students in the years to come thank you thank you for your time okay I'm going to read the next four names with the first person please coming up to the podium and the F the next three lining up along the wall Frank novaro come on up and then following Frank eloisa Galindo I think I saw you out there I'm g i yield my time okay give me one moment before you start please uh Brooke Rios and uh then David Richardson so those so first it'll be frank Navaro who intends to yield his time then eloisa Galindo then Brook Rios then David Richardson afternoon members of the board and staff and audience my name is Ricardo meles I'm the executive

096director and founder of Academia Vance in Highland Park we started in 2004 I have brief comments to talk about a good example we've seen some good examples here of other schools I wanted to add to that our school is in the top 10% of all the public high schools located within L unified in terms of the colleg goinging rate the CDE college going rate right and the majority of our students are going to four year universities and that's why our school has been renewed three times because of those kinds of outcomes when the school started in 2004 I was told by experts hey you need three things to be able to succeed here and have good outcomes for students you need the finances you need to be fearless and you need the facilities I think

097we've done all three of those right but it was very hard especially in the beginning the challenges of facilities and M Keith deaka definitely pointed to how difficult that is now I'm talking about 20 years ago um we had in our first Charter had to use 10 different sites now I'm happy to tell you that for the last 10 years we've gained a lot of consistency and that shows in our outcomes right and we've been able to do that because of Partnerships not like the kind of problematic ones that are just said here we've had great Partnerships with Community organizations several churches and more recently with The Optimist Youth homes Family Services organization right one of those outcomes has led us to have a facility now with the Community Schools Grant and this art center

098community center is also has a ceramic studio and U spaces for our parents to meet with Community organizations to address the rising gang violence situation that's happening in Northeast Los Angeles and as a last example the work that our students are doing has been recognized by the national diversity Coalition in terms of our peer-to-peer uh financial literacy programs that our students are doing Avance is delivering the outcomes that you want thank you very much for your time thank you Alisa Galindo Miss gindo is going to speak in Spanish so if you'd like to hear what she's saying in English as she's speaking please raise your hands and we'll get these headsets to you so you can experience simultaneous translation so keep your hands up and my colleague out there will hand you the headsets and

099as soon as we're done handing them out we'll begin there's no running in the hallways sir I'm sorry that was easy one I'm sorry well good afternoon I'm eloisa Galindo I'm part of reclaim our schools LA and the organization that works with Justice Living Well exactly I'm a mother of East and from Bo Heights area I've lived the privatization as how the public schools are accelerating this and I've seen Monica Garcia Jose guis at where is Jose gu at he's making business with the developers and the cor people from Corporation Mna what is she doing for the students they're just doing business this is privatization because the vouchers are is that the privatization of vouchers for low-income families with within the public system and it's not it's not right knowing that we have a crisis

100a a living crisis in California everyone who wants Lots in La USD let me know how many homeless are at the streets how many student homeless are within La USD that live in their cars that sleep on the streets that live on a couch but you are demanding assistance assistance and R you don't know what the communities are going through F LD families are being affected because of lack of resources and it's only Justice that you don't give LUSD property to the corporations they want to privatize the education so that they can become richer no more we can't give public land to the developers they should make accessible living and Justice living for our students for the families that are living at on the streets all these departments that you see all these buildings that

101you see in Downtown LA and they're almost Greek well all these buildings have high cost and we can't homeless can't live in them and it is time and if for there there is a a law for ass Charter Association and the millionair tell me what law will protect communities lwi income thank you very much for your time especially LD students this is enough no more land for them they belong to us Brooke Rios Brooke Rios are you here come on up you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin all right later good afternoon my name is Dr Brooke Rios and I'm the CEO of new Los Angeles charter schools and I hold wholeheartedly believe that district and public charter schools should share best practices LA's public school students deserve the absolute best we can

102offer and I think as we all know we can be stronger together today I'm here to talk about the diversity equity and inclusion and Justice work happening across the new La Network a few years back new La embarked upon a deep process to learn how we could better meet the needs of our community 80% of our students are latinx 13 % are African-American 4% are white and 83% of our students qualify for free and reduced lunch but more importantly our community is rich in cultural wealth and we wanted to assure that we were uplift uplifting the assets that our students already bring to the table while making sure that the systems underp underpinning our schools were liberatory and not oppressive this process resulted in a strategic plan for Equity the plan outlines goals for developing

103an inclusive supportive and culturally responsive Community where all can Thrive the plan is posted on our website and we report on implementation at every regular board meeting this report is followed by a dialogue where board members publicly reflect on their commitment to equity staff participate in monthly professional development on systems thinking restorative practices and culturally responsive teaching and learning and they're currently developing a deij scope and sequence for grades TK through 8 through relationship ships with teachers and our curriculum our students explore and celebrate their own identity and are empowered to take action as anti-racist our hiring practices assure that our students see themselves in their teachers we have looked under every Rock honestly and with humility to ensure that deij and Equity are woven into the fabric of our organization and I have so

104much more to share as we continue to move through the implementation of our plan I welcome the opportunity to collaborate on what we've learned through this process but more importantly I would love to learn from you thank you for your time okay Mr Richardson is uh is here but is not going to speak but I want to make sure that we Mark him as being here um will the next four folks please come on up as I call your names Yari barano please come on up you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin Elizabeth Hernandez please uh line up along the wall there Clarisa palasio also and then Andre Lewis so first we'll go so jetsi and then Elizabeth and then Clarissa so Yi whenever you're ready two minutes is yours good afternoon board

105members my name is yti varano and I'm a senior at esperansa College Prep the California distinguished school we are a High School located in the beautiful community of East LA where I was born and raised esparanza College Prep offers a range of extracurriculars and cont contributes to our development we have unique clubs like forestry where students are able to practice the conservation of the forest or are my own my own club the Key Club where students can be active members in their Community there is also a very part of our school where students can indulge themselves into the beauty of our culture througha which I am a part of it celebrates a part of my identity empowering my traditions in the heart of Esa and shows me what my parents once treasured before coming to

106the US esperansa consistently shows the students the hope and pride of being first generation and most importantly creates a positive multigen multi-generational change for my myself my community and my community esperansa is committed to providing Equitable access to resources and opportunities for everyone our school ensures that every student feels valued heard and supported this year 100% of our seniors were accepted to a four-year University or college including me I'm thrilled to let you guys know that I was accepted to eight colleges and universities but will be um attending Duke University on a full ride through questbridge our school not only connects with with it students but actively engages with local organizations and businesses and Community leaders our senior students have capstones which are Community Learning projects where we Foster a culture of Civic engagement and

107social responsibility among our community thank you for your time and I know there are many misconceptions about Charter Schools but I hope I have given you a different insights from a student perspective I invite you to visit our own school and um experience for yourselves for what we get to call our second home for having me thank you for your time so Elizabeth Hernandez have you seated your time to Ryan Earl bomb Elizabeth no no come on up Mr earlom I understand so uh you have two minutes to speak once you begin all right um my name is Ryan erbal I was a teacher in Los Angeles Unified for 15 years I now have the honor of working for utla and right now I'm one of the point people on Prop 39 collocation issues and

108you know every year like around this time of the year a lot of schools are concerned about potentially giving up classrooms to Charters that are coming onto their campus uh one example is there's a school that I'm supporting they have this Orchestra room that really means a lot to the school Community you know I was out there the other morning and kids were like taking their instruments in with their parents it was very cute and very inspiring and this now this school is really scared that they're going to lose this room and so first I just want to thank the the the the board for the work that you've done on this committee I think the work that you've done with what has uh recently been passed is starting to make a difference and I

109think the type of transparency that you're advocating is also making a very big difference so thank you and I also just want to State it's not that we're against Charters I mean there's amazing Charters that do really great work we organize with Charters it's just really protecting these rooms that are really important to these School communities and really mean a lot to them and the type of um fear and frustration that uh potentially giving up these rooms causes I also want to mention the uh report in agenda item three and I just think it's really important to highlight the context right now like there's a housing crisis in La it's one of the largest crises I think we're all touched by it in a different way and I think it's another opportunity that the board

110has to really help on this crisis you know to really make sure that um available space is used is used in a positive way so thank you very much for your time and all the work that you do thank you for your time uh Clarissa Palos come on up claresa Palos you'll have two minutes to speak when you begin i y my time good afternoon esteemed board members I am ton Lopez Vasquez a proud La USD senior at espena college prep my family and I are grateful for many high school options I had in my community of Echo Park however when looking at all the options espara College Prep stood out to me because of its fical program my parents immigrated to the US in seek of a greater educational opportunities for my younger brother

111and I we commute 1 hour to school every day from E from Echo Park to East LA and it's worth it for my family and I what drove me to pick esperansa was their amazing ballet fical program as a first generation indigenous Latina preserving my root has always been important to me so having the opportunity to express my culture became vital to the high school I decided to attend esperansa unique esperansa unique dance program academic support and amazing Community fostered the courage to apply to programs like the UCLA reordan Scholars Program where I had the where I had the pleasure of meeting Karen Ramirez our La USD student board member similar to Karen we both had the opportunity to apply to many colleges and attend our Dream schools I am the first in my family

112to ever apply and was accepted into 11 universities including UC Berkeley University of Pennsylvania and UC San Diego although I will announce my choice on decision day alongside my family I am happy to say that I got into my dream school and I will be graduating with highest honors it is because of schools like esperansa that gives students like me the resources to attend higher education and truly create positive multigenerational change for all I would like to invite you to attend our end of the year cultural dance production it's a fical showcase that highlights various regions and gal of Mexico's Rich traditions this production provides a professional experience at no cost to our students and over 2,000 people attend it every year I hope you can come feel the pride and joy of Aruda on

113May 25th I will leave these invites here for you all thank you for your time we hope to see you soon thank you for your time okay I'm going to call on the next folks that are signed up to speak in person so would the first person come up to the microphone and the other folks line up along the wall uh Andre Lewis com on up to the podium and then Maria Osorio understood uh and then uh David toosi and then Gloria Martinez those are the folks that are Beyond deck so Andre is going to speak then we have Maria who has seated her time to a gentleman and then David tolkovsky and then Gloria Martinez so the floor is yours Mr Lewis greetings board members my name is Andre Antoine Lewis Jr I've been

114attending stem prep schools for around 7 years now and through my experiences I've overcome a lot of mental challenges for both myself and the people around me back in my freshman year of high school my school counselor Miss Bach prevented me from spiraling within my Mental Health crisis and also got me the help I needed which in turn allowed me to save one of my friends from falling into crisis as well this was only two years ago for me and one year ago for my friend stem prep provided me with help that I had never experienced before Miss Miss Bach was there at my house to check in on me she talked to me made me feel human and like I had a voice and also led me to some great outside and inside resources

115like Puck school's mental health and clinical counseling program and Child Guidance Center to help me overcome my depression these services for free to me and my family um her words and kindness allowed me to be there for my friend and give me an opportunity from saving him from making a grave mistake um even now both me and my friends still talk to Miss Bach and are outside and side help regularly and we are both in infinitely better spaces than before although the pain from those memories are hard to Rel live I do it in order in order to remind me how far I've come and why I keep fighting and knowing that there are other students going down going through the exact same pain I am it drives me and I'm honored to be able

116to share my experiences and be able to tell them that there is a way out reaching out to your school is probably the best decision you can make and a lot of lives could be lost if they shut down as these Charter Schools offer an experience like no other thank you for your time and consideration thank you for your time uh with the gentleman speaking on for Maria Osorio com on up yes good afternoon uh Maria Osorio did yield her time to calos Mones education Committee of the community service organization I'm here as a volunteer longtime advocate for public education I graduated from mid mon Elementary School graduated from hbag Middle School Rosevelt for a year and I went to the other side Garfield graduate proud bulldog and I want to thank you uh Dr

117rias and the board for beginning to investigate this whole profiteering scheme I think we're just the tip of the iceberg if you read the report there's a lot more information um the co-founder of um Endo parans is a millionaire in he sold several businesses he's been found to be the entrepreneur of the year right uh you know we had to do a freedom of information request to the division uh chared division on end of eight we found out that they they had Financial irregularities they hired non-credentialed right now esperansa ovate is a block away from Garfield High School it was an empty uh former Auto Sales lot they bought it this is a profit making real estate transaction who owns that building who paid for that building right who hired the contractors for for that

118building right you need to really look deep into these real estate transactions because East unincorporated area according to Hilda solisa staff is pro development that that the the the zoning laws the planning laws are pro development there's seven or eight brand new charter school buildings within a mile and a half in East LA you need to look into that it's a real estate development so they so Kip Southern California is full of corporate lawyers real estate agents look into it please thank you for your time okay Mr David toosi Mr David Tok kovski come on up and you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin sorry to run in the hallways but if you gave us more than two minutes we wouldn't have to run so much that's what passing period at schools we

119discovered anyway it's pleasure to to officiate here at the wedding on one side you have the Grooms people and the other side you have the uh Brides people uh it's time to bring everything together and that's Miss arin's responsibility in large part to innovate so let me say sp sp 740 was during Schwarz saggers it was moved into to the Department of Finance away from the legislature but s740 is available to in District and Affiliated Charters too uh so that in the old days when we used to Le lease a church for a continuation school if that were an Affiliated or in District Charter you could apply for the SB 740 and you wouldn't have to be paying out of the general fund and we had no facilities money so take advantage of s740 uh

120that's H oh lawyer looking at me what am I saying but I think I'm right because on AO my former Chief of Staff is now the head of General services and uh she connected me both to the Department of Finance and others and I did research this all out so um there's a lot of opportunities in there uh number two the bond we need a bond and we could end some of these conflicts between the the the uh bride and the Grooms party and and come together we could put a large amount of money into redesigning uh schools that have been historically uh uh collocations I mean we we did a pretty good job at pendo but we squeezed a square peg through a round hole rather than getting a planner and a thinker because

121one of the schools is probably in declining enrollment going to go out of business and instead of putting all our money into a charter off a campus um we should be putting all public school money onto the public schools and not have two systems number three um um Greening the Arts all of these things adult aded early ad CTE that's what a bond would do uh we need more IND District Affiliated schools we the uh oig is very important Lena Gonzalez carrying the measure uh to uh make sure that uh the oig has the ability to audit all agencies and I think it was mentioned earlier we have a charter school right across the street um I think Monica Garcia or Mike Garcia I mean uh charter school we ought to be doing something with

122that rather than having it sit empty and it could be an IND District Innovation it doesn't have to be outsourced because that will fit the agreement made on that building thank you very much thank you very much for your time okay and our final final speaker Gloria Martin marz come on up you'll have two minutes to speak when you begin good afternoon um board members uh my name is Gloria Martinez and I've said stood here before you all um and said the following words but I will reiterate them um we are not against Charter Schools we are not against Charter teachers we're actually willing to organize Charter teachers so that they can get um what they deserve with a fighting Union um and we're definitely not against um Charter students we hear the inspiring stories

123all across the city as a teacher a special education teacher nothing warms my heart than to hear students who are succeeding especially when those students look um and represent me but what we are against are systems that allow for public funds to be siphoned and misappropriated we think that that is something that is problematic for all entities schools across the city are filled with teachers in classrooms across the city in both Charter and Public District schools that are doing the best they can with what we are given but teachers and Educators shouldn't have to make do with the crumbs that we are provided so I encourage this committee um to continue doing what it's doing which is looking into um education systems that are here for profit margins versus the education systems that are here

124for the right reasons which is to serve the communities in the cities of Los Angeles thank you thank you for your time and let's see we actually have I think one person still on the line uh antoneta Garcia I see you're on the line please press star six to unmute yourself and you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin antoneta Garcia hi can you hear me be sure can please go ahead yes hi um good afternoon board members my name is anona Garcia from a and cro CSO from the um chapter education and I am also an LA USD parent I am here because we have a housing crisis in Los Angeles where our L USC families and students are being impacted by the crisis we have thousands of students I repeat thousands of

125students throughout the city that are housing insecure and are sleeping in cars how impossible could that be and living in the worst case scenarios living in the streets I am here to ensure that La USC is utilizing its Surplus land to build affordable housing for lowincome families I do not want and I repeat again I do not want la USD to continue handing out Lu lucrative deals and private estaters and Corporation who do not have our students Health in mind L USD owns land and should be used for Community benefit not corporate greed I was also a proud product a I am also a PR product of La USD and I when I was 15 years old I did live in the streets because my family lost their home and we had other people from

126the community giving a shelter it was so hard for me to study to stay focused so I urge La USC to really help our community not help the corporates thank you thank you for your time and I'm going to call on the last person who said they would be calling in uh Justine Gonzalez I don't see you in the audience are you in the audience Justine Gonzalez uh and you're not a remote on the line so that concludes general public comment thank you for all the public speakers uh present and um remotely so I just want to as the um the audit was mentioned a comment from the audit um was mentioned I also want to mention what the audit also revealed the uh Charter School Finance Authority does not take adequate steps to appropriately

127vet facility grant program applicants um it further says further C CS csfa does not review all applicants for to the uh facility grant program for potential conflicts of interest instead it performs a detailed review only when applicants self-disclose a potential conflict oh my God similarly csfa relies on applicants self-certifying that they meet all program requirements to ensure that Grant recipients are not operated at as or by a for-profit organization because it does not take steps to verify that applicants disclosures and certifications are correct csfa is less able to prevent a charter school from improperly receiving State funding under the facility grant program so this is a finding from the audit so I just wanted to make sure that we all knew um that so um so thank you um for all the presenters um here

128today and I just want to say that you know while Innovation and educational experimentation are valuable public education should should prioritize every single public dollar that is meant for the well-being of students and their academic success funneling resources towards real estate Ventures raises concerns about whether the focus is shifting from student learning to generating profits for developers and Charter School operators we need a system that prioritize long that prioritizes is long-term educational impact not short-term real estate gains concerns are mounting about the growing real estate industry surrounding the charter school industry Public Funding intended for student learning increasing flows towards private companies offering a full service model to those schools including real estate development unlike traditional Public Schools Charter Schools can access State Facility grants as mentioned s740 to offset facility costs even if they

129own the property this Advantage is exemplified as mentioned earlier by the alliance charter school network they purchased for example a building for 3.4 million with with Grant help received rental assistance funds from the state for several years then closed the school after just seven years now they stand to make a hefty profit by selling the property for nearly triple the purchase price price this shift raises several critical questions about accountability and transparency and honesty taxpayers lose out in this scenario and so do our children public funds used to acquire and maintain the facility ultimately benefit the charter networkers CMOS and llc's not students and the public education system as a whole we need a more Equitable system for allocating public education funds Charter Schools should not have the access to programs and financial advantages unavailable

130to traditional Public Schools let's ensure that the public money is used transparently and prioritizes the educational needs of all students thank you so much and we'll see you at the next charter school meeting thank you la [Music]