The Roslyn School Saga
Four districts Chosen for Full-blown Audits

BY KARLA SCHUSTER AND JOHN HILDEBRAND
STAFF WRITERS
August 8, 2004

"Manhasset, Lawrence, Hempstead and Brentwood last week were targeted by state Comptroller Alan G. Hevesi for full-blown audits as part of a project to restore public trust shaken by scandals in the Roslyn and William Floyd school districts.

Hevesi also plans to conduct limited financial reviews of at least 15 other Island districts at a cost of $1.2 million.

The school systems were chosen largely based on tips from the public - 130 specific allegations concerning 32 school districts, Hevesi said."

'Every district has internal issues around a construction project, a failed budget, a disciplinary hearing,"' said Jericho Superintendent Henry Grishman, who is chairman of the New York State Council of School Superintendents. 'As we all waited for the comptroller to release the names, there was some sense it could have been any district in Nassau or Suffolk.' "

BRENTWOOD
"Brentwood recently had hired the daughter of the district's business director as an internal auditor - a fact brought out in campaign fliers from a group called Residents for Better Schools. The implication was clear: The hiring threatened to upset Brentwood's financial checks and balances, by concentrating oversight of the district's $224.6-million budget in a few hands."

'Everyone here is wondering where all the money's going,'said George Talley, a leasing-company owner and co-founder of Residents for Better Schools, who recently was named school board president."

HEMPSTEAD
"Financially speaking, the Hempstead school system would appear in pretty good shape - at least, on paper.

The district spends more than $15,000 per student, comparable to tuition at many private schools. The longtime superintendent receives salary and benefits totaling more than $240,000, according to the latest published figures - one of the best packages on the Island."

Facts prove otherwise such as the district's 86-year-old Prospect School, closed indefinitely last fall due to crumbling brickwork and other decay, the playground is choked with weeds. A mile south, the 93-year-old Marguerite G. Rhodes School has been shut down due to deterioration.

Some residents welcome this audit to determine why problems exist when their finances would suggest otherwise.

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"Even before the audit, ample evidence points in that direction. Last winter, for example, an independent consultant found widespread problems in the district's food services, including pilferage of food. Meanwhile, board members trade charges that their colleagues are placing friends and relatives on the payroll, or using political influence to get payoffs from groups doing business with the system.

'If there's any wrongdoing, we certainly want to know about it,' said Youssef Soufiane, new board president."

LAWRENCE
This district has declining enrollment due to parents fulling their children out and sending them to private schools, a sign of discontent. This issue was ignored for years, because it could be.

" Even as costs went up and enrollment dropped, the tax rate stayed relatively stable, due in large part to the district's decision to use an $18 million surplus to cover operating costs. School budgets passed easily through the 1990s."

Factions began attributing problems to state mandates and other issues. This led to polarization and an inability to continue passing budgets. This recent decision to audit has finally found community consensus.

" 'No question why they picked Lawrence - a lot of things have been going wrong for a while,' " said Bruce Scher, a founder of the town-based Alliance for Public Schools. " 'If things were the way they were 10 years ago, probably nobody would give a damn. But now everybody is keyed up.' "

MANHASSET
"On Long Island's North Shore, competition among the small, affluent school districts is fierce, with residents often tracking the number of Intel science contest winners and Ivy League-bound graduate numbers more closely than the size of their tax bills.

'In 1985, it started going up about 10 percent a year and the final frosting was the reassessment,' Garges said. 'My school tax bill went up 73 percent in one year.'

That year, 2003, Garges cast his first-ever 'no' vote for the school budget. He wasn't alone. Manhasset's budget failed for the first time in a decade."

It has been an uphill battle for the district ever since."

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ROSLYN SAGA