City school officials and school board members say they’re taking seriously a package sent to the Democrat and Chronicle containing personal information about school board President Van White.
Though the package’s contents were meant to discredit White, the situation has instead become a serious test of leadership for both Superintendent Bolgen Vargas and the board.
If it’s determined that a trust has been broken, it could be difficult to rebuild and move on. And the situation could lead to several troubling outcomes.
To recap, the D&C recently received documents that revealed personal financial and legal information about White. Though this information is new, White’s past financial problems are well-known. An anonymous note accompanied the documents that said, “He can’t manage himself. How can he manage a school district?”
The information, which is public record and pulled from the Monroe County Clerk’s website, showed Patrick Malgieri as the log-in name used to access the county’s site. Malgieri is a prominent Rochester-area attorney and the spouse of Patricia Malgieri, who is Vargas’s chief of staff. The Malgieris say they didn’t send the package and they don’t know who did.
Vargas quickly came to Patricia Malgieri’s defense. The two have been friends for a long time, and Vargas withstood considerable criticism when he hired her. Malgieri was a harsh critic of the district when she worked at City Hall as deputy mayor.
The package arrived at a time when Vargas is under fire from the Association of Supervisors and Administrators, the union that represents the district’s principals and administrators, over his management style. Few board members publicly rushed to Vargas’s defense when ASAR members voted no confidence in the superintendent last month.
Vargas issued a statement in response to the package story. In it, he says that while he is concerned that someone would try to discredit White and Malgieri, that “to spend time and resources on speculation and investigation only plays in to the hands of whoever did this. From a public perspective, it would only inflame a non-story about President White. Internally, it would continue a pattern of distraction from this district’s essential work to serve the neediest students and families in our community.”
That sounds like a reasonable position, but it doesn’t override the public’s right to know what really happened. This is a serious offense. It’s unfair to tell rank-and-file teachers that they must be held accountable for their performance if problems involving senior management are treated differently.
Former school board president Malik Evans said in a phone interview this week that just because the board hasn’t been public about its concerns, doesn’t mean it isn’t doing anything about the package mystery. That may be true, but the public and the board would be better served by greater transparency so that it doesn’t appear that concerns about causing a distraction are used as a distraction.
The board also can’t be afraid to follow the trail, wherever it leads.
This article appears in Feb 12-18, 2014.
This is disturbing, Tim. But is it really any different than the anonymity of City Newspaper’s comments sections? Do you doubt that public officials and government employees anonymously do pretty much the same thing right here? And does City Newspaper accept anonymous tips? Certainly Gannet does. If you do, aren’t you encouraging this? So… I don’t like that this happened. It is gross and amateurish and unprofessional. But for City Newspaper to be wringing its hands and tsk-tsking the Malgieris and Vargas and the Board, is a bit hard to believe. Stop accepting anonymous comments if you do not like this behavior.
I hope everyone can see the irony here. D&C reporter David Andreatta asked Patrick Malgieri for clarification regarding his intention to remain anonymous. If Malgieri would have fessed up that he did in fact send the letter and also that he did in fact intend for it to be anonymous, then Andreatta would probably have promptly fed the envelope, note, and documents into the shredder.
I disagree, Mr. Champoux. This isn’t hand-wringing.
Serious questions about Dr. Vargas have been raised from many different parties. His handling of this seems to be another reason to worry about his leadership. The tension between Malgieri and White was an open secret. No reasonable person believes the wild coincidence the district is offering as explanation. Instead of telling the public to stop worrying about it, Vargas should have vowed to get to the bottom of it. This whole thing is a symptom of an absurdly dysfunctional system.
And there’s a lesson here for the reformers among us too. We overlooked Malgieri’s ironclad contract because we thought she was one of us. Not unlike reformers in NYC who turned a blind eye to Cathie Black’s lack of qualification for Chancellor. Short of committing a felony or missing 90 consecutive days of work, Malgieri can’t be fired. Not for poor performance or misconduct or insubordination, or any of the things we reformers like to yell is wrong with our current teacher/principal evaluations and tenure.
Did Malgieri’s contract give her the reform super-powers we had hoped? Hardly, by all objective measures, the district is worse than ever. The only thing her contract did was assure her no consequences for the personal attack of her boss–and duly elected board member who’s been critical of the administration and calling for change.
To paraphrase Saul Alinsky: how quickly the revolution becomes the establishment.
Well said Carrie. This reeks of corruption for all to see. If the mayor had pulled this crap, it would be headline news. Van white is trying to expose something so unbelievabably
Damaging that a bunch of inept cronies will resort to ill moral tactics to cover it all up. Is anyone paying attention to this? Or will the likes of Mary Towler keep saying that they don’t know what the problem is? To push this blatantly obvious manipulational act will be the real disgrace. Lent does she get an iron clad contract and the teachers get blamed for everything under the sun. Maybe someone needs to suggest that the big decision makers must have some accountability. What a formula for disaster. Look no further folks, the problem is right in front of your eyes.