May 21, 2008 - 12:36pm
Karrow demands Davy step down from education post
By Matt FriedmanAssemblywoman Marcia Karrow today demanded that state Education Commissioner Lucille Davy resign from her post for not trying to recoup misspent money from Abbott school districts.
Responding to questions at a hearing last week, where auditors questioned the use of $83 million in state funds for the predominantly low-income, inner city schools, Davy said “We are not going backward to collect money.”
Davy also said that the state would not withhold funds for districts with questionable expenditures. In all, over half of the state’s education budget goes to Abbot districts.
Among the questionable expenditures, according to newspaper reports, were a $6,000 retreat to Atlantic City by the Irvington school board and a $1,716 flat screen television for an administrator’s office in Union City.
Karrow said that it was “unconscionable” that Davy would not try to recoup the money.
“If the DOE Commissioner is not going to hold accountable those responsible for this flagrant abuse of taxpayer money, then ultimately, she must be held responsible,” she said in a press release. “What good is an audit if we only expose the waste, but do nothing to recover the wasted money? It’s not acceptable to sweep this under the carpet as was done with the School Construction Corporation multi-billion dollar debacle.”
Karrow went on to assail Davy for not releasing the audits’ findings earlier.
Davy could not immediately be reached for comment.
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Marsha tells it like it is
She hit the nail on the head again.
Who's watching the store?
Let's see...The state gives districts money to educate students. How many people does the state education dept. have to monitor the money? Who decides how many people? Aren't the legislature and the governor's office in charge of giving money and monitoring its use? The only answer would be....Go back. Did anyone gut the education dept of funding for monitoring? Why is this issue being raised now? There are alot of dirty hands. What about the School Construction Corporation? Oh my. What a mess.
Good for Marcia!
Marcia is absolutely correct in this matter. When one finds misused taxpayer money there should be an attempt to recoup same, or, at the very least, more good money should not be sent "down the rat hole" without a reduction for the % of money found to be wasted. Hopefully, the Dem legislators will listen and agree and move with this issue, although I am not holding my breath that this will actually occur.
More worthless bluster . . . more demagoguery
You guys never cease to amaze me. Davy isn't going anywhere, and neither are your calls for "more efficient government" or "more efficient government-sponsored education".
There is no such thing as efficent government, because there's no such thing as an efficient monopoly. Null, zip, nada, nihil . . . nothing. Might as well call for the government to create a more perfect square circle. Every single government monopoly must, by its very nature, and over time, continually devolve into a bureacratic miasma characterized by ever increasing costs for less and less product and/or service. It's the nature of monopolies and the devolution just described follows monopoly-organized institutions as night follows day.
What we need is a state constitutional amendmment banning our state government from sponsoring or funding or regulating in any way the provision of educational services or products or buildings, etc., etc. in any way at any any level whatsoever. Only then might we able to have "thorough and efficient" education in New Jersey.
You can't have both good education and government sponsorship thereof. The two are necessarily mutually exclusive.
So why pick on Davy? She's just doin what comes naturally.