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City Councilman Bill Green is calling for the City Controller and Auditor General to investigate former Superintendent Arlene Ackerman’s communications office. On Tuesday, City Paper reported that Ackerman used the School District Communications office as a personal public relations machine dedicated to promoting and defending her personally: coordinating and assisting public rallies in her favor, communicating regularly with private supporters, and spending taxpayer time and money on various kinds of "propaganda," including protest signs and a farewell tribute video.
"It seems like a real problem if, as a District employee, you are essentially inciting people to rally against the District that you work for," says Green, a critic of the District's large communications budget. "It's clearly not appropriate to spend public dollars that way, and I certainly hope that the city controller and auditor general look into it."
State Auditor General Jack Wagner's office declined to comment and City Controller Alan Butkovitz did not return repeated requests for comment.
“It’s certainly questionable,” says Zack Stalberg, president of good government group Committee of Seventy. “I think until an outside party comes in and takes a real close look, it would be premature to say that it is illegal.”
Stalberg says that he thinks Green’s call for an investigation “makes sense,” and that there’s a good chance the Auditor General or Controller will follow through.
“I think there’s a good possibility there will be a response,” he says. “The Auditor General has already expressed concerns about goings on in the Ackerman regime. And I think there’s an appetite from a lot of different directions to find out whether the SRC [School Reform Commission] has been doing its oversight job correctly. My hunch is that there will be interest in following this up.”
Illustration: Evan M. Lopez
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please lock this crook up!!!!— psualum
Comment removed.- Suq_Madiq: best screen name of all time — Tyrone Biggums
- Gee, isn't using public monies for your own benefit what they call. EMBEZZLEMENT? Which i believe is a crime. now if we take the three women's 6 figure salary, each, and claim that back from queen arlene's exit packet packet..— Graves
- Why was she allowed to negotiate having a communications team in the first place.— Bush Destroyed America
- Just another drop in the cesspool she created with the help of NUTTERBUTTER!!!!— WCJRJR
- Investigate all of them!!!— Nitroglycerin
- An investigation in that which will ultimately change what?
Serves a good purpose if we want to take our attention off City Council and upcoming issues facing our city. But hey who knows, moving backwards we might begin to go forward, Duh!— Lyrra - In my opinion, Ackerman abused her position by using her staff for her personal venue and should not be entitled to the hefty payout, just because she had a contract with the Philadelphia School Board!!!
Furthermore, if Ackerman was so dedicated to her position a ssuperintendent of schools, then she would not have stepped on toes, that were considered necessary to the education of the city's youth!!!
— cmuller2539 - Does she have to post her crookedness in bug block letters on city hall before anyone does anything? Glad I'm not holding my breath holding for financial recovery of our money. Kiss that money good bye.— crystalrainbowspirit1
- Comment removed.
- In addition to the outrageous PR budget, she was also able to bill the School District for on-boarding services from Maven, Inc. This company received free money from PCDC and was supposed to shoe Arlene the ropes in Philly. We got hosed for that $300K.— Mezike23
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