Of the 50 Baltimore City Public School employees earning the most overtime in 2005-2006, 72 percent of them are maintenance workers, according to data released by the school system.
What they were working on is anyone?s guess, given that a confidential report from the state Department of Education showing school employees lied about hundreds of building repairs and allowed poor work on a variety of projects. The report outlined problems from the most recent school year, but it?s hard to imagine they have not existed for a long time given the chronic lack of oversight throughout the system.
Another issue is school police overtime. School Police Sergeant Ralph Askins, for example, pulled in $103,565.08 in 2005-06 thanks in large part to over $35,950.25 in overtime ? the most of anyone in the school system. Other officers peppered the top 50 overtime earners too. (Click here to view the entire Excel file detailing public school salaries and overtime.)
J. Keith Scroggins, the school system?s chief operating officer, called overtime abuse a major problem.
He cited one example where students damaged a door so that it would not lock. As a result, students used it to enter and leave when they were not supposed to and fight with students in a neighboring school. Instead of fixing it, the school system sent a police officer there to monitor it ? all on overtime.
Scroggins, who has held his position for a year, said he plans to cut overtime in half over the next year by overhauling the work schedule and reporting methods to ensure past mistakes don?t repeat themselves. One of those ways is asking the new head of facilities, Blaine Lipski, to inspect all the schools cited in the report. Another is requiring all those responsible for maintenance at each school to sign a certificate ensuring that all repairs claimed to have been fixed are done.
We like the honor system, but unless those certificates come with real consequences, like losing your job for lying on them, we doubt they will have much effect.
And shouldn?t all those who falsified reports return any fake overtime to the school system? What about firing those responsible and prosecuting them? Their behavior is not only unethical but criminal.
Every dollar that went to pay people for work not done is money that did not go to helping students learn. The overtime from the top two maintenance workers alone could send 12 students to local parochial schools ? which have proven high standards and graduation rates. (Go to examiner.com for a complete list of salaries and overtime at the school system.)
We welcome Scroggins? focus on accountability. But taxpayers in the city and the state must not give the school system any more money for repairs, as requested, until Scroggins can prove his oversight brings well-functioning, safe schools whose facilities managers complete work on budget.
More money is not the answer if it only means perpetuating a broken system ? and more broken doors.
