JRC Group Calls Foul in Sac City RFP Process
By Suzanne Brooks
Greetings:
Subj: A. A Synopsis of the Problem with the $200, 000 grant award
B. An Update on my meeting with Denise Curl, Youth Resource Analyst, Office of Youth
Development. The City of Sacramento, 915 I Street, 5th Floor, Sacramento, CA 95814 ...
A. Synopsis
1. I received information from a member of the community of an RFP for a community organization or business to provide community based counselors to work alongside attendance centers in 3 Sacramento area schools--McClatchy and Burbank in Sacramento and Inderkum in Natomas to help reduce the staggering truancy---38 to 80%, depending on the school. The demographics of these schools are about 80% students of color, with high truancy rates among Asian American and Pacific Island students, with Asian Americans as the largest groups of color in several schools, including Inderkum. It should be pointed out that White students who are poor and all students who are part of the LGBT community are not escaping the negative treatment being reported by parents as well as students.
2. This information, along with city dropout rates of 50% for Hispanics and 60% for African Americans, and the equally dismal situations for students in elementary and middle schools, makes clear that the schools are failing the students. In virtually all of the Sacramento area schools, including K-12, the community colleges, CSUS and UC Davis, the faculty and staff are overwhelmingly White, and mostly White male. For example, UC Davis faculty is 80% White male. You may remember how UC Davis committed to sponsor Women of Color Day in 2008, then reneged on their commitments leaving me stuck for thousands of dollars. Through the help of a couple of caring Assembly members, I recovered some of it, but still lost $4000 of my own money and was paid nothing for the 6 months of work.
3. With this situation in mind, many successful years of work with students of all backgrounds, extensive education, and associations with many other educators/community activists, I decided to submit a bid. With major writing help from Dr. Charlesetta Stalling and little over a week's notice before the deadline, but which still included efforts to reach out and include people from multiple ethnic groups, we put together an exceptional team of 3 counselors--Dr. Chris Slaton, Dr. Emmajean Plummer and Rose Marie Colbert, 1 education consultant--Dr. Stalling--and myself as program manager.
Though I offered positions to individuals of Chinese and Filipino background, the short notice and prior commitments prevented them from accepting.
4. Ultimately, I assembled the team of 5 plus a financial management firm to handle all funds. The 3 counselors and consultant are African American. I am African American, Native American and European American. The financial firm is owned by a European American with 23 years of financial management experience. The 5 members of the education team includes one male and two females with doctorates; one female with an Associate and Bachelor's degree; and me with a BA, MA and having completed all but my dissertations for 2 doctorates. Each of us has more than 20 years of directly relevant experience.
In addition, I am a former Philadelphia police officer and juvenile aid officer and have near native fluency in Spanish, with other language skills in French, Latin, Hawaiian and American Sign Language. Four of us have been engaged in relevant educational research for years, especially related to students of color, all kinds of discrimination, and a host of other issues like domestic violence.
5. With our credentials and experience, I was shocked to learn that the Sacramento Office of Youth Development and Sacramento Police Department have awarded the $200,000 grant to Panacea, Inc, a drug treatment/anger management center whose director has a GED and financial manager has a high school diploma and that of the 10 people listed on their website, 5 have no college degree--only drug counselor certificates awarded by a related organization and not by an educational institution. That the remaining 5 people have bachelor degrees but there is no indication of direct relevancy to the RFP. In addition, there is some question about the possibility that 2 of the 10 have felony drug convictions, one recently.
In addition, Panacea is a fee for service business. A major task for the Community Based Counselor program is to make referrals. It is not clear if they can make referrals to themselves, which would mean being paid by the grant and then again for the referrals by the clients. Where we had developed plans to have each counselor become engaged with the students and families, building trust and rewarding students for staying in school in innovative and interesting ways, Panacea has apparently proposed to circulate their counselors through the schools. How can the students get to know the counselors and have any sense to stability with that method? It is not clear that there will be counselor and administrative accountability with circulating counselors, either during the hours of 9 am to 1:30pm daily when counselors are to be available to the students and their families, nor during the 15 hours of fieldwork each week.
6. Since a major complaint of students, parents and communities of color in Sacramento area schools is that they are subjected to racism and gross disrespect which is exacerbated by the lack of teachers, staff and administrators of color, it is beyond belief that Panacea, http://www.panacea.worldbreak.com/ with 9 of the 10 counselors and administrators identified on their website appearing to be White. Nor is there any mention on their website of any kind of diversity. It is not difficult to imagine that it would be possible to associate many students with drugs, alcohol and anger problems which rob them of a future. For example, a drug association could be used to exclude them from college financial aid.
7. Copies of the proposal we submitted have been shared with key people. We believe it is educationally sound, rooted in established, successful educational practices, to be implemented by caring, experienced counselors and administration--all of whom are well known and respected in the community, with positive reputations that extend to other parts of the state and nation. In addition to our individuals credentials and successes, I submitted the proposal under my sole proprietorship/business consulting DBA, Creative Concepts Systems, http://www.creativeconsys.com . A visit to this website, along with the proposal itself, makes the expertise very clear.
8. I learned today that a member of the community visited the Office of Youth Development to review the Creative Concepts Systems and Panacea proposals and was required to complete a Freedom of Information Act Request and that after complying, was told he would have to wait 24 hours to see the requested documents. I have never heard of such requirements before. This does raise eyebrows.
9. Interested parents and members of the community are encouraged to examine this situation and to encourage a correction in the award. Any assistance you might be able to give in this regard will be appreciated. As you can imagine, it is sad when those who are qualified to provide students with the services they deserve are passed over and an award is made for which there is no clear basis.
10. On Wednesday, October 28, I shared information about the situation at a meeting of the Justice Reform Coalition which will weigh in on concerns of the community.
B. Update:
10. On Wednesday, October 28, I left phone messages at the Office of Youth Development, expressing concern that we had yet to receive the letter telling us why we did not receive the grant award and why it was awarded to Panacea, Services. I received no responses on Wednesday nor on Thursday by 3 PM, so I went to the Office for Youth Development in City Hall to request the promised letter of explanation concerning our not being awarded the grant and why Panacea was given the award. From about 3:30 PM to 4:45 PM, I met with Diane Curl who will become the manager of this and other projects in January 2010.
I advised Ms. Curl that office that members of the team proposed by Creative Concepts Systems will visit their office together on Friday, October 30, 2009. I asked if we will also be required to complete FOIA requests in order to look at the proposal submitted by Panacea, Inc. and when the letter to us will be forthcoming. I advised her that following our review on Friday, we will likely appeal the award that has been made, unless we can avoid that process, which we would prefer, by having the award to Panacea set aside based on a comparison of the education, experience and possible records of Pancea's planned participants and those of Creative Concepts Systems. I also asked if a number of questions and considerations had been a part of the evaluation process, including the following:
1.The risk of relapse among drug counselors who have had substance and anger issues themselves and the associated risk of having them in a school program aimed at truancy which is an educational problem which has many causes.
2. The importance of not criminalizing truancy by associating it automatically with substance abuse and violence unconditionally, and thus ignoring the many other reasons students are truant.
3. The need to calmly, methodically, and thoroughly address the concerns of parents and students, many asserting racism, sexism, homophobia, national origin discrimination and other forms of insensitivity to issues arising in culturally diverse communities. Addressing these issues requires extensive, advanced education; professional experience in schools at all levels; fully developed professional and personal networks in educational institutions, social services and government agencies; seasoned educators with established records of educational success; skill and experience in developing new and innovative educational programs which are not punitive and do not make the current crisis worse.
4. Competence in research, writing summaries and assessments of institutional as well as individual problems, and the ability to develop solutions which meet individual student needs constructively, while building student self-esteem and improving academic performance. Under no circumstances should students be treated as criminals, hastening their processing into the criminal justice system.
5. I reviewed with Ms. Curl the qualifications of every member of the Creative Concepts Systems team for the project and compared them with what we know of the Panacea Services team. I asked that the City of Sacramento do its own, objective review in the interest of helping the students in the three target schools. I also suggested that the model developed by Creative Concepts Systems was planned as a model which might be considered for other schools in order to have consistency for all students.
6. I advised Ms. Curl that at this point we are seeking informal resolution in which the City makes, in our view and that of other in the community, a decision which better serves the needs of the students, schools, communities and City and is more appropriate for Creative Concepts Systems whose proposal not only meets truancy and academic needs but is rooting in accountability for the funds used and the work to be performed.
7. Ms. Curl was both polite and cordial. Indeed, our discussion was lively, friendly, collegial and understanding. (She hugged me as I left.) She indicated that while I could see the Panacea proposal, she did not know where it is for me to see it today, but that she would find out and get back to me, so we would know where we can read it on Friday, October 30. I expressed my hope that no modifications in the Panacea proposal would be made during this intervening period and that no one else would be subjected to an impromptu freedom of information requirement without some explanation widely publicized about why and when this became a requirement. Ms. Curl indicated that she would speak to her supervisor about the concerns expressed.
8. As a result of today's discussion, I plan to return to the Office of Youth Development on Friday, October 30, at 11:15 AM. Dr.Charlesetta Stalling will meet me there. It would be great to have as many of the Creative Concepts Systems proposal team be there with us as possible. Others in the community are welcome too. Following our reading of the proposal, unless the City rescinds the award to Panacea and makes the award to Creative Concepts Systems shortly thereafter, we will proceed to the office of Doris Matsui, Member of Congress who helped secure the funds for this grant, and ask for her intervention. To do otherwise is to shortchange the students, schools, families, communities and the City, as well as the taxpayers whose resources should not be wasted.
October 30, 2009 Update
Three of us met today with Mr. Lyn Corbett, Director of the Sacramento Youth Development Office and Denise Curl, Analyst, at their office. This was our third in person attempt to see the winning proposal.
On Wednesday, Roger Jamison went to their office and requested the opportunity to review it and was told by Denise Curl that he had to file a Freedom of Information Act Request (FOIA) in order to see it. When he did that, he was then told that the Office of Youth Development requires a 24 hour notice for this. So he was refused access to the winning proposal of Panacea Services.
Also on Wednesday, I telephoned the offices of Denise Curl and Lisa Deklinski, Administrative Analyst, Sacramento Police Dept. and left messages that we want to see the winning proposal and asking when the written confirmation of the information telephoned to us on Friday, October 23, 2009 would be sent to us. I received no responses on Wednesday or Thursday by 3 Pm so I went to their office.
On Thursday, about 3:30 PM, I met with Denise Curl and made the request that those of us on the Creative Concepts Systems proposal would come to their office today, Friday, to see the winning proposal of Panacea Services--a drug treatment/anger management program, thus giving the Office of Youth Development 24 hours notice. I also asked about the FOIA requirement for the person who had come there on Wednesday. I did not identify him by name to her. She asked if I knew who had given him the information and form. I didn't know it was her at that time. She told me she had no knowledge of anyone ever doing this and that she would look into it and would report it to her supervisor, Lyn Corbett. She also indicated that she would telephone me in the morning, today, to let me know where the Panacea proposal would be because she did not know where it was when I was in their office on Thursday. She never telephoned.
On Friday, today, at 11:20 AM, Dr. Charlesetta Stalling, Roger Jamison and I met at the Office of Youth Development and asked to see Lyn Corbett so that we could see the Panacea proposal. Mr. Corbett said he was busy in a meeting but would be finished shortly and would meet with us. We were kept waiting for about 35 minutes in a conference room. When he met with us, later joined by Denise Curl, he claimed to have been informed that we were just coming to meet with him and that he did not know we wanted to see the proposal. He stated that although the winning proposal is public information, it does not become public information until after the contract with Panacea is signed and affirmed by the City Council. He stated that for this reason he does not know when we can see it. He could offer no explanation regarding why we were not notified of this before we went there today, nor on the two previous days. I informed him that we will appeal the decision to award the contract to Panacea because we are overwhelmingly more qualified and believe that Pancea is unqualified. Mr. Corbett tried to suggest that the Creative Concepts Systems proposal had been submitted by novices to the field, leading us to wonder if our proposal has been read since we have nearly 200 years of combined education and experience among the 5 professionals plus our proposed financial management team.
We reiterated several concerns expressed on each of the last 3 days:
1. That there may be a criminalization of the handling of truants since the firm hired to operate the 3 attendance centers has no obvious experience on their website related to non-criminal student issues nor any apparent background in education, educational methods, educational research, teaching or educational administration. There seems not to be any understanding that not all truancy is drug and violence related.
2. There seems to be no knowledge or understanding of reports of racism by students, parents and community groups related to schools in the area, nor of the impact of underrepresentation of faculty and staff of color on school populations in which the representation of students of color exceeds 50% and is often as high as 80%. In addition, there is not a single word relating to cultures, diversity, multiculturalism or racism on the Panacea site. This makes it significant that only one of 10 Panacea staff pictured on their website is a person of color, that 5 of the 10 have no college education--including the director and the financial manager listed on their website, that 5 of the 10 have drug certificates from an association, not from educational institutions.
3. I have just re-visited the Panacea website (about 2 AM, October 31, 2009) and have found that the following diversity statement has been added, although I had expressed to Denise Curl that I hoped that Panacea would not attempt to modify its website following our voicing concerns. "To respect the diversity of our community and recognize the value and dignity of all." Note, another statement highlighted in red below is not on the Panacea website. It is on the CADCA website..
4. The only education beyond high school level (and it is not clear that they all have high school diplomas) that 5 of Panacea's staff have are from CADCA--the Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America, which are not educational institutions. Neither the director nor the administrative assistant who handles their finances have evidence on their website of any education beyond a GED or high school, not even the CADCA certificates. There are 5 who have BA's--their highest degrees but none appear to be in education.
There seems to be no understanding or recognitions of educational and other social issues related to truancy.This is the information from Panacea's website:
"About CADCA: When it comes to preventing drug and alcohol abuse, there is no one-fits-all approach. It takes solutions that are based on a community’s unique problems and circumstances. That’s why, since 1992 Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America (CADCA) has been training local grassroots groups, known as community anti-drug coalitions, in effective community problem-solving strategies, teaching them how to assess their local substance abuse-related problems and develop a comprehensive plan to address them. Today, CADCA is the nation’s leading drug abuse prevention organization in the nation, representing the interests of more than 5,000 community anti-drug coalitions in the country.
Read More
"About CADCA's National Coalition Institute
As a vehicle for coalition training, technical assistance, evaluation, research and capacity building, CADCA's National Coalition Institute works continually to help America's community anti-drug coalitions get smarter faster. CADCA administers the Institute with a grant through the Drug-Free Communities Support Act."
CADCA is focused nationally on addiction, school violence, child abduction, commercial exploitation of children and criminal justice. Following are reports from the CADCA website:
It will hardly be justice to give a $200,000 grant to an organization whose contacts in schools are limited to presentations about substance abuse and anger management and whose leadership is educated only to high school level and not to experienced educational professionals with the highest levels of education and scholarship who have addressed not only these problems but comprehensive educational issues. This is also an issue of race for the students and their communities and for the Creative Concepts Systems team which has 5 professionals of color plus Better Business Ventures, a European American owned and staffed firm (5 employees) which we planned to have manage all the finances. We are equitably multi-ethnic, with experience with all ethnic groups. Panacea has one person of color among them and no evidence of interest in cultural diversity. According to City of Sacramento regulations pertaining to responding to RFPs, prime contractors are expected to hire staff who are qualified to carry out the responsibilities outlined in the RFP. In this instance, the winning bidder has no relevant education which could qualify them to carry out educational activities in schools. In addition, since 5 of Panacea's staff have only drug counseling certificates from outside educational institutions, which are commonly given to people in recovery who wish to help other substance abusers to recovery, I have repeatedly asked if there has been due diligence to ascertain if any of the staff of Panacea have criminal or addiction histories and, if so, if there has been consideration that relapses among people in recovery are common and could pose a danger to the students. A relapsed addict often engages in drug trafficking and if placed in a position of trust and responsibility inside a school could be a source of trafficking and inducement to vulnerable youth. Neither Mr. Corbett nor Ms. Curl seem to understand this issue. Nor does there seem to be any understanding that there is an affirmative legal responsibility for those who work with children and youth to report dangers to children. I see no evidence that these concerns are being considered while they prevent us from seeing the Pancacea proposal. It is difficult not to suspect that the Panacea grant application could be undergoing modification to justify its approval. Besides refusing to allow our access to the Panacea proposal, we have been given conflicting information on how to access it and when that can take place, have yet to receive the written confirmation of the telephone call last Friday informing me that we did not get the grant and that it was given to Panacea. In addition, today we requested documents and associated forms to appeal the decision to award the grant to Panacea. At first, Mr. Corbett stated that we could not be given this information until after the contract with Panacea has been signed and affirmed by the City Council. When I challenged that decision based on the assertion that access to information about the appeal process cannot possibly be contingent on that basis, Mr. Corbett admitted that we are entitled to information about the appeal process. He and Ms. Curl left us in the conference room, went to another part of their office and returned with a document which he claimed was the appeal process. At that point he ended the meeting and saw us out of their office area. When we looked at the document we had been given, we discovered that it is a document providing information regarding how to respond to an RFP and has not a single word about how to appeal any decision. We have given a copy of that document to Congressmember Matsui's office as well as a copy of the Creative Concepts Systems proposal. We understand that we can proceed to appeal the actions of the Office of Youth Development in writing anyway, even if they are trying to stall or prevent it until they get a signed contract to Panacea which they apparently think will not be reversible. As a licensed private investigator, I am not comfortable circulating suspicions of criminal records of anyone. I think it would be best if those who are interested in what is transpiring ask whether, under the circumstances that it is not unusual for addicts in recovery to have the drug certificates listed on Panacea's site and absent any college education for half of Panacea's staff, including its leadership, if there has been due diligence to see if their current staff--at the time they submitted their proposal--includes addicts in recovery, any convicted felons, and any recently arrested, tried, convicted or sentenced individuals who can constitute a danger to high school students. Surely, since the Sacramento Police Department, which is a partner on this project, can check this situation. As for evidence of the education of the Panacea employees, if you go to their website section on their "professional team" http://www.panacea.worldbreak.com/photoalbum.html and click on their 10 photos, you will see their education under each of their individual photos. For comparison, I am sharing our complete proposal, our resumes and the website links to Better Business Ventures http://www.betterbusinessventures.com/ (our financial manager); Creative Concepts Systems, my site http://www.creativeconsys.com; and Save Our Youth, the program of Dr. Chris Slaton who was to be one of our counselors, http://www.saveouryouth.com/index2.html. Here is one of Dr. Stalling's sites: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/charlesetta-stalling/10/539/90a. Another procedural note: City of Sacramento regulations state that for grants over $100,000, pre-bid conferences are mandatory. We attended. So did the three organizations which each managed a single school center for the last 2 years but with whom the Office of Youth Development and perhaps the police were not satisfied. They are: Another Choice/Another Chance (ACAC); La Familia; and Lamercie Youth Services. It appears that some work was also provided by the Center for Fathers and Families. Panacea did not attend the pre-bid conference. Despite the city's regulations, we were told at the pre-bid conference that it was not mandatory. This was repeated to us today. In another document distributed by the Office of Youth Development, there is a review of the "holistic" activities to be implemented by the Counseling Centers to prevent criminal behavior and improve school attendance and achievement. There is also a note near the end about the ability to require students to attend treatment or intervention programs. Since Panacea is a drug treatment/anger management center, the question arises whether they can work on a grant from the city, then refer students to themselves or their agency and, since they are a fee for service agency, be paid for the referrals either by the families of the students or by Medicaid which they accept or by insurances. Finally: when appeals to granting processes are made, the only considerations that can be made will be to those who submitted proposals. The previous programs had already allegedly performed unsatisfactorily, which only left Creative Concepts Systems and Panacea. Dr. Stalling asked who else submitted proposals both before and after we submitted. There was no mention ever of Panacea, only the others and Creative Concepts Systems. We were notified on Wednesday that the selection committee would not meet until Friday, October 23 to decide the selection for the program scheduled to begin on Monday, October 26 and which required Live Scan criminal background checks, $1,000,000 in car and professional liability insurance from all members of our team and $1,000,000 in general liability for Creative Concepts Systems. I asked on Wednesday how they expected counselors to be in place on Monday under these circumstances and was told they only expected organizational work to begin then. I was notified by phone on Friday, October 23 about 3 PM that we were not the successful bidder. Since then, we have been unable to get any explanation for the decision made. There are multiple issues in this. First, whether the successful bidder was qualified at all to meet the needs of the students for which the RFP was issued? Second, whether their selection was justified given the proposals of the other bidders? Third, what is the reason for the refusal to disclose the basis of the decision made and access to the winning proposal which is public information? Fourth, why have we been given misinformation regarding appealing the decision and changing rules for accessing the Panacea proposal? Fifth, are there conflicts of interest for Panacea or any bidder?
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Sincerely,
Suzanne Brooks